Mozart in the Woods—Gretna Music’s 50 Years

(EMAILWIRE.COM, June 12, 2025 ) Denver, CO and Allentown, PA – Outskirts Press—the fastest-growing, full-service self-publishing and book marketing company—is pleased to announce the release of a new book sure to please music lovers of all ages. Carl Ellenberger’s Mozart in the Woods—Gretna Music’s 50 Years
tells the story of a young physician who moved to a remote, idyllic woodland in Pennsylvania, the home of a Chautauqua community from the 19th century. Eager to play his flute again after years of medical education, he called old school friends who had become professional musicians. With them and his community, he created Gretna Music. In 1980, Time Magazine called it “one of six of the best” small music festivals in the US.
The Pennsylvania Chautauqua built an auditorium in 1892 in a quiet woodland community along a mining railroad decades before the arrival of the first automobile. Now a “rural Carnegie Hall” named “Mt. Gretna” after a station on the railroad, the place is an active artist colony with a rich cultural history. Its location in the woods adds a wonderful dimension to live concerts (as well as birds) for a growing congregation of devoted friends from cities in a wide surrounding region,

In 1976, Carl Ellenberger, founder of Gretna Music, repeatedly heard that “the people around here don’t care for classical music.” After 50 years, that response has changed: Gretna Music is a place to hear exceptional performances of music that has endured for millennia as well as jazz and the best music of our time, including performances by 50 Grammy winners and countless Grammy nominees, seven MacArthur fellows, and representatives of major orchestras. In addition to Gretna residents, who participate in many ways, audiences come from all over Pennyslvania, Maryland, New York City and the entire mid-Atlantic region.

The board and staff of Gretna Music learned important lessons from facing obstacles such as bankruptcy, collapse of the 82-year-old hall, external threats to existence, pressure to compromise artistic integrity, cultural change in our society, and others covered in the book. But the exceptional performances over 750 concerts by more than 2,000 musicians from six continents expanded the musical universe of the congregation, who learned to value and support the music while making new friendships for a common purpose and values, much like congregations of churches or synagogues.

The historic festival is gearing up for their 50th summer season and promises an incredible lineup.
For more information, visit GretnaMusic.org.

At 208 pages, Mozart in the Woods—Gretna Music’s 50 Years is available online through Outskirts Press. It will also be sold through Amazon and Barnes and Noble for a maximum trade discount in quantities of 10 or more and is being aggressively promoted to appropriate markets with a focus on the non-fiction category.

ISBN: 978-1-9772-8075-6 Format: 6 x 9 color paperback Retail: $28.95 eBook: $5.00

Genre: NON-FICTION / Music

About the Author: Carl Ellenberger studied music at Interlochen and Eastman, medicine at Yale, practiced and taught neurology at Penn State and Case Western Reserve medical schools, and has played with some of the best musicians on the planet.
About Outskirts Press, Inc.: Outskirts Press offers full-service, custom self-publishing and book marketing services for authors seeking a cost-effective, fast, and flexible way to publish and distribute their books worldwide while retaining all their rights and full creative control. Available for authors globally at www.outskirtspress.com and located on the outskirts of Denver, Colorado, Outskirts Press, Inc. represents the future of book publishing, today.

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