Sinclair Community College will celebrate 35 years of music with two concerts this February.
Community Wind Symphony and Youth Wind Ensemble will perform on Sunday, Feb. 24 at 2 pm and the Community Concert Band will perform on Monday, Feb. 25 at 7:30 p.m.
Both concerts will be held in Blair Hall Theatre and admission is free, with open seating to Sinclair and the community. The three community bands are comprised of over 100 community members, including Sinclair students.
“These concerts have a lot of really enjoyable music that make’s for a nice break on either a Sunday afternoon or a Monday evening,” Dr. Kenneth Kohlenberg, Music professor and conductor of the community band concerts said. “It’s just a real joy to see all these people who are coming from all over the Miami Valley to Sinclair.”
A variety of pieces will be performed by all three groups. The Community Wind Symphony and Community Concert Band will be performing pieces written or published in the late 1970s, the time-period in which they first formed, as well as performances that reprise pieces from the bands’ first concerts.
The Community Wind Symphony will kick off the celebration with a new piece composed by Dr. John Parcell, associate professor in the Music Department, entitled “The Endeavor’s Rite.”
According to Kohlenberg, the piece was written to not only celebrate the community bands’ 35 year run, but to celebrate Sinclair’s 125 anniversary with the spirit of Sinclair’s vision, to “find the need and endeavor to meet it.”
They will close their performance with “Aerodynamics,” a piece written by David Gillingham that celebrates the Wright Brothers’ quest for flight. Gillingham was commissioned to write the piece for the 25 anniversary performance of the Wind Symphony.
The Youth Wind Ensemble, formed in 1999, is comprised of roughly 50 high school students from over 15 different schools who applied and auditioned with Kohlenberg. They now study and rehearse on campus.
Along with three other pieces, they will perform a Dave Brubeck medley, “Dave Brubeck: A Portrait in Time,” in honor of the legendary jazz pianist and composer who passed away late last year.
The Community Concert Band will perform eight pieces, including “Declaration Overture” by Claude T. Smith, “First Suite” by Alfred Reed and “Komm’ Süsser Tod” by Alfred Reed.
Kohlenberg said the pieces chosen for the concerts will showcase variety with songs ranging from the Renaissance Era-inspired “Praetorius Suite” by Jan Bach to the more contemporary, freerunning and movement-inspired “Parkour (l’art du déplacement)” by Samuel R. Hazo.
“The college is committed to the community, to providing not just entertainment… but for providing the educational benefits for all of the players who are in the groups,” he said.
Dr. Clarence Walls, former dean of Fine and Performing Arts at Sinclair, started the Community Concert Band in the fall 1977 and the Community Wind Ensemble, now called the Wind Symphony, in Jan. 1978.
“The fact that these groups have been going for now 35 years shows a real commitment by Sinclair and the value of promoting music and music education,” Kohlenberg said.