Caramoor Center For Music And The Arts

If you are looking for one of the most fascinating places in Westchester County, head on over to Katonah to go to Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts! This is a former estate that used to belong to Walter and Lucie Rosen, and currently serves as a live music venue for symphonic, opera, chamber, American roots, and jazz performances. It also has a variety of gardens and grounds for picnicking, walking, and exploring the sound art installations they have there. There is also a small stage in the center of the property, a pavilion and a tent right next to it, and a theater that has a variety of performances. I also remember that this is where my brother and I had our high school graduation. 

One of the main features of the property is The Rosen House, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This house can also be enjoyed in a number of ways, such as a guided tour, an afternoon tea, hearing a concert in the music room or Spanish courtyard, or attending a fundraising event. The house also currently contains many different works of art that are by and about women artists, many of whom Caramoor’s founders Walter and Lucie Rosen considered their friends, which will be highlighted in a tour this summer from May 24-August 18. The house itself is Mediterranean-style and was built during the period between 1929 and 1939. It is filled with examples of fine and decorative Asian and Renaissance art and offers a number of treasures such as complete 18th-century rooms that are originally from private villas and chateaux in Italy, France, and England. There is also a Burgundian Library that is a 17th-century, paneled room with a blue groin-vaulted ceiling. There is also a 16th century painted Spanish ceiling in an alcove off the music room. The dining room in the house features doors that are believed to have been made for a Venetian palace, as well as turquoise Chinese export wallpaper featuring birds perched in flowering trees. Walter Rosen’s bedroom has gothic paneling from a residence in the Tyrol region of Italy and is furnished with pieces from Renaissance Italy and Spain. It also has a carved and gilded bed that belonged to Pope Urban VIII. There is also a music room that features Renaissance furniture and architectural elements, art objects such as sculptures, paintings, and stained glass, and a Spanish courtyard that contains gardens and cloisters and niches with intricately painted wall designs.

There are also many events coming up at Caramoor over the next several months. One of these events will be happening every Friday at 1:00 starting on May 24, which is Afternoon Tea, and will be taking place in the Music Room. This event is in honor of founder Lucie Rosen, who enjoyed the tradition during her time living in England, and what is served there is tea, a variety of tea sandwiches, scones with crème fraiche and preserves, and desserts. Another event will be happening on June 9 on the grounds, which is called Soundscapes. This is described on the website as a day to explore their sound art collection and discover a world of aural fascinations. There are many pieces this year in their Sonic Innovations series. The first is called “Seismic Grief,” and it incorporates sonic inflatable sculptures that are designed and shaped using seismic data that was captured during the earthquake in Turkey and Syria on February 6, 2023, from two different sites, Turkey, and the United States. The next piece is called “In ‘C’,” and it is also a permanent sound art sculpture that is an interactive kinetic sculpture shaped as a 16-foot-high double letter C. From the top of the C’s curve, 24 tuned metal bell chimes ranging over two octaves are suspended, and there is also a push-button panel in front of the sculpture that when it is pressed, activates the sculpture’s chimes to play pre-composed short pieces that are each 1-2 minutes long. The next piece is called “Stone Song,” which is made from stones and is laced with pressure sensors and strain gauges, and sensors for humidity, temperature, and barometric pressure. All these factors feed into a drone synthesizer, whose fundamental tones shift slowly over the months as the stones settle. 

One of the standout events that has been held for many years is the Caramoor Summer Music Festival, which mainly focuses on classical music and takes place in both the Spanish Courtyard of the house and in the 1,700-seat Venetian Theater, which is a tented facility on the grounds. Some notable shows that have been there in the past include the U.S. premiere of “Not the Messiah (He’s a Very Naughty Boy),” which was written by Eric Idle, and he was also there as both soloist and narrator. Another notable show happened back in 2016, which was a performance from alternative rock singer Ben Folds, which I find impressive as he typically performs in venues. Other notable performances over the years include singer and songwriter Roseanne Cash, who is the daughter of Johnny Cash, two-time Tony Award winner Patti LuPone, a performance of “She Loves Me” with Alexandra Silber, Santino Fontana, and Montego Glover, singer and banjo player Bela Fleck, folk rock singer Lucinda Williams, country singer Emmylou Harris, alternative rock singer Aimee Mann, folk duo The Milk Carton Kids, legendary cellist Yo-Yo Ma, Broadway star Audra McDonald, and Samara Joy, a jazz singer who won Best New Artist at the Grammy Awards in 2023, and also went to the same school as me, SUNY Purchase. This year, they are going to have several more concerts. These include a gala performance from longtime Caramoor friend Wynton Marsalis with Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, a performance of the semi-opera “The Fairy Queen,” a performance from the Mark Morris Dance Group, orchestra performances such as The Knights with Aaron Diehl and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s with Milos and Jeremy Denk, chamber music and recitals such as composer, conductor, and multi-genre musician Damien Sneed, harpist Bridget Kibbey, the Abeo Quartet, pianist Richard Goode, and Grammy-nominated pianist Joyce Yang. There will also be their annual American Roots Music Festival, which is going to be headlined by Grammy-winning folk singer-songwriter Madison Cunningham. Their annual Jazz Festival will also be returning and headlined by young composer, bandleader, and pianist Matthew Whitaker. There will also be a performance from folk singer, Pulitzer Prize winner, and MacArthur “Genius” Grant recipient Rhiannon Giddens. There will also be some concerts on the lawn, and my dad is hoping to go to one that is during the daytime this year, and I think that might be something fun to do this summer. The standout show that is happening there this summer is Broadway star and actress Sutton Foster, which is notable to me because she already performed in the area recently at the Ridgefield Playhouse recently, so it’s cool that she will be performing closer to where I live, and she was also a panelist on an episode of one of my favorite game shows, “Match Game.”

Overall, Caramoor is a cool place with a variety of interesting things to see and do and shows to see, and you should all go check it out at some point this summer!