NEWS LITE : PRESIDENT KICKS BACK IN UTAH.

Two weeks after his impeachment trial, President Clinton's life seems almost back to normal: speeches, travel, fund raising, golf. There was even a family reunion at a Utah ski resort to celebrate Chelsea's 19th birthday Saturday.

The Clintons borrowed the gated, multimillion-dollar mountaintop home of Hollywood executive Jeffrey Katzenberg for the Utah vacation, where they will stay until Tuesday. Katzenberg has several intermediate ski runs just off his back yard at the Deer Valley Resort, about 25 miles east of Salt Lake City.

As he was getting ready to leave Los Angeles, the president told reporters he had a good day, including shooting an 83 over 18 holes of golf. ``It was really fun,'' he said. ``I loved it.'' He added that he would be catching up on his reading in Utah. ``I don't ski, so I'm going to stay in and read,'' he said.

The president was greeted upon his arrival in Salt Lake City by Gov. Mike Leavitt and other local officials before taking a motorcade to the Katzenberg home.

After a scandal-scarred year, a sense of relief and higher spirits has seeped into Clinton's entourage. ``We've come a long way in the last six years. We've had a good time,'' Clinton told cheering supporters late Friday.

But troubling problems remain for the president, as he acknowledged on this six-day trip in the West.

``I'm not sure I've made any progress at all in bringing peace to Washington, D.C.,'' the president said, only half-jokingly, at a San Francisco fund-raiser.

Mathis lists Nat, Lena among big influences

The Wall Street Journal asked veteran popular singer Johnny Mathis to name the five African-American musicians who had the greatest influence on his musical development.

Nat King Cole: ``To this day, he's still my favorite singer. Nat had a voice which was incapable of singing flat or sharp.''

Lena Horne: ``I was greatly influenced by her performances. She was so dynamic. When I was a kid, I left San Francisco for New York, and I remember seeing her sing for the first time at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel. I was simply mesmerized.''

Duke Ellington: ``I put him in the same category as George Gershwin.''

Miles Davis: ``His music was 180 degrees different from mine, but he taught me that you couldn't apologize for the way you performed. You have to be your own person.''

Stevie Wonder: ``I've recorded so much of his music. He can make anything sound good.

British balloonists set endurance record

Two British adventurers attempting to make the first nonstop round-the-world balloon voyage set a record Saturday for the longest time aloft in a balloon.

Colin Prescot, 48, and Andy Elson, 45, who took off from Spain on Feb. 17, broke the endurance record after being in flight 233 hours and 55 minutes, their spokesman said.

They were soaring at 17,000 feet over Bombay, India, at the time and involved in delicate maneuvers to keep the aircraft away from China.

The previous record was set by Elson last year on his failed round-the-world bid, which ended in Burma after China refused him permission to enter its airspace.

``Although this record is a major achievement, and one worthy of a celebration, there is still a long way to go before we complete the 18,000-mile journey around the world,'' the pilots said in a message to the team's headquarters in London.

Folk singer traces rap's roots to genre of `talking blues'

Noel Paul Stookey of the 1960s group Peter, Paul & Mary says folk music isn't dead - it's become rap.

``What is rap but Woody Guthrie's `talking blues' down home, on the street? I think folk's big impact is (still) here,'' he said Friday in Los Angeles.

Folk is ``storytelling between people; it's the sharing of emotions,'' whether through century-old tunes or the works of alternative rocker Jewel or Grammy-winner Alanis Morissette, Stookey said.

Peter, Paul & Mary had a string of folk hits, including ``Puff, the Magic Dragon,'' and its members were active in the anti-Vietnam War and civil rights movements.

After a seven-year layoff in the 1970s, the trio re-formed and now performs 32 concerts a year. Each concert includes new tunes, which have to pass strict musical and political muster.

``We have an unwieldy and sometimes cumbersome integrity that doesn't always let us sing everything,'' Stookey said.

A retrospective album, ``Songs of Conscience and Concern,'' will be released next month and includes songs about everything from farm-worker rights to the dangers of nuclear energy.

Some of the proceeds will go to charities.

Stookey, 61 and a self-described ``Jesus freak,'' currently is artist-in-residence at Northfield Mount Herman Preparatory School in Northfield, Mass. His wife is the chaplain.

News Lite is compiled by Karen Duffy from Daily News staff and wire reports.

CAPTION(S):

4 Photos

PHOTO (1--2) Party Preparations

Chef Wolfgang Puck, who is slated to prepare the food for the Governors Ball after the Academy Awards, prepares his post-Oscar fare for the press Friday, while pastry chef Sherry Yard displays the dessert for the occasion.

(3) Norma Matheson, widow of former Utah Gov. Scott Matheson, hugs President Clinton on his arrival Saturday in Salt Lake City.

Associated Press

(4) Balloonists set a record Saturday for the longest time aloft.

Denis Doyle/Associated Press