Tuesday
Feburary 25, 2025
5:00 pm
Rialto Center for the Arts
Carnival of the Animals (1886/2006)
CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS | 1835-1921
arr. BOCOOK | B. 1953
1. Introduction and Royal March of the Lions
2. The Elephant
4. Finale
The Carnival of the Animals (Le Carnaval des animaux) is a humorous musical suite of 14 movements written for private performance by two pianos and chamber ensemble; Saint-Saëns prohibited public performance of the work during his lifetime, feeling that its frivolity would damage his standing as a serious composer. The suite was published in 1922, the year after his death. A public performance in the same year was greeted with enthusiasm, and it has remained among his most popular.
The most famous movement is the penultimate:
11. The Swan
Blues for a Killed Kat (1987)
JACK END | 1918-1986
arr. FENNELL | 1914-2004
Early one winter morning after playing at a Jazz club, composer and clarinetist Jack End observed a cat that had lain dead for a few days to be still in the dimly lit gutter in front of Sibley Music Library. When he dropped the instruments in his studio he sat at the piano to express his sadness - what else but with the Blues.
Frederick Fennell was an American conductor and one of the primary figures who promoted the Eastman Wind Ensemble as a performing group. He was also influential as a band pedagogue, and greatly affected the field of music education in the US and abroad. In Fennell's New York Times obituary, colleague Jerry F. Junkin was quoted as saying "He was arguably the most famous band conductor since John Philip Sousa."
Cry of the Last Unicorn (2011)
ROSSANO GALANTE | B. 1967
Rachel Breaux, conductor
Intensely descriptive from the very first note, this work portrays a fateful encounter of hunters tracking the "last unicorn." The music is at times poignant and other times dramatic and exciting as the chase is depicted. Sweeping themes and rich scoring help to make this a memorable work for the symphonic stage.
- Program Note from publisher
Rossano Galante is an American composer. He earned a degree in trumpet performance from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1992. He then was accepted into the film scoring program at the University of Southern California and studied with film composer Jerry Goldsmith.
Galante has composed music for the films Bite Marks, The Last Straight Man, Monday Morning and Channels. He has served as orchestrator for over sixty studio films including A Quiet Place, The Mummy, Logan, Big Fat Liar, Scary Movie 2, The Tuxedo, and Tuesdays With Morrie, to name only a few.
The Old Grumbly Bear (1910/2004)
JULIUS FUČÍK | 1872-1916
arr. GLOVER | B. 1995
Brandon Hardegree, euphonium
Who would have thought that a grumpy old bear could be so delightful to spend time with? This old fashioned charmer features a low-voiced soloist. Fučik was himself a bassoon player and composed this charming “polka comique” for solo bassoon and orchestra around 1910 under the title Der alto Brummbar or the Old Grumbling Bear. The title suggests the possibility that this piece might in some way be a musical portrait, either of Fučik himself or of some cranky older bassoonist that Fučik met in his long performance career.
Julius Ernst Wilhelm Fučík Czech bandmaster and composer. Fučík studied composition with Antonín Dvořák and was a bassoonist in a number of opera orchestras. The composer became one of the most prolific European composers of his time, producing more than 400 works including operettas, chamber music, masses, marches and a symphonic suite.
Galop (1959/1971)
From the musical comedy Moscow, Cheremushky
DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH | 1906-1975
trans. HUNSBERGER | 1932-2023
Admirers of Shostakovich’s symphonies and concertos are likely unaware that the composer also wrote a substantial quantity of lighter music. In his early days, he composed incidental music, songs for plays, and even full-fledged operas and film scores. Among them is the operetta Moscow, Cheryomushki.
Moscow, Cheryomushki is an operetta in three acts, libretto by the team of Vladimir Mass and Mikhail Chervinsky, the leading Soviet humorists at that time. The satirical plot deals with a theme common to the people of Soviet Russia and the Cheryomushki District:
affordable housing.
- Program Note by the San Francisco Wind Ensemble
The story takes place in late 1950s Moscow, where a smart new block of apartments has been built and everyone is desperate to live there. Newlyweds Sasha and Masha along with their friends dream of having a place of their own. During a house-warming party, a local government official (who illegally plans to knock two apartments into one for his ambitious new wife) comes bursting through the neighboring wall. It is during this scene that Galop is scored. The score accompanies a reckless chase full of physical comedy. At the end of this unusual story, the residents find a way of exposing all the corruption, and the wrong-doers are defeated, leaving everyone else to live happily ever after.
