Festival Rolland began in 2017 when two friends from San Francisco accepted a long-standing invitation to come play music in Avallon. The friends were cellist James Jaffe and pianist Ian Scarfe, and the enthusiastic response to their recital encouraged them to return the following year to establish a recurring summer music festival. The festival borrows its name from Nobel prizewinner Romain Rolland, whose writings on Beethoven’s music made a deep impact on James.
