Our country has always been a nation of immigrants. From the earliest settlers to those seeking a better life, all have contributed to this great melting pot of humanity. And all have brought to this land the cultural wealth that has enriched us all. This is what the Bettendorf Park Band will celebrate in its 50th Anniversary Season Opening Concert, Friday, November 3.
Many Italian-Americans came to Iowa to work in the coal mines and settled in southern parts of the state. The Societa Stemma D’Italia, Mutuo Soccorso (Mutual Assistance), established in 1898, included in its articles of incorporation, “The particular and principal objects of the said Society are for the benevolent and charitable purposes to aid and secure the members in case of need and practice benevolent and charity work to all.” The organization exists to this day as Des Moines's Society of Italian Americans. Our tribute to these pioneers is Eduardo Boccalari's Il Bersagliere,the "Italian Riflemen."
Danza Espagnola, by Rosario Carcione pays homage to the large Hispanic communities in the nation and in Iowa. Immigrants from Central and South America have brought their own unique heritage and ethic to make this land a better place. Currently, two men of Hispanic roots serve on the City Council of Dubuque.
Inside St. Wenceslaus Church Spillville, Iowa
Among the most well known of Iowa's immigrant populations are the Bohemians. Early Czech immigrants to Iowa settled in farming communities, most notably at Spillville in the northeast corner of the state. In 1893 the famous Czech composer, Antonin Dvorak, who was living in New York City, spent a summer in Spillville where he was able to work on his music surrounded by his fellow Czechs. A large community would spring forth in Cedar Rapids, now the home of the National Czech and Slovak Museum. Albert Oliver Davis's Bohemian Scene, is a brief three-movement setting of folk pieces, including on reminiscent of the dance music of Dvorak.
Nordic Fest, Decorah (Is that really a marching orchestra?)
Decorah is renowned as Iowa's center of Norwegian heritage. Luther College, an institution of Norwegian-American descent, is among the highly regarded colleges in the country. The Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum is the national Norwegian-American museum and heritage center, with over 24,000 artifacts, 12 historic buildings, a Folk Art School, and a library and archives. Arlin Snesrud's Norwegian Folk Rhapsody uses six folk songs and dance tunes to create a delightful panoply of the sights and sounds of Scandinavia.
Warren Barker' Ireland is a "true Irish medley" with arrangements of "Saint Patrick's Day," "Donnybrook," "The Irish Washerwoman," "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen," and "The Kerry Dance."
Other stops on our musical tour and tribute include:
March Suite Britannia by John Cacavas, a stirring martial suite (Great Britain.)
John Tatgenhorst's arrangement of Scottish folk songs, Gary Owen and Scotland, the Brave.
A three-movement suite entitled Bartok for Band (Hungary.)
The finale from Hector Berlioz's monumental symphony for band, the Marche Triomphale (France.)
Rimsky-Korsakov's stirring Coronation Scene from "Ivan the Terrible" (Russia.)
A return "home" with a march by euphonium virtuoso Russell Alexander, From Tropic to Tropic. (Nearly all of Alexander's compositions are published by Iowa's own C. L. Barnhouse Co., in Oskaloosa.)
The concert takes place at the Herbert T. Goettsch Community Center, 2204 Grant Street in Bettendorf. THIS FRIDAY, November 3 at 7:30 PM. Admission is free. Come and enjoy.
I have had a number of mentors in my conducting training. As a whole, they could be broken down into a few different groups:
Those who refuse to perform transcriptions. "There's too much great original literature written for the wind band; why play a transcription of an orchestral work?" These are usually the wind ensemble guys, and they really don't like marches either.
Those who play transcriptions, transcriptions, and more transcriptions, with a march tossed in for variety. "These are the warhorses that I grew up with; if they are good enough for me, they're good enough for my students! Hrumph!"
Those who fall somewhere in-between. The transcriptions are not "bread and butter" of programming, but are included for reasons to be discussed below.
As conductors, we are products of our education and those teachers who encouraged us to rise up to challenges of the repertoire and to the students in our care. I have been fortunate to study with some of our finest pedagogues in both the short and long terms. Suffice to say, nearly all have been extremely opinionated about one or more facets of our art. That's not necessarily a bad thing, as long as the advice does not force exclusionary tactics into our own teaching and repertoire choices.
