Southern Illinois Music Festival starts today, continues through July 3

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- Starting today, towns around Southern Illinois will host concerts as part of a three-week music festival.

The third annual Southern Illinois Music Festival begins at 10 a.m. with a free jazz concert for children at the Eurma Hayes Center in Carbondale. Other concerts today include a free chamber music concert at noon at the Old Baptist Foundation Recital Hall on the Southern Illinois University campus in Carbondale, a classical music concert for children at 3 p.m. at the Cairo Public Library, a 7:30 p.m. concert by the New Arts Jazztet at Shryock Auditorium on the SIU campus and a free 7:30 p.m. orchestra concert at the Cairo Public Library.

Concerts will continue in cities from DuQuoin to Cairo through July 3.

Festival founder and artistic director Edward Benyas, an SIU music faculty member and music director of the Southern Illinois Symphony Orchestra, said he started the festival "to establish a first-class classical music festival, including orchestral and chamber music, opera, ballet, jazz, patriotic and new music, right here in our community."

In previous years, Benyas performed at festivals in Charleston, S.C., Des Moines, Iowa and Carmel, Calif., and tried to emulate what he saw at those festivals.

Spreading the festival out geographically to maximize the size and diversity of audience was important, Benyas said, so performances are taking place in venues like the Stafford Library in Cairo and the Stinson Library in Anna as well as in concert halls and an opera house in Sesser. The festival's base is Carbondale.

Some concerts are free, others have ticket prices in the $10 range and above for some special events. The festival coincides with a two-week summer music camp for high school students, according to the festival Web site, www.sifest.com.

This year the festival will include more than 50 performances, up from about 40 in its first year. The budget is about $170,000 for this year's festival, compared with $145,000 for the first. Much of that money comes through sponsorship from local governments, not-for-profit organizations, foundations and businesses, Benyas said.

Musicians from around the country and overseas will make up the multiple ensembles that will present the concerts.

Some highlights of the festival include a June 22 children's ballet of Tchaikovsky's "Sleeping Beauty" that will feature about 60 local dancers; an Italian opera called "Elixir of Love" sung in English and set in Southern Illinois at Shryock Auditorium on June 28 and 30; and a patriotic concert performed by orchestra and a 75-member choir at Rent One Field, home to the Southern Illinois Miners baseball team.

msanders@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182