11.15.23 Crane Concert Band

Evening Concert Series Helen M. Hosmer Concert Hall

2023 – 2024 Season Wednesday, November 15th at 7:30 PM

Crane Concert Band Jill A. Roberts, conductor The Hounds of Spring (1981)

Alfred Reed (1921-2005)

Vesuvius (1999)

Frank Ticheli (b. 1958)

Dusk (2004)

Steven Bryant (b. 1972)

Mother Earth (A Fanfare) (2012)

David Maslanka (1943-2017) Intermission

Islas y Montañas (2001) Tocata (Fanfare) Volver a la Montaña (Return to the Mountain) Seis Manuel (Dance in Puerto Rican Style) La Tumba de (the tomb of) Alejandro Garcia Caturla Ride (2003)

Shelley Hanson (b. 1951)

Samuel Hazo (b. 1966)

CONCERT BAND PERSONNEL Piccolo Julia Taylor Flute Emma Scionti * Morgan Lorey Liz Combs Catherine Keach Kayla Sumberg Paige Bourgeois Oboe Amara Leitner * Molly Murphy * English Horn Molly Murphy Eb Clarinet Paige Krebs Clarinet Gianna Magrino * Ainsley Hipp Paige Krebs Emily Oldfield Connor Martin Elliott Brock McKenna Hickey Lance Frayler Sam McManus Bass Clarinet Ethan Feuer Julia Saxby Savana Angulo

Alto Saxophone Kevin Hyppolite* Kennedy Royal Jack Burley Madison Valenti Crystal Machuca Robinson Correa

Horn Haley Sullivan * Grace Zimlinghaus Anthony Bruno Will Kirk Hannah Shufelt

Tenor Saxophone Chris Kolowski

Trombone Elliott Borden * Julien Herschkowitz

Baritone Saxophone Jack Orrange

Bass Trombone Ian Bailey

Trumpet Casey Asaro * Nick Bedell * Ethan Cobey Sophie Mejia Caiden Cook Zoe Fragapane Zach Rulison Michael Panella Michael Morra Johnny Smith Donny Anderson Joshua Buessem Jaydon Ceron Santana Stephanie Lamb

Euphonium Josh Coldren * Casey DeJesus-Webb

Librarians Ashley Colucci Kayla Outman

Tuba Zach Barstow * Noah Somers Matt Smith Matthew Deutscher Isabella Santoli String Bass Jorge Hernandez Percussion Drew Spina * Luke-Coyne Connolly * Angel Ren Tyler Schmitt Elijah Sutton *Denotes principal or co-principal

PROGRAM NOTES The Hounds of Spring

Alfred Reed

“When the hounds of spring are in winter's traces,” a magical picture of young love in springtime, forms the basis for the present purely musical setting, in traditional three-part overture form, of this lovely paean... an attempt to capture the twin elements of the poem, exuberant youthful gaiety and the sweetness of tender love, in an appropriate musical texture.

The poem, a recreation in modern English verse of an ancient Greek tragedy, appeared in print in 1865, when the poet was 28 years old. It made Algernon Swinburne literally an overnight success.

Program Note by Alfred Reed

Vesuvius

Frank Ticheli

Mt. Vesuvius, the volcano that destroyed Pompeii in A.D. 79, is an icon of power and energy in this work.

Originally I had in mind a wild and passionate dance such as might have been performed at an ancient Roman bacchanalia. During the compositional process, I began to envision something more explosive and fiery. With its driving rhythms, exotic modes, and quotations from the Dies Irae from the medieval Requiem Mass, it became evident that the bacchanalia I was writing could represent a dance from the final days of the doomed city of Pompeii.

Program Note by Frank Ticheli

Dusk

Steven Bryant

This simple, chorale-like work captures the reflective calm of dusk, paradoxically illuminated by the fiery hues of sunset. I'm always struck by the dual nature of this experience, as if witnessing an event of epic proportions silently occurring in slow motion. Dusk is intended as a short, passionate evocation of this moment of dramatic stillness. Dusk is part of a three-work “night cycle,” continuing with The Marbled Midnight Mile and concluding with First Light.

Program Note by Steven Bryant

Mother Earth (A Fanfare)

David Maslanka

Mother Earth was composed for the South Dearborn High School Band of Aurora, Indiana, Brian Silvey, conductor. The commission was for a three-minute fanfare piece. Each piece takes on a reason for being all its own, and Mother Earth is no exception. It became an urgent message from Our Mother to treat her more kindly! My reading at the time of writing this music was For a Future to be Possible by the Vietnamese monk and teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh. He believes that the only way forward is to be extremely alive and aware in our present moment, to become awake to the needs of our beloved planet, and to respond to it as a living entity. Music making allows us to come immediately awake. It is an instant connection to the powerful wellspring of our creativity, and opens our minds to the solution of any number of problems, including that of our damaged environment. My little piece does not solve the problem! But it is a living call to the wide-awake life, and it continues to be performed by young people around the world.