Lest I drift away from the point, here is a program of a concert by the John Philip Sousa band:
What fun! Sousa concerts often included overtures that were well-known orchestral works (Berlioz's Roman Carnival was a favorite) or other pieces that had fallen by the wayside. Soloists always appeared: this concert had three(!): the usual cornetist, sometimes a violinist, and always, one of Sousa's "ladies in white" singing a tune or two. Here we have works by Chopin, Sarasate, Percy Grainger, and the "well-known composer," Preston Ware Orem. Sprinkled throughout were a large number of encores, almost always a Sousa march. These were introduced by a lovely young woman who placed a large placard containing the title on an easel. Needless to say, this is much different than standard concert fare.
The Bill Revelli everyone "knew and loved." He and Kruschev probably got along well.
The University of Michigan Symphony Band, as noted in programs from its groundbreaking tour of the Soviet Union in 1961, performed a large number of transcriptions. Just a handful include:
Rimsky-Korsakov: Procession of the Nobles (almost unheard of in orchestra halls)
Respighi: The Pines of Rome
Wagner: "Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral," from Lohengrin
Kabalevsky: Comedian's Galop
The transcription is part of the heritage of the wind band. Audiences in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries couldn't hear the "masterworks" unless they lived near a city large enough to support a symphony orchestra. That left it up to the great touring bands, as well as the burgeoning community band movement, to provide a vital part of America's musical education (and lots of entertainment. Compare the Sousa program above with a typical university band concert:
(from November 2016):
George Friderich (sic) Handel: Music for the Royal Fireworks
D. J. Sparr: Cloud of Witnesses
Michael Daugherty: Reflections on the Mississippi (tuba and wind ensemble)
Henry Brant: Whoopee in D for a very fine orchestra
Morton Gould: Symphony No. 4, West Point
All original works for the contemporary wind band (except Handel). Individually, some excellent moments I am sure, but collectively? I'm trying to figure out if I'd want to shell out money to hear this? And the sacrilege: not a march to be heard.
I have few negatives to offer about the playing of transcriptions unless they sound downright silly. Once I listened to a very talented ensemble perform 1812 Overture about as well as a band probably could. It sounded ridiculous. Berlioz is hard to pull off but Wagner is made for the wind band, and so are works by composers who have been lost to time:
Giuseppe Verdi was composing "marches by the hundreds" long before he aspired to write an opera. Rimsky-Korsakov held a civilian post as Inspector of Naval Bands. There are many more.
It all boils down to one main point. For whom are we playing? Our own egos? Or the (often) paying public? I'm not even suggesting trying to pander to an audience; rather, my axiom is to educate them without knowing it. Fans will show their support in many ways: boisterous applause, stunned silence during which no one wants to break "the moment," and with their feet. It's almost as easy to run them out of the hall if all they hear is esoteric programming. BUT, on the other hand, if you build it, they will come.
As many know, I inhabit a number of different musical worlds, as a teacher, conductor, and erstwhile scholar. But I can even create subsets there, as I have conducted choral, wind, and orchestral ensembles (often, my bands and orchestras forget that I was once a "throat"). There is one big characteristic that the instrumental folk share: they are snobs.
Yes, a number of my orchestra friends look down upon the bands of American. "All they play are marches. No Beethoven symphonies nor Mozart concertos!" AND (horror of horrors) they march--outside! Note to orchestral wind players: you didn't develop all that technique by playing third heckelphone in the Pumpkin Center Philharmonic. Some of the finest wind players on this continent have one thing in common: many played in our Armed Service Bands. And another note: there's more to band than Sousa (for whom I make no apology) and Drum Corps International.
But let's mention, albeit briefly, Sousa marches played by orchestras. They sound ridiculous: the editions are always in the wrong key and the re-scoring lacks any intent of the composer. PLUS, orchestra conductors just play them too damn fast; it's kind of like, "this is easy, let's get it over as quickly as we can."
