Sublime sounds of iPalpiti Festival come to Encinitas
With its beautiful beaches and delicious restaurants, Encinitas is truly a feast for the senses. Not to be left out, the ears of local residents are in for a treat later this month when the annual iPalpiti Festival returns to the city for the fifth straight year.
In its 19th year overall, the festival will kick off in Encinitas July 7-10 before heading north to the Greater Los Angeles area. On July 16, the tour comes back down to Encinitas for a final performance.
The initial four concerts, each set for 7:30 p.m., will feature seven world-class soloists from around the globe performing in front of the picturesqe ocean backdrop at the Encinitas Library.
First up among the soloists, on July 7, is Duo Gurfinkel, made up of twin brothers Alex and Daniel from Israel. The pair will perform popular miniatures from Mozart, Paganini, Gershwin and Klezmer, among others, in special arrangements for two clarinets. The Gurfinkels were discovered by Zubin Mehta, Conductor of the Israel Philharmonic.
“Daniel and Alexander Gurfinkel are two of the most talented musicians among the young generation of Israeli’s today,” Mehta said in a release.
The next night, violinists Davide de Ascaniis and Haoyue Liao, cellist Carl-Oscar Østerlind and pianist Jacopo Giacopuzzi will perform in different combinations in a program titled “Dvorak and Sibelius.”
Giacopuzzi is a 28-year-old-Italian, who moved to the United States in 2012, while de Ascaniis was born in Italy in 1991. Liao is Chinese, and Østerlind is Danish.
The July 9 event will bring back Duo Gurfinkel and Giacopuzzi to join American violist Julia Clancy to perform pieces from Germany and Spain.
The four-night extravaganza of excellent featured soloists wraps up July 10 with all seven of them taking the stage to perform Brahms’ Clarinet Trio Op. 114 and Clarinet Quintet Op. 115.
After the festival heads to Beverly Hills for a few performances, the 25-member iPalpiti Orchestra, conducted by Eduard Schmieder and featuring world-class young musicians from 18 different countries, will play at the St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church on July 16.
The orchestra iPalpiti (Italian for heartbeats) is unique in that it draws its members from prize-winning laureates of international competitions for the three-week summer music festival. The July 16 performance is titled “From Vivaldi to Hollywood.”
For info on the five Encinitas concerts, visit www.ipalpiti.org. Tickets for each library performance are $15, the orchestra concert is $25, four-concert festival passes cost $55 and $75 will get local music fans into all five shows. For tickets, visit www.encinitas.tix.com.