San Jose Wind Symphony

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Program Notes

Sunday, December 13, 2009, 3:00 PM

"CHICAGO: MY KIND OF TOWN"
McAfee Center, Saratoga

Dr. Edward C. Harris, conductor
Timothy Harris, guest conductor
Alicia Telford, horn
The Aaron Lington Quintet

Carnival

Paul Basler (b. 1963)

Paul Basler is Professor of Music at the University of Florida, where he teaches horn and composition. He received his B.M. degree from Florida State University and his M.M., M.A. and D.M.A. degrees from Stony Brook University. Dr. Basler is widely recognized as one of the most important instructors of horn in the United States, and his textbooks on horn pedagogy and performance études are used by schools of music and conservatories around the world.

Carnival is a tribute to the sights and sounds of the traditional American carnival. The few points of repose in this dynamic piece are opportunities to catch one’s breath amid the joyous bustle of a superb and imaginatively scored piece by a rising star of the American musical scene.

Andante and Tranquillo from Symphony No. 1, Op. 9

Samuel Barber (1910-1981), arranged by Richard Saucedo

Samuel Barber was one of the most important and honored American composers of the twentieth century. Barber’s music, masterfully crafted and built on romantic structures and sensibilities, is at once lyrical, rhythmically complex and harmonically rich. Barber wrote his first piece at age 7 and attempted his first opera at age 10. At the age of 14 he entered the Curtis Institute, where he studied voice, piano and composition. Barber wrote in a great variety of musical forms, including symphonies, concertos, operas, vocal music and chamber music.

Barber’s Symphony No. 1 was written in 1936 and revised in 1942. It was dedicated to Barber’s longtime companion, Gian Carlo Menotti. It is an entirely dramatic piece, and the theme of this second movement has been called “moody.”

Aurora Awakes

John Mackey (b. 1973)

John Mackey holds a B. F. A. degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music and an M. M. degree from the Juilliard School. Mr. Mackey particularly enjoys writing music for dance and for symphonic winds. His works have been performed at the Sydney Opera House; Carnegie Hall; the Kennedy Center; Italy’s Spoleto Festival; and in Italy, Chile, Japan, Colombia, Austria, Brazil, Germany, England, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. He has held college residencies at Florida State, University of Michigan, Ohio State, Arizona State, University of Southern California, University of Texas, and many others.

Aurora Awakes is inspired by Aurora, the Roman goddess of the dawn, who is frequently associated with beauty and light. Over the course of eleven minutes, the piece moves from a place of remarkable stillness to an unbridled explosion of energy. In Aurora Awakes, Mackey quotes from two remarkably different musical sources: the Edge’s guitar introduction to U2’s “Where the Streets Have No Name” and the final chord of the “Chaconne” from Gustav Holst’s First Suite in E-flat for Military Band.

Hold This Boy and Listen

Carter Pann (b. 1972)

Carter Pann received his Bachelor’s degree from the Eastman School of Music and his Master’s degree from the University of Michigan. His music has been performed around the world by such ensembles and soloists as the London Symphony, City of Birmingham Symphony, Berlin-Stockholm-Finnish Radio Symphonies, Seattle Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, National Repertory Orchestra and the National Symphony of Ireland. Throughout the last several years, Pann has contributed to the growth of new works being written for the many wind symphonies around the country.

About Hold this Boy and Listen, composed in 2008, the composer writes that it is “...an unusually soft and subdued song for band, written for my third nephew, David Paulus, Jr. I sat down at the piano and wrote a lyrical work where the melodies and harmonies return, creating a structure not unlike standard song structure. The sentiment is at times innocent or wistful and at other times haunted and serene.”

Rondo from Concerto No. 1, Op. 11

Richard Strauss (1864-1949), arranged by Andrew Glover

Richard Strauss enjoyed early success as a conductor and composer and was influenced by the work of Wagner. He developed the tone poem to an unrivalled level of expressiveness and achieved great success with a series of impressive operas. His relationship with the Nazi government in Germany was ambiguous, a fact that protected him but led to post-war difficulties and self-imposed exile in Switzerland.

