Los Alamos Community Winds Artistic Director Ted Vives conducts a recent rehearsal. Courtesy photoThe Los Alamos Community Winds (LACW) would like to invite you to, “Joyride! A Journey in Music” at 7 p.m.Saturday, Feb. 24 at Crossroads Bible Church.
The Winds will perform selections from several renowned composers including Leonard Bernstein, Percy Grainger, Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, John Philip Sousa, Robert W. Smith, Franz von Suppé and Michael Markowski.
In celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s centenary, LACW will continue its season-long performance of Bernstein compositions with Slava!. The first theme of Slava! is a vaudevillian razz-ma-tazz tune filled with slide-slipping modulations and sliding trombones. Theme two is a canonic tune in 7/8 time. A very brief kind of development section follows, after which the two themes recur in reverse order.
The journey in music will continue with Percy Grainger, a passionate arranger of British folk tunes and dances. This program will showcase his Irish Tune from County Derry and Shepherd’s Hey.
In keeping up with tradition, LACW will be playing a march. This concert’s march will feature On Parade, a lesser-known Sousa piece, which was inserted into Goodwin and Stahl’s operetta, The Lion Tamer.
The Community Winds will perform Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, op.35 – IV. The Thief of Baghdad. Listen to a symphonic suite that illustrates the life of Scheherazade, the fabled storyteller of the 1001 Arabian Nights, whose gift for yarnspinning saves her from a murderously misogynistic sultan.
Enjoy the sounds of humpback whales during Smith’s Sounds of Sailor and Sea. This piece celebrates man’s eternal fascination with the sea and the centuries of seamen who have battled its powerful waves and mysterious depths.
Get ready to gallop along to Franz von Suppé’s Light Cavalry Overture. While the operetta is obscure, its overture is one of von Suppé’s best known works. Interestingly, there are no horseborne troops in the story, but there is a group of overweight dancers who are often referred to jokingly as the “light cavalry”.
The concert will highlight Markowski’s Joyride. A contemporary piece that combines the sounds of Short Ride in a Fast Machine and Ode to Joy, which led to its naming.
Coming on April 14t, LACW will feature a special guest pianist, Tomasz Robak. Dr. Robak completed his undergraduate studies at Rice University, graduating magna cum laude with degrees in both piano and philosophy, and a Distinction in Creative Works and Research. He completed a Master of Music degree in piano performance at the Peabody Institute, where he is currently completing a Doctor of Musical Arts degree. In addition to performing, Dr. Robak is a passionate educator. He is a member of the piano faculty at the Peabody Preparatory, is in his fifth year serving as a Graduate Assistant in Keyboard Studies at the Peabody Conservatory.
LACW is formed by volunteers of Los Alamos and the surrounding communities and is actively accepting new wind or percussion musicians. Feel free to contact info@lacw.org for more information.
