1997-2006
Leading the Bennington Chamber Music Conference as its Music Director for 9 seasons was a great honor. This is a most wonderful community of musicians, a community whose members span all areas of participation in the classical music “ecosystem”:
- Top professional performers whose entire careers have taken place in the public arena (faculty)
- Many of the most highly recognized composers of our time (senior composer-in-residence and resident composers)
- Up-and coming young composers who attend the Conference on fellowship (composer fellows)
- Community music teachers who take responsibility for educating the young in our country and in Canada (participants)
- The pure Amateur Chamber Musician – those who simply love music, who have trained intensively in music since childhood but chose professional careers in different areas (participants)
We all play together and study together, devote our lives to musical improvement, and organize ourselves as a Community in the highest sense of the word.
Accomplishments
- Established 35 tenured faculty of superior quality over 9 years by guiding retirements and adding new hires for those positions and others opened through retirements. No faculty members were dismissed during Guibbory’s tenure
- Raised standards of faculty concerts to a consistent level of excellence in part by establishing a criteria for new hires that required excellence in coaching and performing
- Created “Week Zero”, a new highly successful weeklong program of intensive study and coaching, in response to articulated needs from participants for deeper study of challenging works
- Created a highly popular Thursday evening seminar series
- In conjunction with Chair of the Grants Committee raised financial support for Composers Forum more than 10 fold
- Restructured and developed Composers’ Forum program to fully integrate the Resident Composers and Composer Fellows (student composers) with the paying participants, and created the position of a Senior Composer in Residence (SCIR) who has independent responsibility to define the interactions of Participants, Faculty and Resident Composers [see N.Y. Times article from October 2014]
- Hired, with the SCIR, Resident Composers primarily from among the top recognized American composers, three of whom (Martin Bresnick, Chen Yi, Stephen Hartke) were selected as the first recipients of the Ives Living Award (American Academy of Arts and Letters)
- Received 2 ASCAP/CMA Awards for Adventurous Programming (2001, 2002)
- Solidified Faculty identity through scheduling challenging concert programming
- Solidified Faculty identity by creating concert and recording opportunities outside of Conference/Festival venue
- Solidified Faculty identity through creation of 2 recording projects:
- The Chamber Music of Virgil Thomson (CRI, 2002) nominated for Grammy – Best Classical Vocal
- The Ceiling of Heaven (ALBANY, 2005) Chamber Music Conference 60th anniversary CD
Click to Download Programs & Seminars 2001-2006
CMC Programs and Seminars 2006
CMC Programs and Seminars 2005
CMC Programs and Seminars 2004
CMC Programs and Seminars 2003
CMC Programs and Seminars 2002
CMC Programs and Seminars 2001
CMC Flyer 1998