Before I started playing piano at age 5, my mother had taken us to a concert—I’m one of three girls. I still have this image in my head of looking up at the stage with the spotlight on this big, shiny black piano. Something about the power of the instrument got to me at that young age. 

When I was 14, my mother died of breast cancer. I lost my way for a couple of years, and I stopped loving the piano. I came back to it when I was 16 and loved it more than ever. It was like my connection to my mom in a lot of ways, and that changed my perspective on being a pianist. It became a lot more spiritual to me. 

I’m 62 now, and my relationship with music and with the piano has only deepened over the years. Being a professional musician is humbling. I’m always trying to get better. I joke that I’ll be on my deathbed and I’ll still have a huge, long list of repertoire I want to learn.

When I got offered the Bravo! Vail position [in 2010], one of my first thoughts was, “I need an incredible administrator to work with.” Jacqueline Taylor and I go back to our late teens, and I convinced Jackie to join me in this pursuit as director of artistic planning. 

I’ve been running two other small festivals and Bravo! Vail and playing concerts. Yeah, I could do it all, but I’ve been working nonstop. When I went to renew my contract the last time, one guiding thing for me was that 2027 will be the 40th year of Bravo!. I thought, “What good timing to usher in a new chapter for the festival with a new artistic director.” 

I really wanted to make Bravo! Vail an international hub for performers, where they would want to come because they would feel so beloved, so well taken care of. We have one of the greatest audiences. 

The [festival’s] Piano Fellows program was inspired by memories of being in my early 20s and being desperate for more relationships with other musicians. Being a pianist can be pretty solitary. I personally invite [two fellows each summer]. What I think is unique about this program is they’re not just coming to play concerts, they’re also coming to have master classes, so it’s both a performance and a learning experience. 

A small series that I started that is so close to my heart is Immersive Experiences. We do these at Donovan Pavilion, so we have about 200 people. We’ve had the complete Beethoven violin and piano sonatas, the complete Bartók string quartets, and the complete Prokofiev sonatas. This coming summer, it’ll be the six Bach cello suites with Alisa Weilerstein. It’s a unique opportunity for people to spend two nights really immersing themselves more deeply in the work of one composer. 

I also started the Bravo! Vail symphonic commissioning program. This summer we have a new work that will be premiered in Colorado in a co-commission with the New York Philharmonic. It’s important for the festival to bring in new works. Once, at an intermission, I talked to a patron who I knew didn’t really love contemporary music, and I said, “What did you think of the new piece?” He said, “Oh, I really didn’t like it, but I’m very proud that we did it.” That was such a moment of joy. We don’t all have to love the same things. Thank god, because life would be pretty boring, right? 

Two years ago, we invited a chamber orchestra from Mexico City. And in all of my years at Bravo! Vail, I’ve never seen our audience quite as ecstatic. It was also meaningful because we have a huge Spanish-speaking population in the Vail Valley, and we hadn’t really broken through to them. This was a big step forward. 

I’m at every single concert. I get up and say a few words about the music from the stage. We have almost 60,000 people come through the festival every summer, and I think it’s very important that the artistic director is the face of the festival. I’ve developed so many friendships with patrons that will endure past my time at Bravo! Vail.

 Audiences need live music more than ever, to be able to go to a concert and have everything else melt away, to have two hours to sink into glorious music. What I love about live music is it speaks to audiences collectively and individually. It’s a unifying experience, but it’s also deeply personal.

Before I became artistic director, there was an [unwritten] rule that if you played at Bravo! Vail, you could not play at the Aspen Music Festival in the same summer and vice versa. I instantly got rid of that. There’s absolutely no sense of competitiveness between these festivals. [The Aspen Music Festival] and Bravo! Vail are both equally wonderful, but they have different identities. 

This coming June, I’m going to play and conduct all five Beethoven piano concertos with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. It’s a dream project. I’ll be sitting at the piano the whole time and then with my right hand giving some cues. I can’t imagine a more fun and impactful way to start my final season.

The funny thing IS I’ll have people come up to me and say, “What are you going to do in your retirement?” I am not retiring, not by a long shot. My number one focus will be on performing. I’m starting to perform more in Europe and in South America. And I have other plans on the horizon. 

My time as artistic director has been the most extraordinary journey, and it has given me so much more than I gave to it. It’s been so enriching and thrilling to do this, and it’s been a privilege. I’m taking a lot away from this whole experience that I’ll bring forward into my next chapter.