Then again, lots of band folk, particularly band directors (only the hoity-toity "wind ensemble guys," in their ubiquitous turtle necks, are called "conductor"), refuse to play transcriptions. There are even some--gasp--who refuse to play marches. A couple of years ago, I was glancing through a tour program of what has been (and still is) a fine band program. In the annotations, the conductor (roughly my age) admitted that he's never conducted The Liberty Bell. What?You ask. Seems impossible to me, and--honestly--I would probably never admit to it in public. Wind and orchestra conductors are stuck in the mindset that, if a composition is short and popular, it must be crap. How so not true.
The march is the only musical form indigenous to the wind band; it's as simple as that. Without delving into extreme minutia (as we musicologists are prone to do), let's accept the Britannica definition:
March, originally, musical form having an even metre (in 2/4 or 4/4) with strongly accented first beats to facilitate military marching; many later examples, while retaining the military connotation, were not intended for actual marching. And, let's be honest, they're not just written for military bands: I can think of a march in Beethoven's Eroica symphony and another in Chopin's B-flat minor Sonata. There's the March to the Scaffold (Berlioz), Mendelssohn's Wedding March, and so many more.
But to this conductor--with an occasional turtleneck--there are a limited number of different kinds of marches: concert marches, quick-step marches, funeral marches (and more in this vein) and the be-all and end-all of the genre: the Helluva march.
But let's start with Sousa, who wrote 130-some marches, depending on how one counts. One of his earliest, Revival March (1876) was written for the Philadelphia Orchestra! There are also some others that have been uncovered in steamer trunks with parts strewn everywhere and even one tucked away for decades on the shelves of the Library of Congress. Needless to say, there's a lot more than Stars and Stripes Forever. But exactly what did the old man (and his wife) favor over all the rest?
Sousa's Favorite? It's said to be Semper Fidelis, penned at the end of his career with the U. S. Marine Band, "The President's Own." It's a march without a "dogfight," that ferocious strain tucked in amongst statements of the (frequently) lyrical trio. But Sousa make up for it in that fantastic trio: it's first stated by the trumpets as a kind of bugle call; the second time adds woodwind flourishes, and the third time (!) the low brasses sound forth in a commanding countermelody. Put it all together and it sounds something like this:
Performed by the Tri-State Wind Symphony, Brian Hughes conducting. c. 2015
But what of Mrs. Sousa's favorite? Probably not The Fairest of the Fair, the composition of which was prompted by a pretty girl at one of the Sousa band's concerts. According to the Sousa's daughter Helen, her mother's favorite was The Thunderer, composed in 1889. This performance by "The President's Own." If you've never heard them, sit back and enjoy.
The United States Marine Band, Lt. Col. Jason K. Fettig, conducting. January 2015.
Then there is the "Bohemian Sousa", Julius Fucik. We've done more to bastardize this poor fellow than nearly any other. It has long been a tradition to perform his Entry of the Gladiators under the big top and play it like a galop. That's really too bad, but thanks to the evils of tradition, if it's done right, people will complain, "But it's so slow." So let's go with Florentiner; nah, that one's well known too. Here's one (Fucik's Opus 360--he was a prolific guy) that is one of his least known. But it, like many others here, is a helluva march: Gigantic.
The Quad City Wind Ensemble, Brian Hughes, Conductor. c. 2016
One must include at least one composition of Iowa's march king, Karl, that is. I'll admit that I've not always been a King fan, partly again began one of his best marches is played too fast! Every circus march is not a galop and this one, Barnum and Bailey's Favorite, when approached with the care it deserves (there's a lot going on here), is truly a masterpiece.
The Quad City Wind Ensemble, Brian Hughes, Conductor
Iowa Bandmasters Association Conference, May 2014
We have not even scratched the surface. This link will lead in several directions, but one needs to hear a lot of them to grasp a composer's style. It's kind of like discovering Beethoven; the only real way is by listening to all the string quartets. That's a lot of listening. Instead, visit the U.S. Marine Band website and download the first three volumes of their "Complete Sousa Marches." They've got 55 edited and recorded and--the best part--they're absolutely FREE. Best use of our tax dollars I can think of (besides education).
Here's one more. I offer it just because it's a long time favorite and indicative of a different style: the concert march.
Written for his (and my) music fraternity, here's The Sinfonians, played by the 125-strong UW-Madison University Band, a whole bunch of non-majors. I think they're pretty good.
