It’s been a whirlwind of a Midwest Clinic this year! I arrived early (Tuesday), but took things easy at first to stay fresh for my presentation: The Magic of Singing with Your Band on Wednesday at 4:30 – more on that later. I stayed through Thursday, leaving Friday morning. Here are some of my highlights:

WEDNESDAY

This day began for me with the Orquestra de Sopros ESML (Lisbon School of Music Wind Orchestra), directed by Alberto Roque. This Portuguese band had a great blended, transparent sound. Their program looked like this:

Rapsódia em Fado – Joaquim Luiz Gomes – a Romantic tune with obvious Iberian dance roots

Pendulum (mvts. II and V) – Steven Bryant – full of rhythm, color, and energy. Movement II is essentially a lullaby, and movement V recalled Benson’s Solitary Dancer for me.

Cyprian Suite (mvt. IV) – Carol Barnett – a lively 7/8 dance

Winter Blossom (mvts. II and III) – Xi Wang – hints of minimalism and some purposeful dissonance give this piece a sublime beauty

Commando March – Samuel Barber – a morale booster from the World War II era, and Barber’s only original wind band work

That was the only concert I saw on Wednesday. I would have liked to catch the early morning US Air Force Band Chamber Ensembles, as well as the evening US Air Force Band full concert, but events surrounding my afternoon presentation dominated the day.

At 4:30pm, I presented “The Magic of Singing with Your Band” to a patient, generous, and LARGE crowd. You can see the rehearsal clips I used on the YouTube playlist below. Essentially, I advocate for using some limited vocal techniques in rehearsal in order to improve many different aspects of ensemble playing.

THURSDAY

This was concert day! I saw 4 terrific groups.

The day began with the Wando High School Symphonic Band, directed by Bobby Lambert. These guys put my singing suggestions to shame with their fully solfeged chorale warm-up. They had a clear and carefully balanced sound that allowed for every detail of their repertoire to come through. You can see their full rep here. The highlights for me were the newer repertoire. Aaron Perrine’s Life Painting put 3 percussionists on brushes in front of the band, and used them to add a special sheen to his gorgeous, gestural lyric writing. Leslie Gilreath’s In Memoriam 1619 was a portrait of how slavery led to Gullah culture in South Carolina (this band’s home state), complete with chain sounds, obvious struggle, and a recurring clash of major and minor modalities in the same key. The concert ended with Omar Thomas’s Come Sunday (mvt. II), which is essentially a virtuosic gospel party groove piece for band. In several spots, it asks sections of the band to stand up for a feature while the groove continues joyously in the background. At the end of each of these, the audience clapped. I had a strongly positive emotional reaction to this clapping – I felt like Thomas sort of tricked the audience into doing it with such strong stylistic cues. In other words, he recreated a gospel scene so successfully, and made the section features so exciting, that we couldn’t help but clap. I wasn’t alone in feeling moved by this piece – it was announced later that afternoon that Come Sunday was the winner of the 2019 NBA/Revelli composition prize.

At 11:30, the Eleanor Roosevelt High School Bands, directed by Rachel Zephir, presented a concert of chamber pieces in varying instrumentations. The wonderful variety of both ensembles and levels on this concert was bookended by selections from Reynaldo Hahn’s Le bal de Beatrice d’Este and John Mackey’s Songs from the End of the World. All of the various ensembles played with wonderful sensitivity and clarity, and it was refreshing to see a new approach to a Midwest performance. I was also gratified to see my name in the program – they used my program notes for the Hahn. Thanks, Rachel Zephir and crew, for making me a tiny part of your outstanding performance!

After lunch, I saw the Claudia Taylor “Lady Bird” Johnson High School Wind Ensemble, directed by Jarrett Lipman and Alan Sharps. Their concert program featured a beautiful portrait of Lady Bird Johnson on the front, and their music was carefully chosen to reflect her values. The highlights for me came towards the end, featuring some more traditional music. Playing Karl King’s Melody Shop, the entire euphonium section came to the front for the obbligato during the trio, which they had gloriously memorized. One of them stayed in front for the following piece, an arrangement of Puccini’s Nessun Dorma, which began with the euphonium in the lead. This was but a prelude to some truly mature, musical playing by the entire ensemble.

Although I would have loved to see the Louisville Wind Ensemble, I opted instead for the clinic “No Oboes? No Problem!” which explored chamber wind repertoire for grade IV and below that works with limited or flexible instrumentations. The panel included conductors Melanie Brooks, Cassie Bechard, Langston Hemenway, and Luke Johnson, as well as composers Aaron Perrine and Kevin Walczyk. This featured too many new works to name, and the panelists continue to work to generate new repertoire in this vein. They can be found under the handle Artistic Winds at both Facebook and Twitter. Interestingly, I was called “band royalty” during this session, which I appreciate, but dispute.

The day ended with the the Hikarigaoko Girls’ High School Wind Orchestra from Okazaki, Japan, directed by Kentaro Hino. I have come to expect superb musicianship from Japanese bands over years of attending Midwest and other conferences, and this group only raised that bar. They began with Rossano Galante’s Victory, a wide-ranging overture that allowed them to fully flex their musical might. The entire band moved together, physically leaning into the phrases. Their sound was breathtakingly mature and astonishingly in tune: the entire flute section, for instance, sounded like one instrument, even when you could see all 17 of them playing at once. And maestro Hino’s conducting was both sensitive and absolutely thrilling, shaping each phrase in ways so musical as to seem inevitable. The students shared his stratospheric level of musicianship, and followed him and their guest conductors through each phrase with energy and conviction. Other highlights included Luis Serrano Alarcon’s Invocación, which danced effortlessly and with style before taking a dramatic turn; and Jens Lindeman filling in on Anthony DiLorenzo’s Fujisan, a trumpet concerto written for his friend Ryan Anthony, sidelined by cancer. The final listed piece was John Mackey’s Kingfishers Catch Fire, which this group commissioned in 2007. They played 2 encores. The first, a Christmas medley, struck me as beneath their level at first, but it quickly escalated into something truly impressive, sending my jaw to the floor once again. The second was their school song, complete with singing from the whole band.

FRIDAY and SATURDAY

My Midwest ended on Friday morning, as I flew home to spend the holidays with two sides of my family. I realize, I’m missing a LOT. I’m especially sad to miss the Amador Valley High School Wind Ensemble, directed by Jonathan Grantham, and the Osakan Philharmonic Winds, directed by Tomo Matsuo. While I’m sad I’ve missed out, I also treasure the time I did get to spend at Midwest this year. The value of seeing old friends, making new connections, and generally recharging the artistic batteries at the concerts and clinics cannot be overstated. Any time spent at the Midwest Clinic is time well spent. I am beyond grateful to be able to participate in it year after year, especially in this year when I was granted a platform to share my little corner of knowledge with these incredible colleagues we have. I eagerly await the chance to do it again next year.