Every winter, artists flock to Sarasota like birds migrating south. It makes perfect sense, for this arts town is at the height of its output during the winter months. Museum exhibitions, gallery openings, dance performances and theater premieres run amok along the Gulf Coast as the temperatures drop and the days grow shorter. Within that group of migrating artists, however, is a smaller section of talented individuals, often unheralded because of the brevity of their stay and their relative lack of trips around the sun. These individuals aren’t household names (yet) but during their two weeks in Sarasota, audiences will have the chance to catch some of the future stars of classical music. 

The Perlman Music Program Suncoast Winter Residency opens its doors to some of the best and brightest young string instrumentalists in the world. Now in its 21st year, the program, which operates out of USF Manatee-Sarasota Campus, functions as a home away from home away from home for students of the Perlman Music Program. Founded in NY’s Shelter Island by Toby Perlman and her husband Itzhak, PMP has become a haven for string instrument prodigies from around the world, offering comprehensive instruction in a nurturing, non-competitive environment. After students, aged 12-18, have completed the 7-week summer music camp in Shelter Island, they are invited to Sarasota, where they’ll have the chance to participate in the winter residency. “This is a program that for students, if they’ve been recognized as highly talented, they’ll apply to attend Perlman from all over the world. The Perlmans and faculty sort through the performance samples and select a limited number of students each year,” says Lisa Berger, Executive Director of the Perlman Music Program Suncoast. “Kids can stay in this program until they go to college and can return every year if they’d like, which many of them do. Most of the places they come from are cold and wintery, so they just love coming down here to Sarasota and being together. There’s a lot of fun activities that we do with them, so they’re not just playing their instruments 24 hours a day.”

Although classical music, especially for those talented enough to make a career out of it, is an intensely competitive space, that’s not the vibe at the Suncoast Winter Residency—or any of the organization’s programs. The students, who hail from all across the globe, don’t need to be pushed. They’re some of the best young string players on the planet. What they need is an environment where they can be nurtured, stimulated and challenged. Where they can cut loose and bond with their actual peers, not just their classmates from their disparate hometowns.

“What happens in a concert or even in a rehearsal, is that nobody is, say, first violinist all the time,” says Berger. “Every once in a while in rehearsal, Mr. Perlman will stop and tell everybody to move around. Or even at the concert, you’ll see them move around some as well. Once they leave here, it’s all about competition, but while they’re here, it’s a very nurturing environment where everybody gets an opportunity to shine.”

That is what, for 14 days from the end of December to the beginning of January, the PMP Suncoast Winter Residency offers. With the assistance of trained staff, many currently teaching at Juilliard and the helping hand of older PMP alumni/mentors, these future concert hall maestros and first chair violinists can train to be the best that they can be. A day at the Winter Residency starts early, with individual and group lessons in USF’s classrooms. Students work on their craft, either in solo works with teachers or in quartet chamber workshops, where they learn to hone their skills with other members of the residency.

At night, after a required choral rehearsal in which the entirety of the program, both students and faculty, must partake in—the Perlmans believe that the voice is also a part of the instrument—the students rehearse. They rehearse separately and as a unit, sometimes debuting “Works in Progress” with their teachers’ approval and other times participating in instrument-specific Masterclasses. Much of the work, however, prepares students for the Celebration Concert, culminating at the end of the residency where students will display their talents for the world to see in a formal, concert setting. “We’ll have our big concert at the Sarasota Opera House, where everything they’ve been rehearsing is performed in full,” says Berger. “It’s really fun because the kids get dressed in full concert attire and get to perform as an orchestra and then as a chorus as well. And the audience just loves it, especially when you get to know the returning students who come back year after year.”

One of the perks of the Winter Residency, however, is that it doesn’t just benefit the students. For fans of classical music, the nightly “Tent Events” or orchestral, choral and solo rehearsals held over the residency are free for the public to attend. “There’ll be a couple nights where Mr. Perlman conducts the students in rehearsal in a big performance tent that we put up on the campus. Some nights he’ll conduct, other nights there will be solo student performances and other types of Masterclasses,” says Berger. “When you watch the rehearsals, he’ll pick apart the piece and work on certain movements, so it’s kind of stop and go. And when you’re in the audience watching, Mr. Perlman is wearing a microphone so you can hear everything he says to the students. He has a wonderful rapport with the kids and they just love him.”