Music in the Mountains
Music in the Mountains is an annual summer classical music festival located in Durango and Pagosa Springs, Colorado, with additional performances in other regional towns. Performances are held from early July through early August and feature performances by both professional and student artists. The festival was founded by conductor Mischa Semanitzky in 1987 through the support of Fort Lewis College, the Durango Herald, Durango Mountain Resort, Morley Ballantine, and the Bank of Colorado. In 2008 Gregory Hustis, principal horn player for the Dallas Symphony, succeeded Semanitzky as Artistic Director. In the same season, Guillermo Figueroa, conductor of the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, became the festival's resident conductor and music director.
Founded in 1997, Conservatory Music in the Mountains offers intensive workshops for student musicians during the summer festival, in conjunction with the New Conservatory of Dallas in Dallas, Texas, and under the direction of Arkady Fomin, a violinist for the Dallas Symphony. Members of the Dallas Symphony were important in beginning the festival, and Music in the Mountains maintains strong ties to the Dallas music community.
Music in the Mountains is active in the Durango community during the off-season, operating, among other things, Music in the Mountains Goes to School, a program which exposes children in the Durango schools to music through a variety of means.