Concerto No. 1 was written in 1882 with Strauss’s father – one of the greatest horn players of his time – in mind. The piece was intended to be performed on a waldhorn or forest horn (a valveless natural horn), but it is virtually impossible to play on that instrument; so, it is performed today on a valved double horn. The piece evokes the moods of the forest by including fanfares and hunting calls throughout.

The Directorate March

John Philip Sousa (1854-1932), arranged by Frank Byrne and John Boyd, edited by Edward C. Harris

John Philip Sousa began formal musical instruction at age 6, appeared as a violin soloist at age 11 and began his career in the U.S. Marine Band when he was just 13. He became leader of the Marine Band in 1880 and served in that position until 1892, when he resigned to organize a band of his own. Sousa was a prolific composer, who found themes for his compositions in his country’s history, dedication events, military groups and even newspaper contests. By the time of his death at age 78, Sousa had composed 136 marches, 15 operettas, 70 songs, 11 waltzes and a wide variety of incidental works.

The Directorate was not dedicated to band directors, as the title might imply. This march was written in appreciation of an honor bestowed upon Sousa by the Board of Directors of the 1893 St. Louis Exposition. The Sousa Band had been in existence for less than a year at that time but had created such a sensation at the exposition that the directorate held a special ceremony in his honor.

Tranquillity from Capriol Suite

Peter Warlock (1894-1930), arranged by David Marlatt

Born Philip Heseltine, Peter Warlock came from a well-to-do family of stockbrokers, solicitors and art connoisseurs. His education included music and classic literature, and he befriended and became a follower of many poets, including D.H. Lawrence. He was a composer, music critic, journalist and editor of early music. He composed over 150 songs, instrumental works and transcriptions. Warlock wrote the Capriol Suite in 1926 for piano with string orchestra. “Tranquillity” is the lyrical slow movement. Lush harmonies and colorful textures are featured.

Open Evidence

Aaron Lington (b. 1974)

Open Evidence was commissioned by Timothy Harris and the Chabot College Wind Symphony for a performance at the California Association for Music Education conference in Sacramento in March 2008. Harris specifically requested a piece for small jazz ensemble and wind symphony in an effort to successfully combine these two apparently disparate groups. Open Evidence explores the possibilities inherent in such a musical marriage. The mood of this work ranges from pensive lyricism to propulsive modern jazz, and it concludes with a triumphant and exuberant statement from the full ensemble.”

Centennial Fanfare-March

Roger Nixon (1921-2009) — In memorium

Dr. Roger Nixon passed away on October 13, 2009, at the age of 88. Dr. Nixon was raised in California’s Central Valley towns of Tulare and Modesto. He attended Modesto Junior College and earned his B. A., M. A. and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. His primary teacher was Roger Sessions. He also studied with Sir Arthur Bliss, Ernest Bloch, Charles Cushing, Frederick Jacobi and Arnold Schoenberg. Dr. Nixon served on the music faculty at Modesto Junior College and joined the faculty at San Francisco State College in 1960, where he began a long association with the Symphonic Band and Dr. Edwin C. Kruth, who premiered many of his works.

Dr. Harris writes: “As an undergraduate student at San Francisco State University, I had the opportunity to know Roger Nixon as both a conductor and as a teacher. I vividly remember days when he would run into the symphonic band rehearsal with tiny fragments of manuscript for the band to try a new or revised orchestration for Centennial Fanfare-March. He always made a point of asking the players which they preferred or which felt better to them. He made me aware that the best composers are most interested in the colors, contrasts and emotions, rather than the technical pyrotechnics of music.

“Roger Nixon was a long-time friend to the San Jose Wind Symphony. Throughout the course of the Wind Symphony’s fifty plus years, we have programmed a great many of his wind band compositions. In 2000, the San Jose Wind Symphony’s founder and conductor emeritus, Darrell Johnston, commissioned A Millennium Fanfare by Roger Nixon to open that year’s concert season. We will truly miss this friend, composer, teacher and musician. We are comforted that his spirit will live on through the wonderful music he has provided for wind bands throughout the world.”.

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Program notes are edited by Karen Berry and excerpted from the composers’ notes, Band Notes by Norm Smith, The Pepper Music Catalog and the following sources:

Wikipedia

Carl Fischer Music

University of Florida

Osti Music

carterpann.com

NAXOS

Yale University Bands

aaronlington.com

The Palatine Concert Band

The Peter Warlock Society