Soloists to appear in Musical Arts Society concert

University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty members Stephen Caplan and Juline Gilmore will join Amy Cofield as featured soloists in Southern Nevada Musical Arts Society's "Down a River of Time," a concert highlighting the music of John Rutter, at 3 p.m. Sunday.

The concert will be held in UNLV's Artemus Ham Hall, 4505 S. Maryland Parkway. Admission is $15 for adults and $12 for seniors, the disabled, and the military. Students with ID will be admitted for $5. Tickets are available by calling 895-2787.

Soprano Cofield will be featured with the 60-voice Musical Arts Chorus and 32-piece orchestra in a performance of John Rutter's "Requiem." Gilmore, mezzo-soprano, will sing three spirituals arranged by Rutter for chorus and orchestra including "Steal Away," "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," and "Ev'ry Time I Feel the Spirit."

Oboist Caplan will perform Eric Ewazen's concerto for oboe and string orchestra, "Down a River of Time," and Cofield will open the afternoon program with Mozart's "Exultate Jubilate."

Caplan is a professor of oboe at UNLV and director of the Sierra Wind Quintet. Gilmore, a candidate for the Doctorate of Music degree at UNLV, has been a winner in a number of competitions sponsored by the National Association of Schools of Singing.

Soprano Cofield from New York City recently appeared with the Houston Grand Opera, and has performed the soprano solo role in Rutter's "Mass of the Children" at Carnegie Hall. Cofield has appeared as soprano soloist with the Musical Arts Society eight times.

Friday, March 04, 2005
Copyright @ Las Vegas Review-Journal

Nevadans work to protect China art treasures
Desert Research Institute scientists hope to minimize ill effects of pollution on ancient terra-cotta figures
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

RENO -- Two Reno scientists are trying to protect ancient terra-cotta warriors and horses in China from the modern-day threat of pollution.

Judith Chow and John Watson, internationally recognized experts on air quality from the Desert Research Institute in Reno, are in Shaanxi Province researching the impact of pollution on thousands of life-size statues.

A ceremony to launch the collaborative $250,000 two-year research project was held Wednesday in China.

One of the world's greatest archaeological finds, the 2,225-year-old clay figures are displayed at the Terra-cotta Warriors and Horses Museum in Xi'an, one of the 10 most polluted cities in the world, Watson said.

Chow said she was surprised at how large the figures were. "Some are 6 feet tall, and they all have different expressions on their faces," she said.

The terra-cotta warriors and horses, along with chariots and weapons, were discovered in 1974 while local farmers were digging a well near the site of the tomb of Emperor Qin Shi Huang.

Huang unified China, declared himself its first emperor in 221 B.C. and built the Great Wall.

When he became emperor at age 13, he ordered work to begin on his tomb. During the next 38 years, more than 1 million workers toiled on the terra-cotta warriors. Baked in kilns, each of the soldiers has a distinct facial expression.

"The emperor believed in reincarnation, and he wanted an army of soldiers to protect him in his afterlife," Chow said.

Although ground-penetrating radar has revealed about 7,000 figures, only about 1,000 have been unearthed thus far.

During the last 30 years, museum officials began noticing damage to the surface of the statues and mold growing on them. They suspected that pollutants were the cause.

"Because both outdoor and indoor pollution is having a dramatic effect on these fine arts, we wanted to study which pollutants are causing the damage and, hopefully, we find a strategy to minimize it," said Frank S.C. Lee, an associate professor of engineering from Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

Some of the pollutants could be coming from the 1.5 million annual visitors to the museum, Watson said. "One speculation is ammonia from their breath and chemicals from their clothing could be having an impact," he said.

Chow and Watson will try to find out what pollutants are causing damage, their concentration levels, and what control measures can be taken to reduce the damage.