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The East Central University Symphonic Band and the Wind Ensemble will perform in concert at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday [MARCH 8] in the Ataloa Theatre in the Hallie Brown Ford Fine Arts Center. Dr. Allen Correll conducts both groups.

The Symphonic Band will open with “An Irish Rhapsody” by Clare Grundman, a setting that contains six songs of Ireland, including the typical jig tune “Shepherd’s Lamb Reel” and the popular “Cockles and Mussels.

” Next will be “Michael Jackson: Through the Years,” arranged in 2009 by Michael Brown. The setting for concert band displays the variety and depth of music spanning Jackson’s career from his early days with the Jackson 5 through his association with Quincy Jones. Included are “I Want You Back,” “I’ll Be There,” “Rock With You,” “Thriller” and “Man in the Mirror.”

Two guests will play trombone with the Wind Ensemble, retired band directors Dean Coale and Frank Zugelder. Zugelder also is the director of ECU’s Brass Choir.

The Wind Ensemble will perform the “March” from “Symphonic Metamorphosis” by Paul Hindemith and transcribed for concert band by Keith Wilson. Its form is somewhat different from that of a standard march.

Dr. Steven Walker, ECU professor of music, will sing the tenor solo as the Wind Ensemble plays “Bell-Piece” (Ramble on John Dowland’s “Now, O now I needs must part”), with Rudy Lupinski on piano. It is based partly on Grainger’s piano solo transcription of the same Dowland melody. In terms of harmony, this Ramble is considered to be one of Grainger’s finest achievements.

In the version for voice and wind band he added a “tail-piece” which calls for an independent “bell” part, written for his wife Ella to play at various performances. During his last years, Correll said, Grainger would sing this song every night before going to bed.

The Wind Ensemble will close with “Ghost Train” by Eric Whitacre.

“The legend of the Ghost Train, a supernatural machine that roars out of the night through forgotten towns and empty canyons, is deeply rooted in American folklore, and it was this spirit I worked to capture,” Whitacre has written.

The piece depicts a steam engine train coming to a roaring halt and the passengers departing at the station before building up steam and slowly and gracefully departing. Then, the train blazes across the countryside, “moonlight glistening off its dark steel,” and ends with a final, heroic tribute to trains and the people who worked them.

 

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