Reflections on the Mississippi for Tuba and Orchestra (2023)
Mist
Fury
Prayer
Steamboat
Symphony No. 1 in E Minor (1932)
Allegro ma non troppo
Largo, maestoso
Juba Dance, Allegro
Finale: Presto
Matthew Shipes, tuba
INTERMISSION
Michael Daugherty (b. 1954 )
Florence Price (1887-1953)
PROGRAM NOTES
Reflections on the Mississippi for Tuba and Orchestra (2023) (20’) scored for: piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, timpani, percussion, piano, strings and solo tuba
Michael Daugherty was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa in 1954 and is the son of a dance-band drummer and the oldest of five brothers, all professional musicians. As a young man, Daugherty studied composition with many of the preeminent composers of the 20th century including Pierre Boulez at IRCAM in Paris (1979), Jacob Druckman, Earle Brown, Bernard Rands and Roger Reynolds at Yale (1980-82), and György Ligeti in Hamburg (1982-84). Daugherty was also an assistant to jazz arranger Gil Evans in New York from 1980-82. In 1991, Daugherty joined the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance as Professor of Composition, where he is a mentor to many of today’s most talented young composers. He is also a frequent guest of professional orchestras, festivals, universities and conservatories around the world.
Reflections on the Mississippi (2013) for tuba and orchestra was commissioned by the Temple University Boyer College of Music and Dance. The world premiere was given by the Temple University Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Luis Biava, with Carol Jantsch, solo tuba, at Verizon Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on March 24, 2013.
This concerto, composed in memory of my father, Willis Daugherty (1929-2011), is a musical reflection on family trips during my childhood to the Mississippi River near McGregor, Iowa. In July and October 2012, I returned to the Mississippi to make two road trips from McGregor to Hannibal, Missouri. Along the Great River Road I explored small river towns and snapped photographs of scenic river vistas. Local boat owners also guided me to the secluded wildlife havens and murky backwaters of the Mississippi River. All the while, I was collecting sounds, musical ideas and an emotional framework for my tuba concerto.
The tuba concerto is 20 minutes in duration, and in four movements:
In the first movement of the concerto, “Mist,” I reflect on sunrise as seen and heard through a misty haze over the Mississippi River. After an opening ripple, the tuba intones a mystical melody that ascends through shimmering orchestral chords. An ostinato is introduced in a musical canon by percussion, piano and tuba, followed by a dark second theme that rises from the depths of the string section punctuated by woodwinds. At the end of the movement, the ostinato returns in the timpani and is combined with the misty opening melody of the tuba.
The title of the second movement, “Fury,” recalls the turmoil of the Mississippi River in the fiction of William Faulkner and in the history of the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. Like the jarring time shifts in Faulkner’s 1927 novel, The Sound and the Fury, the music I have created consists of dissonant harmonies, turbulent polyrhythms, and clashing 3/4 and 5/4 time signatures performed simultaneously.
In “Prayer,” the third movement, I meditate on the calm mood of the Mississippi River seen from a high vista, overlooking the water as far as the eye can see, as sunset turns into a clear and starry night. Glockenspiel, vibraphone, chimes and piano echo like distant church bells down in the valley, while the tuba plays a lyrical, soulful melody. In a musical flashback, I evoke material from the first movement to remind us of the timeless currents of the Mississippi River.
The final movement, “Steamboat,” conjures up colorful tales from Life on the Mississippi by
PROGRAM NOTES
Mark Twain (1835-1910). Traveling down the Mississippi River, I have composed lively music that follows the gambling steamboats from Twain’s hometown in Hannibal, Missouri, to the final stop in New Orleans. Much as the tuba plays a central role in Zydeco and Second line music of New Orleans, the tuba soloist in my concerto leads a second line of syncopated rhythms that propel the concerto to a virtuosic conclusion.
