GUEST FLUTIST TO PERFORM AT TTU, WORK WITH STUDENTS

Cookeville, Tennessee - Flute lovers and students will be able to listen to a performance by flutist and frequent Metropolitan Opera Orchestra performer John McMurtery Jan. 31 and Feb. 1 at Tennessee Tech University.

The concert is sponsored by TTU’s Center Stage series and is free and open to the public. TTU piano accompanist Paul Thurmond will collaborate with McMurtery. The 7:30 p.m. performance will be in TTU’s Wattenbarger Auditorium in the Bryan Fine Arts Building, 1150 N. Dixie Ave.

McMurtery is a professor at Western Illinois University and a former member of the New York City Opera Orchestra. He regularly performs with the New Jersey Symphony and the Oregon Symphony. He has been a featured soloist with the Artemis Chamber Ensemble, the Manhattan Chamber Orchesra and the New York Symphonic Ensemble.

He will also be this year’s guest artist for the university’s Flute Day Feb. 1 in the Bryan Fine Arts Building. Flute Day, an annual event for all flute enthusiasts, consists of master classes with the guest artist, an exhibit of flutes and piccolos by J.L. Smith & Co. of Charlotte, N.C., for all to try, a concert by McMurtery and Thurmond at 1 p.m. and a flute choir reading session in which all participants are invited to play. Registration opens at 8 a.m. A $20 registration fee is to be paid at the door.

Center Stage is funded through the university’s general education fund.