Bay Chamber Concerts has submitted the following statement: 

Bay Chamber Concerts announces that in the interest of the health and safety of our patrons, artists and community, plans cannot go ahead with the summer season as originally envisioned.

The Summer Concert Series and Screen Door Festival, hallmarks of the summer season over the past 10 years will return in 2021. In the meantime, Bay Chamber is excited to celebrate its 60th anniversary in a number of creative ways, harkening to its long tradition of chamber music concerts at the Rockport Opera House and with hopes of offering free outdoor concerts in mid-August.

Each Thursday of the season (9th July to 13th August) at 7:30 p.m. Bay Chamber will present Masterworks, online mini-concerts streamed on our YouTube Channel. There is a treasured archive of recorded Bay Chamber performances, spanning decades of concerts and featuring so many astonishing artists and ensembles, from Andrew Wolf and the Vermeer Quartet performing in the 1970’s right up to Orion Weiss, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Geoff Nuttall and the Maxwell String Quartet performing last year. This is a wonderful opportunity to share a curated sample of these superb recordings by streaming a cherished masterwork each Thursday evening. The music will be accompanied by images from Bay Chamber and Rockport’s archives and the work of some of Maine’s most innovative painters and photographers.

On Thursday, August 6, the Masterworks series will feature the electrifying Jupiter Quartet performing a concert streamed live. They will play the World Premiere of a piece commissioned by Bay Chamber Concerts to mark its 60th Anniversary. To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores by Michi Wiancko delights in the beauty and vitality of the natural world and explores ideas of regeneration, resilience, and hope. The quartet will also play Beethoven’s monumental String Quartet in A Minor, Op. 132.

If State official guidance allows, Bay Chamber will feature a small number of live outdoor events in Rockport and Camden during the Screen Door Festival week, Wednesday 12th to Sunday 16th August. These will include Morning Meditations with acclaimed cellist Joshua Roman performed and streamed live each morning from 5 different picturesque locations. The sensational brass quartet, The Westerlies will perform their own concert program and play a free concert in Camden and Rockport.  Co-presented by Coastal Mountain Land Trust’s Arts on the Hill,  Jazz on the Water at Beech Hill,  is schedule to happen on 16th August at 3PM and this year will include another World Premiere commissioned by Bay Chamber – Everyday’s Song by Aaron Siegel embodies the idea that our collective daily efforts are what give us the strength and imagination needed to create the world we want to live in.

More information about all of these virtual and live performances planned for the summer will be available on Bay Chamber’s website (www.baychamberconcerts .org) or by calling 207-236-2823.