Florence Price (1887–1953) was a groundbreaking American composer whose life and music tell a powerful story of talent, perseverance, and identity. Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, she showed remarkable musical ability at an early age, giving her first piano recital at just four years old. Her training eventually took her to the New England Conservatory, after which she returned to the South to teach at historically Black colleges. Despite her professional success, racial violence and segregation made life in the Jim Crow South increasingly dangerous, and in 1927 she and her family relocated to Chicago. There, Price became part of a thriving Black musical community, and in 1933 she made history when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed her Symphony No. 1—the first symphony by a Black woman to be played by a major American orchestra.
Chicago marked a creative turning point for Price, as she composed the majority of her more than 300 works while living there. Her music blends the elegance of European classical forms with elements rooted in African American traditions, especially spirituals and dance rhythms, giving her work a distinctive and expressive voice. Although she achieved moments of national recognition, Price continued to face obstacles because of her race and gender. Even so, prominent artists such as Marian Anderson performed and promoted her music. Today, Florence Price is recognized as a vital figure in American music, whose works reflect both artistic mastery and a deeply human response to her time and community.
Like many European symphonies before it—including Dvořák’s well-known New World Symphony—Florence Price’s Symphony No. 1 follows the traditional four-movement design: a bold opening movement, a slow and reflective second movement, a lively dance, and a triumphant finale. This familiar structure would have been immediately recognizable to audiences of her time. What sets the symphony apart, however, is the musical language Price brings to it. While the opening begins with a syncopated bassoon line that gently echoes Dvořák, Price quickly establishes her own voice, shaping the first movement with rich harmonies and expressive melodies drawn from a different cultural tradition.
The second movement is a broad, hymn-like Largo, led by warm brass sounds that unfold with a sense of calm dignity and spiritual depth. In the third movement, rather than a traditional minuet or scherzo, Price introduces a “Juba,” inspired by African American dance rhythms. This movement draws on the lively body percussion and foot-stomping traditions of “pattin’ juba,” once common in Black communities. The symphony concludes with a vibrant rondo, driven by energetic rhythms and melodies built on the pentatonic scale, a sound world familiar from blues and jazz. Together, these elements transform a European symphonic framework into something distinctly American.
Program Notes by Nicholas Han
Matthew Shipes is the Associate Professor of Tuba and Euphonium at The University of Georgia and tubist with the Georgia Brass Quintet. A dedicated advocate of tuba and euphonium performance and pedagogy, Matt has also worked with the International Tuba Euphonium Association (ITEA) as Membership Marketer and Social Media director, communicating with an international audience of enthusiasts, students and professionals.
In 2020 Matt created the first-ever international euphonium mock-band e-competition, Stars and Shipes, engaging over 100 participants from several countries around the world and featuring a judging panel of top euphonium performers from the premier military bands in Washington D.C. over three years.
Matt was a member of The United States Air Force Band in Washington, D.C as a euphoniumist in the Ceremonial Brass, a position he held until 2016. While in the band, he had many opportunities to perform for former President Obama, several foreign leaders, and for hundreds of ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery.
Matt has performed recitals and given masterclasses across the country, including a featured solo recital at the 2019 United States Army Band’s Tuba and Euphonium Workshop. He was also an invited speaker at the 2019 International Tuba and Euphonium Conference (ITEC) at the University of Iowa, and presented his class, “A Guide to Military Band Auditions,” which he has presented at several regional tuba and euphonium conferences as well. He also performed with the American Tuba Quartet, of which he is a founding member, at the 2016 ITEC at the University of Tennessee, and has most recently been a featured soloist and performer at 2022 and 2024 regional ITEA conferences.
Now in his 32nd year at UGA, Mark Cedel brings a wealth of professional experience to his position as Director of Orchestral Activities. Prior to his appointment at UGA, he was Associate Conductor of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra. In his four seasons with that orchestra, he conducted over 200 performances; appearing on every series offered by the orchestra. Before joining the Charlotte Symphony, Cedel was Principal Viola and Assistant Conductor of the Charleston (SC) Symphony Orchestra for nine years. While in Charleston, he served for two seasons as that orchestra’s Acting Music Director. From 1986-1990, he was a member of the artist faculty at the Brevard Music Center and was principal conductor of the Brevard Repertory Training Program.
