Bard SummerScape is set to return July 8–August 22 with limited, in-person audiences indoors and outdoors across the Bard's 1,000-acre campus in New York's Hudson Valley. The annual seven-week festival will adhere to rigorous health and safety protocols.

The full season of music, dance, opera, and performance will launch with the world premiere of I was waiting for the echo of a better day, a new commission from choreographer Pam Tanowitz and composer Jessie Montgomery, and will culminate in the 31st annual Bard Music Festival, Nadia Boulanger and Her World.

Through a series of themed concerts, lectures, and panel discussions, the Bard Music Festival will pay tribute to Boulanger, one of the most important female figures in classical music history. Complementing the festival is the first fully staged North American production of King Arthur (Le roi Arthus), by Boulanger’s compatriot Ernest Chausson, conducted at the Fisher Center by Leon Botstein, the festival's founder and co-artistic director.

Gideon Lester, artistic director of the Fisher Center at Bard, said, “SummerScape has adapted to current circumstances without downsizing the breadth of its programming. This is an ambitious festival, as our audiences have come to expect. From the Fisher Center’s main stage to the parkland of our Montgomery Place campus, this year the festival extends from traditional performance spaces to the stunning landscape of the Hudson Valley.”

The full SummerScape 2021 program will be announced in April. Click here for more information.