- Program Note by the Iowa State University Symphonic Band
Personnel
T. Devin Reid
Assistant Director of Bands
Assistant Director of Athletic Bands
T. Devin Reid is currently an active musician and educator throughout the southeast. A native of Fayetteville, NC, Mr. Reid is a 2005 recipient of the North Carolina Teaching Fellows Scholarship. He holds a Master of Music in Wind Band Conducting from Georgia State University and a Bachelor of Music in Music Education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. In 2018, Mr. Reid accepted the position as Assistant Director of Bands at Georgia State University in Atlanta, GA. Prior to this, Mr. Reid served as the interim assistant director of bands for two years. In this capacity he co-teaches the Panther Marching Band, conducts the Basketball Band, conducts the University Concert Band, teaches undergraduate and graduate level conducting courses, and supervises student teachers in the field among other duties and courses.
Since his arrival, the GSU Concert Band has grown to become the largest instrumental concert ensemble at the university. With Mr. Reid’s direction, the GSU Panther Band performed in 2019 as part of the Pepsi Super Bowl LIII Halftime Show, been accepted as a CBDNA Southern Region top marching band in 2020, and been accepted to perform in the 2022 Tournament of Roses Parade. Preceding his appointment at Georgia State, Mr. Reid taught public school in Georgia and North Carolina and served as Graduate Assistant for the Georgia State University Bands. While teaching at James Kenan High School (NC), Mr. Reid grew the program from 0% to 10% of the school population in just three years. His ensembles performed at numerous events in and out of the community including the NC Muscadine Festival, NC PAS Day of Percussion and the Virginia International Music Festival.
Mr. Reid has presented clinics and workshops at the North Carolina Music Educators Conference, Georgia Music Educators Conference, Tennessee Music Educators Conference, South Carolina Music Educators Conference, Florida Music Educators Conference, American String Teachers Association National Conference and the Georgia State University Bands of Distinction Honor Clinic. He is a recurrent guest conductor at the International Euphonium and Tuba Festival. He is also an active concert band and marching band clinician and adjudicator throughout Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina.
As a performer, Mr. Reid is an actively sought-after musician. He was the percussionist for the popular brass quintet and Delos recording artist “Da Capo Brass.” Their debut album “From The Beginning” stormed the iTunes classical charts at #8 in January 2012. He has also been a member of the regionally acclaimed blue grass band “T.R. and the Boys” as baritone vocalist and mandolin player. They have three releases, and their most recent album “Lonesome” features one of his original songs as the title track. He is a member of the National Association for Music Education, College Band Directors National Association, and is an endorser for Sabian Cymbals.
Mr. Reid is happily married to his beautiful wife Amy and they reside in Powder Springs, GA with their daughter Katelynn and son Ethan.
Rachel Breaux
Graduate Teaching Assistant & Wind Band Conducting Student
Rachel Breaux, a native of Temple, GA, is a recent graduate of the University of West Georgia where she received her Masters in Flute Performance and took advantage of conducting opportunities with the UWG Wind Ensemble under the direction of Dr. Byrd. She also holds a Bachelors of Music degree in Music Education from West Georgia.
Rachel has enjoyed various teaching opportunities throughout Georgia. These include having her own private lesson studio consisting of students from Carroll, Paulding, Fayette, and Coweta counties, being an instructional staff member with local marching and concert bands, a flute sectional coach, and being a graduate teaching assistant while attending UWG.
While still performing in local church orchestras and ensembles and teaching privately, Rachel also enjoys graphic design, media, and marketing management for various organizations, including West Georgia Arts. She is in her first year studying wind band conducting at Georgia State University under Dr. Robert J. Ambrose.
Brandon Hardegree
soloist, euphonium
Brandon Hardegree is an aspiring euphonium soloist and low brass instructor based in Atlanta. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Euphonium Performance at Georgia State University, where he studies under world-renowned euphonium player Dr. Adam Frey. Brandon holds a bachelor’s degree in Music Education from Jacksonville State University. As a performer, Brandon has excelled in multiple solo competitions, most recently earning second place in the Artist Solo Competition at the 2024 Southeastern Regional Tuba Euphonium Conference. Alongside his passion for performing, he is dedicated to teaching and inspiring the next generation of musicians.