Due to the current pandemic situation, the Baylor University Wind Ensemble’s next concert of will be presented without an in-person audience. However, viewers at home will be able to enjoy the performance by going to the School of Music website for an online livestreaming opportunity.
The concert will take place on Monday, February 15, beginning at 7:30 p.m. The conductor of this splendid, 69-member ensemble of woodwinds, brass, and percussion is Baylor’s Director of Bands, J. Eric Wilson.
Opening the program will be anti-Fanfare by American composer Andrew Blair, as conducted by Hannah Morrison, a graduate student from Magnolia, Texas. Blair’s anti-Fanfare was inspired by a music lesson during which his teacher mentioned that he should consider writing a concert opener for woodwinds and percussion only, with no brass instruments. The piece was premiered in January 2020 with the composer conducting.
Next on the program, Dr. Wilson will conduct three innovative pieces by Australian composer Percy Grainger. The Duke of Marlborough Fanfare is based on an eighteenth-century broadside ballad about the Battle of Ramillies (1706) between the English and French. The Duke of Marlborough Fanfare was composed in 1939.
Grainger wrote his Hill Song No. 2 for twenty-four wind instruments in 1907, but he revised its scoring repeatedly until completing the final version in 1946. His plan was to present the fast, energetic elements of Hill Song No. 1 (1902), but without its slower, more dreamy passages.
Shepherd’s Hey was written for full orchestra in 1913 and was premiered on May 3 of that year with the composer conducting. So pleased was Grainger with the orchestral setting that he adapted the tune for concert band in 1918.
This live concert by the Baylor University Wind Ensemble will be streamed from the stage of Jones Concert Hall in the Glennis McCrary Music Building. To join the virtual audience, visit the School of Music website by clicking here.