Tag Archives: Concert

Announcing our Spring Concert

Back to Basics ~ performing a pre-pandemic concert in a post-pandemic world.

Announcing our Spring Concert ~ performing a pre-pandemic concert in a post-pandemic world.

This year’s Spring Concert features a program that was planned two years ago, but was never performed. The subtitle of this concert is “Back to Basics”. Not only is the band playing a straight-forward wind ensemble concert with no obvious theme, but they’re also going back to performing a pre-pandemic concert in a post-pandemic world. 

Highlights of our upcoming concert include a piece by Percy Grainger called “Lincolnshire Posy”. Grainger was an interesting fellow and his music reflects that. He wanted music to reflect nature and have a free-flowing sense of time, which is why you’ll often hear lots of meter changes in his music. The second movement of “Lincolnshire Posy” is a great example of this free flow in time because the melody is not strictly in common time or a basic meter throughout the movement. 

Another highlight of this concert is a selection called “Alligator Alley” by Michael Daugherty. Daugherty is a modern day composer who incorporates pop culture into his music, such as “Dead Elvis” or “Metropolis Symphony” (the story of Superman). “Alligator Alley” is the nickname for a stretch of highway between Naples and Ft. Lauderdale in Florida’s Everglades National Park. Daugherty composed this music to celebrate the management of the National Park Service in preventing poachers from hunting alligators. Listen for the snap of the alligator from the whip player when you see this performance!

Announcing our Spring Concert ~ performing a pre-pandemic concert in a post-pandemic world.

One last piece of music I’d like to showcase is Shostakovich’s “Waltz No. 2”, which has been arranged for wind ensemble by Johan de Meij. You may have heard of this famous waltz in Kubrick’s movie “Eyes Wide Shut” or the holiday classic “Bad Santa”. It was composed as a part of Shostakovish’s “Suite for Variety Orchestra”. In the original orchestral version, it included alto saxophone, which is not an instrument that normally plays in orchestra. It’s great to hear Meij’s band arrangement because the sax part is now accompanied by wind instruments that match the tone quality of that instrument.

There are eight other pieces that will be performed for this year’s Spring Concert. Please come see our concert this May 1st at the Center for the Arts main stage at 4:30PM. 

Best,

Zach Singer


A Night at the Movies: The Sequel!

Free Concert! 07:00 pm – Sunday, May 05, 2019 at the Center for the Arts

True Believers,

I can’t wait for Spring Concert this year! I’ve been itching to do a movie themed concert ever since I became the conductor of the community band. The last movie themed concert performed by the band was in 2016 with Jennifer Levanduski conducting. That concert featured such classics as “Officer Krupke” from “West Side Story”, the theme from “The Godfather” and music from “Tombstone”. Just like Hollywood, I wanted to do that concert again, but bigger! This concert features only music that has been found in movie sequels, hence the title of our concert, “A Night at the Movies: The Sequel!”

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All of the music selections feature music from movies that have sequels.  Movies like “Jurassic Park”, “Superman”, “Star Wars” and “Back to the Future” have many sequels and feature their main themes in all of them. Some of the more obscure movie sequels in our concert include “Blue Danube Waltz” from “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “Wizard of Oz”. Some might remember their respective sequels, “2010: The Year We Make Contact” and “Return to Oz”. “Return to Oz” might be one of my favorite sequels to a beloved classic because of it’s very dark tone and memorable scary moments. Some of our selections will feature themes that are only found in their sequels, such as “Yoda’s Theme” from “Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back” and music from “Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers”.

To celebrate our 30 year birthday we have invited our founding conductor, Don Cushman, to conduct a special piece.

This concert is going to be a blast! All of the musicians have been working real hard to bring the power of cinema to your ears. I can’t wait to see you at The Center Theater on Cinco De Mayo!

Excelsior!

-Zach

Continue reading A Night at the Movies: The Sequel!

Lions & Elephants & Swans…

OH MY! Free Halloween Concert for the Kids.
October 27, – 3:00pm Teton Village, WY at Walk Festival Hall

This is my favorite time of the year. The leaves have changed colors. The wind is howling. All manner of superstitious creatures are making their way out of the shadows. Halloween season is here!

Jackson Hole Community Band 2017 Halloween Concert

To celebrate, the Community Band is performing it’s annual Halloween Concert for the Kids at Walk Festival Hall. Children, adults, and musicians will be dressing up as their favorite characters and listening to the haunting sounds of winds and percussion. We’ll be playing such classic Halloween tunes such as Danse Macabre, Bach’s Toccata and Fugue and music from the movies Dark Shadows and Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Special Appearance by Dancers Workshop Student Performers
This year will also feature a collaboration with Dancers Workshop. Our performance of Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals will have Lions, Elephants, and Swans dancing alongside the band. I would like to thank school director, Eric Midgley, for organizing and rehearsing the dancers for this event.

Sammy Douville (flute) & Jason Wright (saxophone) at the 2017 concert

It wouldn’t be a Halloween concert without our Addams Family sing-a-long. Audience members will be singing the classic tune at the end of the show with a guest singer to lead them. We’ll also invite costumed kids to march their way along the stage to the militant sounds of Gustav Holst’s Mars from his most famous work The Planets. After the show, children will have the opportunity to seek local Teton Village businesses for some trick-or-treat candy.

This year’s Halloween concert is shaping up to be the most challenging and fun that I have ever conducted. I can’t wait to see the ghouls and goblins make their way to the show and have a haunting time!

Boo!

-Zach

Flutes Anna Senecal & Noah Osnos 2017

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