Kneisel Hall

Kneisel Hall is an annual chamber music festival and school located in Blue Hill, Maine. The season runs for seven weeks each summer from mid-June until early August. A small faculty works with approximately fifty pre-professional musicians, concentrating almost exclusively on chamber music for strings and piano. From 1986 until his death in 2015, pianist Seymour Lipkin served as Artistic Director.

The origins of the festival date back to 1902, when violinist Franz Kneisel first brought his students to his summer home in Blue Hill. Kneisel and his colleagues in the Kneisel Quartet established a summer teaching tradition that lasted until Kneisel's death in 1926. After a long hiatus, the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School was reestablished in 1953 by Kneisel's daughter Marianne Kneisel, pianist Artur Balsam, violinist Joseph Fuchs and violist Lillian Fuchs. From Marianne's death in 1973, the post of Artistic Director was held by cellist Leslie Parnas.

Ronald Copes, Laurie Smukler, Roman Totenberg, violin
Doris Lederer, Katherine Murdock, viola
Jerry Grossman, Joel Krosnick, Barbara Stein-Mallow, cello
Jane Coop, Seymour Lipkin, Marian Hahn, piano

Seymour Lipkin, Artistic Director
Ellen Werner, Executive Director
Patty Stowell, Director, Maine Young Musicians Program

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