Conductors' Notes
Joanna Giordano, String Orchestra This concert program focuses on works by American composers and showcases various moments in American music history. The technique featured in Blue Fire Fiddle r transports the listener back to the very origins of this country in the early 1600s, when settlers played fiddle tunes. Soon Hee Newbold’s fiery melody of sixteenth notes and double stops races ahead atop a sturdy foundation of pizzicato in the lower strings. Next up we have two movements from Serenade for Strings by composer Norman Leyden, who began his professional music career playing bass clarinet in the New Haven Symphony Orchestra. The third movement “Nocturne” uses the unconventional, asymmetrical meter of 5/4 time. It opens and closes with a gentle melody for solo violin which is then passed throughout the orchestra. The fourth movement “Cakewalk,” is anything but what the title suggests. A syncopated rhythmic motif punctuates throughout the movement, with constant changes in dynamic and tonality keeping the listener on their toes. Leyden craftily weaves in melodic material from the first and third movements of Serenade for Strings in the violins as the rhythmic ostinato chugs along in the lower strings. Next we turn to It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing) , a jazz standard by Duke Ellington and Irving Mills representing a quintessentially American genre of music. Our musicians have greatly enjoyed learning this famous tune, with its “blue” notes, scat rhythms, and dramatic articulations. The final piece of our summer program, Warrior Legacy by Soon Hee Newbold, is emblematic not only of the legacy of the United States but also of the WCYO as we celebrate our 20th anniversary. Warrior Legacy opens with a bold and foreboding ostinato followed by a solemn but hopeful melody. The piece transitions into a lively compound meter and finishes in bold, dramatic fashion. However, the most exciting thing about Warrior Legacy is the collaboration between our String Orchestra and our Wind Ensemble–an opportunity that these musicians have greatly enjoyed.
Albert Montecalvo, Wind Ensemble
Warrior Legacy I am happy to combine the Wind Ensemble with the String Orchestra for Warrior Legacy. Because of the differences of beginning string and band instruments such as key signatures, transpositions and fingerings it is often not until high school or beyond that these two instrument groups combine together in an ensemble. Thank you to WCYO for giving me the opportunity to conduct these two groups today and also to Joanna Giordano for preparing the String Orchestra so well. Encanto This is the shortened version of Encanto. I thought of it as a musical "appetizer" for the longer 10 minute Gershwin "main entree" which follows. As usual, Robert W. Smith makes great musical sense despite the complex meter and rhythmic intricacies of this little gem.
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