Concerts
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OU Band Alumni Association
Concerts
Wind Symphony with David Maslanka on Tuesday
The OU Wind Symphony's first concert of the fall semester arrives Tuesday at 8:00 PM in Sharp Hall, in the Catlett Music Center on the OU campus. It's not your ordinary concert, though, because it features Symphony No. 4 by David Maslanka at the end of a four-day stint as composer-in-residence at the University of Oklahoma.
Wind and percussion groups around the country often perform Maslanka's work. If you've attended OU symphonic wind concerts over the past several years, you've heard some of his pieces, including the haunting A Child's Garden of Dreams (in 2007), portions of his Symphony No. 2 (in 2006), and the two-movement Give Us This Day: Short Symphony for Wind Ensemble (in 2008). His complete works for wind ensemble include several concerti, three symphonies (with three more in progress), Testament (written in response to the events of 9/11), and many more.
Mr. Maslanka is spending several days at the OU School of Music, teaching a series of master classes and rehearsals on his work with OU wind, percussion, and composition students. Many of these are in Sharp Hall, and all of those are open to the public and have been added to our Events calendar. These include two master classes on Symphony No. 4 with the OU Wind Symphony under Dr. Wakefield (one Sunday night at 8:00 PM, the other Monday at noon), a composition and advanced orchestration master calss on Tuesday at noon, followed by a master calss with solo marimba performances of My Lady White and Variations on Lost Love, and a rehearsal with the OU Percussion Orchestra (conducted by Dr. Lance Drege) on Crown of Thorns, a Maslanka piece the OU Percussion Orchestra commissioned and premiered in 1991 under Dr. Gipson.
The residency culminates in two Sutton Series concerts in Sharp Hall. On Monday night at 8:00, the CanAm Piano Duo (Karen Beres and Christopher Hahn), with percussionists Lance Drege and David Steffens, perform three pieces, including their Maslanka commissioned piece This is the World We Know, the world of air and breathing and sun and beating hearts. You can see other details in the poster on the right (click on it for a printable PDF version of your own).
On Tuesday night, Maslanka's Symphony No. 4 anchors the OU Wind Symphony in concert. The program includes William Walton's Crown Imperial (a personal favorite), Ron Nelson's Morning Alleluias for the Winter Solstice, and Karl King's march, The Melody Shop, written when the composer was just 19 and featuring a difficult euphonium solo in the trio. (There's somewhat of a funny story behind that.)
Admission to each Sutton Series concert is $8, or $5 for students, faculty, staff, and senior citizens. Both Maslanka concerts are to be streamed live from the OU School of Music, so feel free to listen from home if you can't be there. (Some of the rehearsals or master classes may be streamed as well, but since those things usually aren't done with microphones, I don't really know.)
There's also a Symphony Band and Concert Band concert on Thursday, February 25, in Sharp Hall, with several familiar band pieces by Grainger, Nelson, and Sousa; I'll post more about that next week. In the meantime, it's wonderful that Mr. Maslanka is spending so many days at OU this week giving the students insights into his works and their complexities. We hope to see you there Tuesday night for the concert!
Posted by Webmaster on 2/20/10; 3:04:59 PM from the Concerts, OU Music dept.
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