California Summer Music

Founded in 1995, California Summer Music (CSM) is a three-and-one-half-week summer training program for young musicians held in Pebble Beach. Enrollment consists of sixty to seventy advanced students from around the world under the age of 25. Under the musical direction of cellist Irene Sharp, CSM focuses on intensive one-on-one instruction and on chamber music, both standard repertory and new music, as a means for increasing individual technical/musical facility. CSM occupies a distinctive niche among top-flight summer programs for exceptional young artists by placing special emphasis on cultivating young composers. The composition students are in their early 20s and are all provided scholarships so that they can attend CSM and with Pulitzer Prize winning composer Paul Morevac. In addition to furthering the program’s strategic objectives around sustaining musical excellence and promoting arts education, CSM’s presents 20 annual free public concerts at local schools and to audiences throughout Monterey County, one of the least well served of the Bay Area’s 11 counties. With ongoing general operating support this $340,000 organization will be able to improve organizational effectiveness by retaining the services of Cynthia Mei, hired in 2007 to share administrative and managerial responsiblities with CSM founder Irene Sharp.