Christ leads fifth musical festival

Friday, May 16, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.

The Las Vegas Music Festival's fifth season, June 8-22, will feature students and guest classical musicians from around the world under the direction of Evan Christ.

Nine concerts around the Las Vegas Valley will show off the talents of the festival's 80 students and 20 guest artists. Former principals from the Boston, Philadelphia and San Francisco orchestras will be in residence at UNLV to coach.

Faculty Chamber Music Concerts, 8 p.m. June 9, 11 and 18 at the Summerlin and Clark County libraries, feature a variety of chamber ensembles. For the first time, Christ on piano and Scott Yoo on violin will perform works by Mozart and Milhaud. This longtime collaboration, which dates back to their years together at Harvard University, has never before seen the two side by side on the chamber stage.

Retired Boston Symphony Orchestra principal flute Doriot Anthony Dwyer and Mendelssohn Quartet cellist Marcy Rosen will contribute to the programs with music from Kodaly and Prokofiev. UNLV faculty artists Carol Stivers, Teresa Ling, Andrew Smith and Steve Caplan, Florida Symphony concertmaster Ellen de Pasquale, Philadelphia Orchestra's Choong-Jin Chang and Juilliard's Henry Lee, Alexis Pia Gerlach and Sang Mee Lee round up the high-hitting roster of talent. Tickets are $5.

The first LVMF "Under the Stars Concert" will be at 8 p.m. June 13 at The Hills Park in Summerlin. Bring your own blanket, lawn chairs and refreshments, but no glass bottles, please. Beware: Teller of Penn & Teller will be on hand to narrate his own version of "Peter and the Wolf." Yes, he will be talking!

To start things off, Paul Kreider, Dean Gronemeier and members of the UNLV vocal and percussion departments will join forces with the LVMF orchestra and Christ for opera and drum selections. Tickets are $10.

If afternoons are best for you, LVMF has scheduled three concerts at 2 p.m. June 15, 20 and 21. Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center will send Walter Trampler to play Mozart during the "Afternoon Concertos Concert" on June 15 at Summerlin Library. Tickets are $5.

Student performers will be on hand to demonstrate and perform what they learned in the two weeks of intense work with faculty for two Student Chamber Music Concerts on June 20 at Clark County Library and June 21 at UNLV's Harris Theater. Admission is free.

Finally, Christ and Yoo will take to the podium once again for the LVMF Chamber Orchestra and LVMF Grand Finale concerts. Yoo teams up with cellist Alexis Pia Gerlach to perform the driving Shostakovich Cello Concerto at Clark County Library at 8 p.m. June 17. Tickets are $5.

Christ leads the LVMF orchestra for the eighth straight year at 2 p.m. June 22 at Artemus Ham Hall. Come out for an afternoon of Dvorak and "Romeo and Juliet." Tickets are $10.

Season tickets for all nine concerts are $35. There is a 20 percent discount for students and seniors. Call 229-6211 for tickets.

All concerts are sponsored by the Las Vegas Department of Parks and Leisure Activities' Cultural and Community Affairs Division.