MasterWorks Festival Director Promises This Summer Will Be The Best Yet
Posted
Staff Report-
For five weeks this summer, the MasterWorks Festival will present more than 50 performances of music, dance and theater – all free and open to the community. Highlights will include two orchestras giving weekly concerts with 12 concerto artists, a full ballet with orchestra program, and performances by the MasterWorks Theatre Troupe that will then appear at an off-Broadway theater in New York City. Furthermore, MasterWorks will present its annual “Patriotic Pops” Outdoor Concert July 5, just before the fireworks on Winona Lake begin. This concert will be held in the Winona Lake Park. “It is going to be an amazing summer at MasterWorks this year,” said Artistic Director Dr. Patrick Kavanaugh. The first two concerts are June 14 and 15 in Rodeheavor Auditorium. These will include chamber music performed by faculty of the MasterWorks Festival. The following evening, June 16, is the first of four MasterWorks Festival faculty recitals that take place each Sunday night of the festival. The first orchestra concerts take place June 21 and 22. Conductors for this year’s orchestra concerts are Daniel Meyer, David Bowden, Daryl One, Luis Haza, Mirian Burns, Kavanaugh, Anthony Spain, Christopher Russell and Andrew Sewell. Some of the principle works to be performed by the orchestra include Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 (“Pastoral”), Brahms Symphony No. 4, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 (“Pathetique”), Ravel’s “Bolero,” Dvorak’s Symphony No. 8 and the Belioz Symphonie Fantastique. Soloists this summer are Wei Yu (cellist, New York Philharmonic) playing the Dvorak Cello Concerto, concert pianist Hugh Sung playing Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on a Theme” by Paganini, Bonita Boyd (flutist, Eastman School of Music) playing Mozart’s “Flute Concerto in G Major,” and the renowned concert violinist, Rachel Barton Pine, playing the “Saint-Saens Introduction and Rondo Cappricioso. In addition, MasterWorks faculty will present two concertos: clarinetist Harry and Karen Hill will perform Mendelssohn’s Concert Piece No. 2; and flutist Paula Kasica, oboist Reed Messich, trumpeter Wesley Nance, and violinist Shannon Nance will play Bach’s “Brandenburg Concerto No. 2.” Finally, the student concerto concert will present four of finest MasterWorks students as soloists. This summer, the MasterWorks Dance Ensemble will give two performances of “Giselle,” one of the greatest ballets of all time. These dance performances are the only MasterWorks events not held in Winona Lake. Instead, they will take place at the Performing Arts Center of Warsaw Community High School July 6 and 7. The MasterWorks Theatre Troupe’s production this summer is the dramatic “Twelve Angry Jurors,” adapted from the original play of “Twelve Angry Men.” After performing this play in Grace College’s McClain Auditorium July 4 and 6, the troupe will leave for additional performances in Pittsburgh and at the Off-Broadway Theater Studio 315 in New York City. Other MasterWorks events will include recitals by the Vocal Department, the Chamber Music Department, the String Department and the Wind Department, in addition to many master classes open to the community. For more information, visit www.MasterWorksfestival.org or call 574-267-5973.
