Winter Update – December 2023
Dear Friends:
The Community Band has been hard at work, under the direction of Cheryl Martinez, on an uplifting concert to be presented on Sunday, March 17, at 2 pm in the auditorium at the Ashbrook Independent School. The concert is titled “Expressions of a Day” and will take the listener through a day from sunrise to sunset, with a wonderful collection of descriptive pieces. Also featured is a saxophone solo by our own Peg Urban.
The program will feature “At Dawn They Slept,” a descriptive piece about the attack on Pearl Harbor, and “Where Never Lark or Eagle Flew,” an overture inspired by “High Flight”, a poem written by a young American volunteer pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force during WWII. His famous sonnet is now the official poem of the RCAF and RAF and must be recited from memory by freshman cadets at the USAF Academy. We will also play a pair of happy pieces, “Seize the Day!,” and “Joy,” Both are new to us, found by our conductor when she attended a band directors workshop. As the day winds down, we feature “Enduring Traveler ,” based on the familiar tune,” I Am a Wayfaring Stranger.” We will close with a very lush version on “When You Wish Upon A Star.”
Peg Urban, our saxophone soloist, is a long time member of our band and a talented musician. She has studied saxophone with Steve Matthes, and recently took up the oboe, when it looked like we needed one for the band. She is our “trailer guru” who directs the setting up and taking down of our summer band. She is also in charge of set up and take down when we play at Ashbrook. She will play Movement II of “Scaramouche,” by Darius Milhaud.
We hope you will want to come and enjoy “Expressions of a Day,” with us. Again, the concert is at Ashbrook Independent school, at 2 PM on Sunday, March 17. Band members are being asked to park across the street in the Gymnastics Center parking lot, to free up more nearby parking for our patrons.
Happy (almost )Spring!
Sue
We value our “friends” who come to our concerts in the summer and throughout the year. We have an e-mail list to inform you about what we are doing and what volunteer opportunities we have.
E-mail List
We send out a newsletter approximately once a month, with a calendar of our concerts and information about the band. During the summer, the newsletters are a little more frequent, since we play so many concerts in June, July, and August.
If you would like to be on that list to receive Community Band News, please send your request to Sue Borden (sueborden@comcast.net). We’d like to know your mailing address and phone number, as well as your e-mail address, but the only really necessary information is your email address.
Volunteer Opportunities
From time to time, we need non-band members to help us with tasks that we often can’t do ourselves. Here’s a list of some of those:
- Ushering at indoor concerts during the academic year
- Managing sales of Band items at concerts (both summer and winter)
- Marketing – distribution of posters
- Publicity – speaking about the band at club meetings
- Expertise – help with fundraising, marketing, logistics, sound, lights
If you would like to volunteer, please contact Sue Borden (e-mail address above) who will put you in touch with our volunteer coordinator, or put you to work directly. We are always open to ideas you have, so don’t hesitate to contact us.