Program Note by David Maslanka

Islas y Montañas (Islands and Mountains)

Shelley Hanson

Tocata (the Spanish spelling of the familiar Italian word) is a fanfare based on the music of the Caribbean people of African descent.Many traditional rhythms of the Santeria religion are incorporated in this piece.

Although “toccata” is the word used in Spanish for “fanfare,” it is also used here in the sense of its root meaning, “touch.”

Volver a la Montaña (Return to the Mountain) is based on several folk tunes of the Quechua (“Inca”) people of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. Near the end of the movement, the folk song Séparacion (Separation)is quoted briefly. The Quechua people have had a to leave their villages forever because of the economic difficulty of trying to maintain their traditional mountain lifestyle.

The movement opens with a stately processional, followed by a fast dance that uses the characteristic Latin American alternation or simultaneous appearance of two- and three-beat patterns. In the return to the processional theme near the end of the movement, muted trumpets echo the flutes, as sound would echo in the mountains.

Seis Manuel (Dance in Puerto Rican Style) is movement 3 of the 4 movement suite. The seis is the traditional song and dance form of the Jibaro people, the peasant farmers of the mountains of Puerto Rico.

At least 50 distinctive types of seis have been identified. “Seis” means “six” in Spanish; the term originally meant a dance for six men or six couples. This movement SEIS MANUEL, is based on a traditional recurring harmonic pattern called the seis mapéyé, over which a singer improvises a melody. Because of the very long history of military bands in Puerto Rico, with a particular importance placed on low brass and clarinets, those instruments are given solos. In keeping with the Puerto Rican tradition of naming a seis after someone important to its creation, this SEIS was re-named in honor of conductor Manny Laureano, who commissioned and premiered the piece.

La Tumba de Alejandro Garcia Caturla: In the tradition of the French tombeau (literally tomb), a memorial piece, this piece pays tribute to composer Alejandro Garcia Caturla by incorporating many of the elements of his style. Fascinated with Afro-Cuban music and especially that of the Santeria religion, Caturla used complex folk rhythms, polytonality, dissonant chords often built in fourths or fifths, pentatonic scales, and a very limited melodic range such as that used by Santeria singers. Caturla only occasionally used authentic folk melodies, preferring to compose his own. Much of his output is intended programmatically to evoke Afro-Cuban themes and his affection for the music of Debussy, Ravel, and Stravinsky is sometimes evident.

The Spanish equivalent term, “tumba,” also is used for the large conga drum. Programmatically, this tumba seeks to intermingle the tragic loss of Caturla, with references to the Santeria bembé, funeral rites, and particularly the characteristics of the goddess Oya. She is the goddess of the wind, and of the cemetery; she can be the gentlest of breezes, or the largest of hurricanes. Traditional poetry of praise to Oya refers to her as the one who guards the frontier between life and death; she can be a nine-headed apparition, associated with nine flashes of lightning, but “if there’s a whirling beat, she’ll dance to it.” The first part of the piece depicts mourners calling out to Oya and the fast section that follows shows the results of her appearing to them in earthly form. The ending refers to the conclusion of the Santeria mourning process, which involves taking a plate outside and publicly smashing it nine times to free the spirit of the deceased. Musically some of Oya’s rhythms are quoted, as is the Christian Dies Irae; and the two eight-bar themes on which the piece is built incorporating a rising interval of a fourth associated with an invocation to Oya, as well as the initials AGC. Program Note by Shelley Hanson

Ride

Samuel Hazo

Ride was written as a gesture of appreciation for all of the kind things Jack Stamp has done for me, ranging from his unwavering friendship to his heartfelt advice on composition and subjects beyond.

In late April of 2002, Jack had invited me to take part in a composer's forum he had organized for his students at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Following the first day of the forum, Jack invited all of the composers to his house, where his wife Lori had prepared an incredible gourmet dinner. Since I didn't know how to get to Jack's house from the university, he told me to follow him. So he and his passenger, Mark Camphouse, began the fifteen-minute drive with me behind them. The combination of such an invigorating day as well as my trying to follow Jack at the top speed a country road can be driven, is what wrote this piece in my head in the time it took to get from the IUP campus to the Stamp residence. Ride was written and titled for that exact moment in my life when Jack Stamp's generosity and lead foot were equal in their inspiration as the beautiful Indiana, Pennsylvania, countryside blurring past my car window.

Program Note by Samuel Hazo