Great Mountains Music Festival opens next month

The festival, the eighth of its kind, will feature both world-renowned artists and young and talented Korean musicians playing both old and contemporary pieces, they said. "The Great Mountains Music Festival and School is preparing for more success based on achievements gained in the past seven years," Chung Myung-wha, a new co-artistic director of the festival, told reporters. "This year's goal is to stabilize the system of the festival so it can go forward without swaying even under the leadership of new directors."Her younger sister, violinist Chung Kyung-wha, is another new co-artistic director. She will play a Brahms piano trio with Chung Myung-wha, who is a cellist, and pianist Kevin Kenner during the festival. It will mark the first time in six years that the sisters perform on the same stage. This year's program will also be attended by internationally recognized artists, including Karine Georgian, the Russian cellist who won first prize at the Tchaikovsky International Concours, Spain's top cellist Lluis Claret and Robert Diaz, an acclaimed violist and president of the Curtis Institute of Music. Among the young Korean musicians are pianist Son Yeol-eum, double bass player Sung Min-je, violinists Clara-Jumi Kang and Shin Hyun-su, and cellist Koh Bong-Ihn. They will play such masterpieces as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "Requiem," Franz Schubert's "Quintet in C Major," Felix Mendelssohn's "String Quintet No. 2," Frederic Chopin's "Barcarolle for Piano," Johannes Brahms' "Clarinet Trio" and Bela Bartok's jazz-inspired "Contrasts" and classically-centered "Divertimento." The music school, which runs parallel to the festival, is expected to draw 164 students from 12 nations, who study in some of the world's leading conservatories, the organizers said.  Launched in 2004, the festival and school have been attracting a growing number of visitors, with over 32,000 people taking part last year. Part of this year's programs can be watched on a large screen set on an artificial floating island in Seoul's Han River, the organizers said.