In addition to directing orchestral activities at UGA, Cedel served as professor of viola from 19942002. During that period he performed, toured, and recorded regularly as extra/substitue viola with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, including its northeast tour with concerts in Carnegie Hall. He returned to teaching viola for the 2009-2010 academic year, while a search was conducted to fill the position.
Cedel has been associated with many orchestras in the southeast. This includes Principal Viola of the South Carolina Chamber Orchestra and the Guest Principal Viola of the Savannah Symphony, and orchestras in Augusta, Macon, and Jacksonville. He has performed with many distinguished conductors such as Claudio Abbado, Leonard Bernstein, Riccardo Muti, Zubin Mehta, Eugene Ormancy, and Carlo Maria Giulini.
Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, Nicholas Han made his conducting debut with The Music & More SummerFest Music Festival in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He earned his Undergraduate degree in Violin Performance at Central Washington University in 2020, and his Masters in Orchestral Conducting at Oklahoma State University in 2023. In 2022, he obtained the position as assistant conductor for the Oklahoma Chamber Symphony and was the Apprentice Conductor for the Oklahoma City Philharmonic in May 2023. He is currently pursuing his Doctoral of Music Arts degree at University of Georgia Athens. Nicholas also held a position as Cover Conductor for the Gwinnett Symphony Orchestra from Fall 2023 to Spring 2025. His recent conducting engagements include guest conducting LA Conducting Workshop and Competition Orchestra and Gwinnett Symphony Orchestra.
Nicholas, over the summer of 2022, was selected as one of 3 winners for the ICWC (International Conducting Workshop and Competition) Competition in Atlanta, Georgia. He was also selected as a 1st place winner and received the Audience Prize in the LA Conducting Workshop and Competition in Garden Grove, California. Nicholas will participate as a Conducting Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival in the summer of 2026, studying with renowned conductors such as Robert Spano, Jane Glover, Leonard Slatkin, and Mark Stringer. His principal mentors include Nikolas Caoile, Thomas Dickey, Alexander Mickelthwate, and Mark Cedel.
VIOLIN I
Jhonni Campos, co-concertmaster
Alexis Boylan, co-concertmaster
Zeyu Yuan
Jocelyne Andronache-Opris
Sarah Nienhiser
Andre Araujo de Souza
Karla Mejias
Ori Kang
Zhije Xu
Sageiana Codispoti
Haohan Yang
Ruhua Zhang
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Simms Murray, principal
Ellis Kim
Mei Takuno
Abigail Kim
Adelmo Gimenez
Briana Darden
Edric Nduwimana
Ahziri Moreno-Martinez
Kiera Johnson
Rea Aiyer
Leo Jahn
Chloe James
Mark Cedel, Conductor
Nicholas Han, Assistant Conductor
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Rachel Liu, co-principal
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Mason Minutella
Vic Jeon
Daniel Boscan
Jodie Stone
Ashley Belcher
Clinton Stempien
Caleb Paradis
Marissa Evans
Zeb Tate
Danielle Chun
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Dorothy Park
Lily White
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Ian Koontz
Kate Selby
David Zoblisein
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Antonio Peirano Acostay
Lana
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Madeline Bower
Peyton Lightcap
Felipe Schutz
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Blair Carrier
Alexia Toma
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Eleanor Love
Tim Fitzgerald
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Caleb Jackson
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Ava Defillipo
Jonah Hammett
Patrick Malone
Ian Welch
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Will Cuneo
Antonio Urias
Jack Rozza
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Ian Wolff
Victor Guevara, bass
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Jack Gordon
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Grayson Pruitt
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