The 2016 Gustavus Wind Orchestra, James Patrick Miller, conductor
The Gustavus Wind Orchestra from Gustavus Adolphus College, one of the nation’s most storied collegiate concert bands, will conclude its 2016 concert tour with its Home Concert on Saturday, April 9 at 1:30 p.m. In its second year under the direction of conductor and music director James Patrick Miller, the ensemble will present its Home Concert in Björling Recital Hall. The concert is free and open to the public.
James Patrick Miller succeeded long-time Gustavus Wind Orchestra Conductor Douglas Nimmo in 2014 and came to Gustavus after serving as Director of Wind Studies at the University of Massachusetts. He first joined the Gustavus music faculty in 2008 as the interim conductor of the Gustavus and Vasa Wind Orchestras.
The Gustavus Wind Orchestra was organized as the first music ensemble at Gustavus in 1878 and is recognized as the oldest collegiate ensemble west of the Mississippi. From that beginning 138 years ago, the wind orchestra has grown to earn international acclaim through the quality of its concerts and recordings, as well as its work with world-renowned composers and its national and international touring.
Under the leadership of its artistic directors, the Gustavus Wind Orchestra has focused on building a reputation of quality musicianship while recording and touring extensively throughout the United States, Canada, and abroad. In the 1940s, the ensemble toured with renowned Australian composer Percy Grainger. On its international concert tour in 1990, it was the first American ensemble invited to present a concert in the “open” East Berlin. Concert tours in Scandinavia, Western and Central Europe have followed.
The Wind Orchestra will open the concert with the Dmitri Shostakovich “Waltz” from the Jazz Suite No. 2, followed by Gunther Schuller’s Nature’s Way. The wind orchestra will then feature seniors Mackenzie Burnham, as conductor of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Sea Song, and Rebecca Ihnen, as oboe soloist in Emile Paladilhe’s Concertante Op. 47. This concert will include a performance of Dream Machine, a work commissioned by the band for its College Band Directors National Association debut on February 26, by Gustavus alumna and composer Katherine Johns Bergman ’07. The final work before the intermission will be Philip Sparke’s Fantasy for Euphonium and Concert Band, featuring senior euphonium soloist Iain McCrory.
The percussion section of the Gustavus Wind Orchestra will open the 2nd half of the concert with Brian Mason’s Rochambeaux. The entire ensemble with then return to the stage as senior Laura Johnson conducts Steven Bryant’s Dusk. The concert will conclude with Dr. James Patrick Miller returning to lead the ensemble in Symphony No. 4 by David Maslanka.
This 1:30 p.m. performance on April 9 by the Gustavus Wind Orchestra at Björling Recital Hall is free and open to the public. The public is cordially invited to join the members of the Gustavus Wind Orchestra for this special event concluding its 2016 spring concert tour.