Carolyn DePew
Staff Writer
The annual Immanuel and Helen Olshan Texas Music Festival kicked off its 1998 season with two concerts in the Moores Opera House at the University of Houston main campus last week. One concert was held June 9 and featured a small chamber music ensemble. The other was presented June 13 by the full Texas Music Festival Orchestra.
The chamber music concert was comprised of works by Albioni, Boyce, Bourgeois, White and Beethoven and was performed by the Moores Brass Quintet and a wind ensemble composed of faculty musicians. The Texas Music Festival Orchestra performed the Elgar Cello Concerto in E Minor, Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 "From the New World" and the Introduction to The Age of Gold by Dmitri Shostakovich. Maxim Shostakovich, Dmitri's son, conducted the orchestra.
The concerts were two of the 13 concerts that comprise the Texas Music Festival season, the first two of seven set to be performed at the Moores Opera House. Other concerts will be held at the Rudder Theatre at Texas A&M University and at the Centrum at Cypress Creek Christian Community Center.
The two concerts at the Moores Opera House were very successful. The June 13 concert was especially large, attended by "at least 600 people" according to a student who was working at the box office that evening.
"Today we are very pleased (with the turnout)," said Texas Music Festival General Manager Alan Austin on the evening of the June 13 concert. "Chamber music audiences are always smaller."
The Texas Music festival has been held annually at UH since its establishment in 1990. It is a four-week program of performances and workshops led by prominent artists from the Moores School of Music faculty, members of the Houston Symphony and internationally recognized guests.
The festival draws prospective participants from across the country and globe. Spots are filled by auditions only, and music students from Mexico, Spain, Taiwan, Bulgaria, Korea, Chile, Germany, China and other nations were selected this year.
"There was a tough competition this year," said Gregory Grabiec, a senior biology major and a violinist in the Moores School Orchestra. The performers were, he said, "very impressive."
Individual concert tickets are $10 for general admission and $5 for students and senior citizens. Tickets may be purchased in room 120F of the Moores School of Music building Monday through Friday from 1-5 p.m. or at the door.