Ravinia_2018_Steans_Music

RAVINIA’S STEANS MUSIC INSTITUTE

Treasured

Fried

oms

Miriam Fried feels privileged to share and shape the future

By Kyle MacMillan

In the fall of 1993,

Miriam Fried

had a conversation with the head of the

Ravinia Festival that would steer the

esteemed violinist’s career in an unex-

pected and fulfilling new direction.

Asked to expand her summer

teaching time at Ravinia’s Steans Music

Institute, the festival’s internationally

recognized summer conservatory, Fried

first wanted to know who was going to

replace the departing director of its Pro-

gram for Piano and Strings. She called

and posed that question to Zarin Mehta,

then executive director of Ravinia, and

he astonished her by asking if she would

take the job.

“I was flabbergasted,” Fried remem-

bers. “I didn’t know what to say.”

But after thinking about it for a few

days, Fried agreed to accept the posi-

tion, and this summer will mark her

25th year as program director. Far ex-

ceeding the tenure of her two predeces-

sors—Robert Mann (1988) and Walter

Levin (1989–93), she has become the

enduring face and soul of the program.

Celebrating 25 years at Ravinia’s Steans MUsic Institute

BENOIT ROLLAND