Music@Menlo opens 24th season while preparing for new artistic leadership

Gail Wein | 27 JUL 2026

“Pretend you are a wind through the grass,” cellist Dmitri Atapine tells a teenage violist during a coaching session of Brahms’s String Sextet at Music@Menlo. Atapine’s colorful direction—at another point referencing Spider-Man—guided the group to a musically nuanced performance. A few hours later, Atapine himself is on stage along with his colleagues, a collection of world-class musicians. Their shimmering performance of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons opened Music@Menlo’s 24th summer festival.

A quarter of a century ago, cellist David Finckel and pianist Wu Han, Music@Menlo’s founders and artistic directors, were deeply affected by events in September 2001: the 9/11 attacks on the United States, and the death of the famed concert violinist Isaac Stern a few days later. Stern was a mentor to hundreds of musicians throughout his career, and the two were determined to fill the void that his passing left. Finckel and Han envisioned a multi-week program that would serve as both a training ground for budding talents and present a top-notch concert experience for area audiences.

The opening concert on July 18 at the Menlo School in Atherton, California, “The Glorious Violin,” featured four different violinists, each taking their turn as soloist in Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons. Each brought their unique musicality to the work – Arnaud Sussman was commanding in his performance of “Spring”; Bella Hristova gave a muscular rendition of “Summer;” Kristin Lee’s “Autumn” was gleeful and playful; and Chad Hoopes dazzled in “Winter.” The musicians returned in violin-piano pairs in the second half of the program, which was devoted to the work of Fritz Kreisler. In this diverse collection of miniatures, each couple had their star turn: Sussman with Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Jessica Lee with Chelsea Wang, Hristova with Hyeyeon Park, Hoopes with Wu Han, and Kristin Lee with Wu Han. The spirited camaraderie was evident in both the performances and the high-fives the players exchanged as they rotated on and off the stage like participants in a relay event.

Bella Hristova solos in “Summer” from Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons.” (credit: Harrison Truong)

Performances by the faculty (also known as festival artists) are the tip of the iceberg in this multi-faceted Silicon Valley festival, which runs through August 8. The heart of Music@Menlo is the Chamber Music Institute, which includes International Program Artists (pre-professional musicians age 20 to 30, “IP” for short), and the Smith Family Young Performers Program Artists (students ages 13 to 19, also known as “YP”). Throughout the festival, these participants rehearse intensively, receive daily coaching from the festival artists, and perform in Prelude Performances and Koret Young Performers Concerts, where the audience can hear their progress firsthand. The IP and YP experience is immersive. In addition to rehearsing and performing together, the artists gather for meals and recreational activities including a scavenger hunt and a World Cup watch party.

Another element woven into the Menlo experience since the very first year is Encounters, in-depth lectures that delve into a range of facets of the programs at the festival. On July 17, Michael Parloff had the challenge of covering four composers – J.S. Bach, Mozart, Felix Mendelssohn, and Schubert. His presentation was wide-ranging, cohesive, enlightening, and often humorous. He prefaced his talk with a kind of love letter to Finckel and Han, thanking them for the opportunity to take deep dives into various aspects of the repertoire. On August 4, Menlo brings in Ara Guzelimian – a longtime Menlo Encounterer – to discuss “Artistic Legacy.”

After twenty-four seasons at the helm, Finckel and Han are stepping away from the program that they built and nurtured. Atapine and the pianist Hyeyeon Park, currently co-directors of the Young Performers program, will assume artistic leadership of Music@Menlo in 2027. Both are alums of the International Program and have served on the faculty for over a decade.

Many of the festival’s other alums now populate major chamber ensembles, conservatories, universities, and other music institutions around the world. Nearly forty former participants have gone on to found their own festivals or become artistic directors of existing ones, including Chamber Music America, ChamberFest Cleveland, and Brussels Cello Festival. Some audience members have likewise made the festival a yearly tradition, returning summer after summer for decades.

The concert on July 19, “Being Mendelssohn,” was a prime example of what keeps those audiences coming back for more. This survey of Felix Mendelssohn’s music for strings and piano culminated in the rarely-heard Piano Sextet, written when the composer was still in his mid-teens. The work was intended as a vehicle to show off Mendelssohn’s own keyboard talents. The pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet was brilliant in this mini-concerto, sharing the spotlight with violinist Kristin Lee, violists Guillermo Figueroa and Paul Neubauer, cellist Sterling Elliott and bassist Scott Pingel. Earlier in the program, Figueroa performed the Violin Sonata in F major. His performance with pianist Wu Han was not only moving and eloquent; it was remarkable in that he stepped in at the last minute to replace Areta Zhulla, who was unable to appear.

Performance of Mendelssohn’s “String-Sextet.” (credit: Harrison Truong)

As Finckel and Han conclude their tenure, they have left behind a remarkable legacy, with many of the nearly 500 alums of the Chamber Music Institute in professional performance and leadership positions of their own. Perhaps Atapine summarized it best when he described Music@Menlo as “paradise.”

Dmitri Atapine and Hyeyeon Park will strive to keep that paradise going as they take the reins in summer 2027—yet another Music@Menlo alum success. ■

EXTERNAL LINKS:

• Music@Menlo: musicatmenlo.org

About the author:

Gail Wein is a journalist and publicist in classical music. As a freelance radio reporter, she creates classical music features for NPR, Voice of America and KUSC in Los Angeles. Her writing credits include The Washington Post, Musical America, Playbill, Symphony Magazine, New Music Box, Classical Source and other publications.

Read more by Gail Wein.

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