The Penn’s Woods Music Festival is back this year for in-person concerts to celebrate its 35th anniversary. Kicking off Wednesday, the festival provides an array of events for music lovers over two weeks.
Last year, the festival was held virtually, with footage from the 2019 festival compiled into a series of concerts available online only in 2020, so, when it came to planning the 2021 festival, organizers weren’t entirely sure what the festival would (or could) look like.
With an aim of bringing musicians back to State College for an in-person event, an early-summer date didn’t seem possible, especially as organizers watched other annual festivals, such as People’s Choice Festival and the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts, cancel. With an eye on an August festival, pushed back from its normal June dates, organizers proposed several festival scenarios, receiving Penn State approval just in time.
“Lo and behold, they said, we think that you could do the whole festival,” explains Russell Bloom, assistant director at the Penn State School of Music, “and then we had six weeks to plan what normally takes six months to do right.”
Still, he says, even with the last-minute challenges, both musicians and audiences have seemed thrilled to be back at the Penn’s Woods Music Festival.
The festival consists of a series of concerts featuring classical and jazz chamber ensembles, as well as a chamber orchestra, with events both live-streamed and scattered across Penn State’s campus.
“The thing that surprises me the most about first-time [attendees] is that they have a low expectation of the quality of the performances,” Bloom says. “‘Wow. That was really extraordinarily good.’That’s the kind of response I get from first-time people… The level of musicianship is really, really high and the programming is a little bit of something for everyone. We try to [offer] something unique that maybe has never been played in central Pennsylvania before.”
For those who have attended the festival in the past, and plan to attend again this year, Bloom says to expect a few new offerings and changes. The 7 p.m. performance on Saturday, Aug. 14, at the Penn State Arboretum will feature an entire orchestra, versus the small groups that the festival typically features at Arboretum concerts.
Both Saturday evening concerts, which Bloom notes are the most popular events at the festival, will take place outdoors. The first, at 7 p.m. on Aug. 7, is at the Penn State Music Building Olsan Stone Terrace. The latter, on Aug. 14, is a free Music in the Gardens program at The Arboretum. Consistently growing in popularity each year, the last Music in the Gardens concert in 2019 attracted more than 2,500 attendees.
The festival’s chamber concerts in the Music Building, which are typically smaller and more intimate, will offer general admission seating instead of reserved seating, a change that festival organizers hope will help attendees feel more comfortable with the indoor setting.
Before the official festival kick-off on Wednesday, a pre-festival event from 5-8 p.m. on Tuesday is a new addition to the lineup and part of the Penn’s Woods Plus program. Taking place at 3 Dots Downtown during Tuesdays on the Terrace, a “salon-type” concert will feature three, New York jazz musicians in an intimate, informal setting.
Purchase tickets and find more information about the Penn’s Woods Music Festival, including the full festival schedule, at sites.psu.edu/pwmf.
The festival is moving to electronic ticketing, so Bloom advises attendees purchase their ticket in advance and, for those with any issues with the electronic ticketing process, reach out and the box office team is happy to help.
General admission tickets for concerts on Aug. 4, 6, 7 and 11 are $25 for adults and $10 for students. Music in the Gardens, Aug. 14, is free to attend. Each concert begins at 7 p.m.
