Review: Band's sounds of the season

By Pamela J. Marshall
Submitted to the Concord Journal

The highlight of the Concord Band's Winter concert was Colours by Roger Cichy, written in 1997. The band has commissioned Cichy for its 50th anniversary concert in March 2009, and throughout this season, Music Director William McManus has been introducing this composer to band members and audiences by programming some of his other music. Colours is a challenging, complex work with flavors of a big-band jazz sound.

The piece has six short movements, each named after a color with a suggestive mood, such as mauve, dark ivy, amber. At the opening, a fast fanfare motive was passed among the sections — trumpets, horns, woodwinds — and everyone executed these technical passages with panache. The second movement included a bluesy introduction of parallel chords and a modal melody with lovely ornaments, played with expression by the piccolo and saxophone. The third movement was strongly reminiscent of Bernstein's West Side Story and there was crisp playing from the percussion section. The big band feeling got stronger in the fifth movement with a sax solo that could have been in a James Bond movie; the performer appropriately over-dramatized it with lots of vibrato, making me smile. The last movement was up-tempo, full of irregular rhythms and rich, dark harmonies and the brass really wailed at the climax.

Guest Artist Spotlight: Ethan Sloane

Guest Artist Ethan Sloane
clarinet

Clarinetist Ethan Sloane, Professor of Music at Boston University, earned his Bachelor of Music degree at New England Conservatory, and Masters and Doctorate degrees at Yale University. He has taught at Mannes College of Music (New York), University of Northern Iowa, University of Victoria, and West Virginia University, as well as Boston University. Among his many awards and honors, he has served as Executive Assistant to the Director of the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University and was a member of the artistfaculty of the California Music Center. In 1976, he won First Prize at the Ars Vivus Chamber Music Competition. In 1980, Professor Sloane was the regional chair of the International Clarinet Society. Professor Sloane has been an artist-clinician for the G. Leblanc Corporation, and in 1981 he was awarded a Martha Baird Rockefeller Grant. He has presented numerous recitals, including performances at Merkin Hall (New York City), the National Gallery of Art, the California Music Center, Kenyon College, Washington Jefferson College, and Queen Elizabeth Playhouse (Vancouver, BC).

Professor Sloane has played concerts with the Pacific Wind Quintet and has performed at the Marlboro Music Festival. He is a former principal clarinetist of the Symphony of the United Nations, the Festival Orchestra of New York, and the New Haven Symphony. He has been a member of the Empire Trio of New York since 1973. He founded the Hampden-Sydney Music Festival (Virginia ) in 1980 and still serves as the Artistic Director of this prestigious chamber music festival. He was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters by Hampden-Sydney College in 1991. Professor Sloane has been in his present position at Boston University since 1984.

Ethan Sloane has enjoyed a long and prominent career as performer, recording artist, teacher, and arts administrator. As soloist and recitalist he has appeared extensively throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. Much in demand as a chamber musician, Dr. Sloane has produced recordings both on CD and for National Public Radio. His devotion to the extensive solo and chamber music literature for clarinet has earned critical acclaim, and his editions of masterworks by Brahms and Mozart have received wide acceptance.

Winter Concert Continues 50th Anniversary Celebration

The Concord Band will present its annual Winter Concert at 51 Walden Street in Concord on Saturday, March 1, 2008, beginning at 8:00 pm. As part of a two year celebration of its 50th Anniversary, the Concord Band is featuring performances of its favorite commissioned works at each major concert. The celebration will climax with the band’s 50th Anniversary Concert in March, 2009. Last fall, the Band began this two-year celebration with performances of two of its commissions—Satiric Dances by Norman Dello Joio and Dichotomy– Impressions of Kerouac by Dan Lutz. The Winter concert will feature compositions the Concord Band commissioned by composers Warren Barker and James Curnow. The concert will also feature guest soloist Ethan Sloane, Professor of Clarinet at Boston University.

The concert will open under the baton of Music Director Dr. William G. McManus with a performance of Triumphant Entrance, composed for the Concord Band by Warren Barker in 1991, and an appropriate selection among the numerous works the Concord Band has performed by this outstanding composer/arranger over the years. The Concord Band’s Assistant Conductor, Paul Berler will take the podium to lead the Band in a performance of Gustav Holst’s First Suite in Eb. This masterwork for band, one of the most popular works in the entire concert band repertoire, is generally regarded as a cornerstone of the great works for band by British composers.

Music Director McManus will return to the stage with clarinetist Ethan Sloane for a performance of Carl Maria von Weber’s Concertino, Op. 26 for clarinet. This concerto is one of the great treasures of the clarinetist’s repertoire and was one of the works that established the clarinet as a leading instrument for the expression of Romantic music. The von Weber Concertino remains today as among the most popular solo pieces for the clarinet.

The first half of the concert will conclude with a performance of From Every Horizon, a tone poem for band by Norman Dello Joio, who composed the very first Concord Band commission, Satiric Dances, in 1975. From Every Horizon is a version of a score done for a film of the same title that was shown at the New York World’s Fair in 1964-65. Dello Joio arranged this exciting work into three short movements which musically portray scenes in New York City.

Assistant Conductor Paul Berler will open the second half of the concert with William Walton’s great concert march, Crown Imperial. This march, typically English in its majestic sonority and stately elegance, was first performed at the coronation ceremony for King George VI, in 1937.

Music Director William McManus will return to the podium with Colours, a six-movement suite for band by Roger Cichy. This is an impressionistic work with each of its six movements representing a particular color. The Concord Band has commissioned Roger Cichy to compose a new work in honor of the Band’s 50th Anniversary. The concert will close with a performance of James Curnow’s Welsh Variants, which was commissioned by the Concord Band and premiered on October 22, 1988, in Sentry Center Auditorium in Concord with the composer conducting.