Tag Archives: Concert

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

2018JHCBHalloweenPoster_COLOR

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A Grand Celebration

The Jackson Hole Community Band Celebrates Independence Day at Jackson Lake Lodge

Winter is a distant memory. The snow has melted. Adventurers are rafting down the Snake. Trails are blazing with mountain bikers and hikers. Summer is here! What better way to celebrate than a good ole fashioned patriotic concert!

I couldn’t be more excited for our Jackson Lake Lodge Concert. It’s truly a treat to perform in front of the beauty that is Jackson Lake and Mount Moran. Being so close to Independence Day, this concert will feature some classic American themed music from Henry Fillmore to John Philip Sousa to Aaron Copland. Veterans will have a chance to show their nation’s pride with our “Armed Forces Salute”, which features “The Caisson Song”, “Semper Paratus”, “The Marine Hymn”, “U.S. Air Force Song” and “Anchors Away”.

This concert also features a piece by american cartoonist and xylophonist George Hamilton Green. It’s a jovial rag for wind band and solo xylophone by the name of “Log Cabin Blues”. Somehow, it strikes up the image of a Yellowstone moose somehow making its way into a local’s cabin late at night. The xylophone soloist for this concert will be none other than yours truly. While not too difficult for the band to play, the xylophone solo challenges the player with complex stick movements and long improvisational-like arpeggios.

The program will have a chance to relax with a performance of Gershwin’s “Someone to Watch Over Me”. This performance features our one and only bassoonist, Caitlyn Falco, singing the enchanting lyrics. Caitlyn also sings with the Jazz Foundation of Jackson Hole and everyone in the band is excited to have her display her talent for this concert as well.

It wouldn’t be a Jackson Lake Lodge concert without PDQ Bach. Perhaps the most esteemed wind composer of all time, his works are reminiscent of a day in the life of a musical Mad Hatter. “March of the Cute Little Wood Sprites” is a tale as old as time. As described in the composers notes, “this piece was commissioned by a band of cute little wood sprites…and they were so pleased with the result that after the first performance several members of the troupe, still wearing wings and halos, climbed up on top of the composer and did a jig.” While seemingly a harmless work, this piece has provided the greatest challenge a community band could ever face; SINGING! Displayed at small intervals, community band musicians will have the opportunity to show off their reluctant dedication to the conductor with a few “Laas” and “Do-Waahs” here and there. I have no doubt that this group will use the power of the sprites themselves to pull off a charming display for the audience.

Lastly, our most challenging piece on the program (besides Midway March), “A Copland Tribute”. This piece takes the best parts of this american composer’s vast repertoire and cleverly sews it seamlessly into one piece for wind band. You will hear music from his “Fanfare for the Common Man”, “Simple Gifts” from “Appalachian Spring” and “Buckaroo Holiday” and “Hoe-Down” from “Rodeo”. The setting for this performance couldn’t be more Grand. I’m sure this conductor’s face will light up with majesty when hearing these classic Copland themes with a simultaneous view of Mount Moran. I can’t wait!

Take Care Ya’ll!

-Zach

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A Wrinkle in 3/4 Time

As the season continues, we take the time to reflect on the past. From the dawn of man to the modern day banging of so many percussion instruments. What’s the difference, you ask? Not much. Our upcoming Spring Concert is full of thoughtful moments that reflect upon how far music has come since our caveman roots. From baroque style music like J.S. Bach to impressionist music of Debussy to the classic 1960’s rock n’ roll of the Beatles. There’s so much for the musicians of the community band to learn. And the best part of this learning experience is it’s fun!

It’s amazing to see musicians eyes light up when they listen to the sounds of medieval modal music being infused with an almost ethereal-like quality of sounds from the woodwinds and percussion (bells and bowls!). Of course, what Jackson Hole Community Band concert doesn’t feature a march or two. This concert will once again feature the sounds of Sousa from his Black Horse Troop. Perhaps not the most well known of his marches, but it does bring that classic Sousa feel from the bottom of your tapping foot. But Sousa isn’t the only one claiming the march music spotlight. This concert also features the music of Paul Hindemith’s Symphonic Metamorphosis. Originally a four movement piece, the community band is playing the ambitiously difficult, yet thrilling march movement. Based off of a piano duet composed by Carl Maria Von Weber, Hindemith is a master at transposing the somewhat simple dimensions of two pianos to an entire orchestra, or in this case wind band.

The expanded percussion section, how many faces do you recognize? (Click for larger view.)

Perhaps the most fascinating of pieces lined up for this Spring Concert is a piece by Texas resident John Mackey. His piece, Foundry, shows how much he loves percussion. As the name implies, this piece is a gritty, mechanical piece that features a multitude of percussion instruments. What makes this piece so special to the musicians of the band is it’s need for more percussion players from different sections of the winds. When offered the opportunity, members of the trumpet, saxophone and flute sections offered to chip in their help with the percussion section. This piece represents the future of percussion music and it’s many fascinating colors.

As conductor of the band, I can’t be more excited for our epic journey through time! When April 21st arrives, it will be impossible to wipe the joyous grin from this conductors face! I hope you dear readers will be smiling along with me!

Ciao!

-Zach Singer

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