Festival Brings Prestige and World Class Talent to Campus

This is the sound of the Bowdoin International Music Festival, a six-week celebration of classical music that’s been coming to the Brunswick campus for more than six decades.

Launched in 1964 when Bowdoin music department chair Robert Beckwith invited Julliard scholar and violinist Lewis Kaplan to set up a series of concerts, the annual event soon became known primarily as a summer music school, featuring a small cohort of visiting musicians and students. Initially a program of the College, the festival became an independent nonprofit in 1997 and in 2004 changed its name to the Bowdoin International Music Festival in recognition of its worldwide reach. Kaplan remained artistic director of the festival until 2014, when he was succeeded by David and Phillip Ying, members of the Grammy Award-winning Ying Quartet.

Six decades after it started, the festival has grown considerably, and education is still a major part of it: Last year some 270 students were selected to take part, attending master classes with renowned performers and composers. They were chosen out of nearly 1,500 applications from musicians around the world and benefited from some $600,000 in scholarship money. Many former students have gone on to great success, including pianist Emanuel Ax and cellist Fred Sherry.

Some 200 concerts and other events are now put on annually, featuring around eighty performers and streaming live to more than 110 countries. These livestreams attracted close to 23,000 viewers last year, while nearly 12,000 people physically attended events on campus over the course of the festival.

The festival’s executive director, Daniel Nitsch, says the event has established Brunswick and the Bowdoin College campus as a worldwide hub for the study of classical chamber music. “The relationship with the College is integral to this growth and key to our identity. The facilities, notably the Studzinski Recital Hall, provide midcoast communities with the opportunity to experience world-class music in a world-class setting. The inspiring campus and welcoming college administration offer an environment that uniquely feeds the study of chamber music, an intimate art form that demands both exceptional personal achievement and the ability to connect with and uplift others,” said Nitsch.

Bowdoin connections
While no longer formally connected to the College, the festival maintains close links, regularly employing Bowdoin students as summer staff (including the photographer whose work is featured in this article). Bowdoin faculty have also been featured: Professor of Music Vineet Shende, for example, has been highlighted as part of the Gamper Festival of Contemporary Music (a mini-festival within the festival devoted to programming works by living composers).

Each summer, the festival also partners with the Bowdoin College Museum of Art for a number of events, including two “Music at the Museum” concerts and an event known as “Composers at the Museum,” where students write and perform a composition inspired by a work of art from the museum.

“We have a deep sense of gratitude and appreciation for the College’s support and for our place in the campus summer community and cultural fabric of Brunswick,” said Nitsch.

“Furthermore,” he added, “When not studying and performing, our students and faculty routinely enjoy campus resources, such as the dining halls, athletic facilities, game room, Quad, museums, and, for our faculty families, the new Longfellow playground.”

The 2025 Bowdoin International Music Festival wraps up on August 8. Among the highlights still to come are performances featuring such world-renowned artists as the Jupiter String Quartet, whose August 4 program includes work by Johannes Brahms, and pianist Richard Goode, a leading interpreter of the music of Mozart who will be performing the great composer’s Piano Concerto No. 25 in C Major on August 8 as the festival finale.