Ad Astra Music Festival Kicks Off Tenth Season July 14

On Friday, July 14, the Ad Astra Music Festival kicks off its tenth season with a recital by Elisa Sunshine and Matthew Piatt at St. John Lutheran Church in Russell.

The first weekend is rounded out by two performances of the Pulitzer Prize winning musical, Next to Normal, in concert at the Elks Lodge in Russell on July 15 and 16.

The opening recital, Sunshine and Piatt, features Victoria-native and Ad Astra regular Matthew Piatt at the piano. Piatt is an assistant conductor and coach primarily at San Francisco Opera and has assisted at The Metropolitan Opera the last two years and at Chicago Lyric Opera for many years before that. To open the season, Piatt invited his friend Elisa Sunshine, a New York-based soprano and former Adler Fellow at San Francisco Opera to join him for a fantastic evening of art songs and arias from the past and present. It is part of the festival's chamber music series, where tickets are $10.

To finish out the weekend, the festival is producing two performances of Next to Normal, in concert. The show opened on Broadway in 2009 and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama the year prior. The deeply moving story focuses on a family processing grief and mental illness. It's rated PG-13 for language and drug use and might be heavy for those who struggle with mental health. The festival has assembled a cast that includes knock-out Broadway veterans Julie Foldesi and Trey Ellett, two Kansas college students Noah Svaty and Mary Little, 2023 Hays High School graduate and Chicago-bound Seth Tripp, and Russell-native and NYC-based actor Nathan Hilger. The show is directed by Hays-based playwright Catherine Trieschmann with technical direction by Terrance Volden, costumes by Dalee Werth and music direction by New York pianist Connor Doran. Next to Normal, in concert, is part of the festival's mainstage series and tickets are $20.

Season tickets and individual tickets, performance information, performer bios and ways to get involved are all on the festival's website at www.adastramusicfestival.org.

(Information courtesy Ad Astra Music Festival.)