The Foothill College Symphonic Wind Ensemble

David B. Adams, Conductor

Robert C. Smithwick Theater
Foothill College, Los Altos Hills, CA
2:30 PM, Sunday, December 6, 1998

Program Notes

The Vanished Army by Kenneth J. Alford

Parenthetically titled “They Never Die”, this march was written in 1918 and dedicated to the first 100,000 men who gave their lives fighting against tyranny during World War I. One of the most expressive marches, it is both somber and stirring, serving as a reminder of the terrible price of the war. Alford often used fragments of familiar tunes in his marches; a portion of It’s a Long Way to Tipperary may be heard at the end of the second strain.

Kenneth J. Alford was a pseudonym for Frederick Joseph Ricketts (1881 - 1945); Alford was his mother's family name. Born the son of a coal merchant in London, he studied both piano and organ as a child and by the age of fourteen was playing cornet in the Royal Irish Regiment Band. He completed the bandmaster's course at the Royal Military School of Music at Kneller Hall in 1908. Most of his marches were composed during the next two decades while he was bandmaster of the Second Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. Alford is best remembered for his restrained and dignified "poetic" marches. He was as famous in England for his marches as Sousa was in the United States.

Symphony No. 1 for Band by Claude T. Smith

I. Flourish
II. March
III. Lyric Song
IV. Toccata

The first movement, Flourish, begins with a fanfare-like sound in the allegretto moderato tempo. The brilliance of the tutti sound is pulsed with strong rhythmic accents. The 6/8 March opens with solo bassoons playing the principal march tune. Following a trumpet and drum duet, the march develops a vigorous and pulsating pace of stirring proportions. Large and sonorous chords open the Lyric Song movement. The melodic material is given a variety of scorings, including solos and a brass treatment in contrapuntal style. The Toccata is a movement of energy and drive which displays the technique of the band. This movement includes a fugal section for woodwinds and percussion. The work is brought to a thrilling close with the same chords with which the first movement opened. The Symphony was commissioned by Kappa Kappa Psi and Tau Beta Sigma national honorary band fraternity and sorority, respectively, and first performed in 1977.

Claude T. Smith (1932 - 1987) was born in Monroe City, Missouri. He started his musical career playing trumpet in the fifth grade. He attended Central Methodist College until he was drafted into the Army during the Korean Conflict. Unable to find a position with the service bands as a trumpeter, he auditioned on the French Horn and won a position with the 371st Army Band. Smith finished his undergraduate studies at the University of Kansas in Lawrence. He taught instrumental music in Nebraska and Missouri junior and senior high schools, later teaching composition and conducting the orchestra at Southwest Missouri State University. In 1978, Smith gave up teaching to serve as a full-time composer and consultant for Wingert-Jones Music Company and Jenson Publishing Company. During his career, he composed over 120 works for band, chorus, orchestra, and small ensembles. Active as a clinician and guest conductor, he received numerous awards and honors, including election to the presidency of the Missouri Music Educators Association. His composition Flight has been adopted as the “Official March” of the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution.

Elegy For a Young American by Ronald Lo Presti

The Elegy For a Young American was written in 1964 and is dedicated to the memory of President John F. Kennedy. The many stages of mourning can be felt as the work unfolds. A quiet adagio sets a tone of respect and solemnity in the beginning. Feelings of shock and denial are reflected by the dynamics and octave jumps in the melody. Anger and remorse express themselves, but they are replaced with a resolution of the loss and an allegro celebration of the contributions of this great American. The maestoso closing reminds us again of our loss.

Ronald Lo Presti was born in 1933 in Williamstown, Massachusetts. He is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music and a former Ford Foundation composer-in-residence. He has taught at Texas Technical University, Indiana State College, and is presently a member of the music faculty of Arizona State University. Lo Presti has been the recipient of several Ford Foundation grants to young American composers.

American Salute by Morton Gould

Morton Gould's music is unique in its Americanism and in the seemingly endless wealth of creativity displayed by the composer. Like much of his music, "American Salute" is semi-serious in nature, and reflects Gould's uncanny skill in thematic development. Using only "When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again" for melodic resources, he contrives a brilliant fantasy. Originally written for orchestra and transcribed for band, "American Salute" has become a program favorite for both bands and orchestras.

Morton Gould (1913 - 1996) showed signs of musical talent at a very early age. He began to play the piano when he was four years old, published a composition at the age of six, and was engaged to play piano over radio station WOR when he was seven. At eighteen, he joined the musical staff of the Radio City Music Hall, and at twenty-one, he became conductor and arranger for his own program on the WOR-Mutual network. He has composed more than 1000 works for radio, television, films, the musical and ballet stage, and the concert hall. He earned a Grammy for classical music in 1966. Kennedy Center Honors were awarded to him in 1994; the following year, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his Stringmusic.

Concerto in C for Piccolo and Band by Antonio Vivaldi

Most of Antonio Vivaldi's output of over 500 concertos were written for his primary instrument, the violin, and other string instruments. Although the violin was the dominant instrument in Italian Baroque music, composers did not neglect the wind instruments, especially as the numbers of proficient, often wealthy, amateur players increased. This Concerto was probably encouraged by Vivaldi's Amsterdam publisher.

Son of a violinist at St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice, Antonio Vivaldi (1678 - 1741) received his early training from his father and the cathedral's director of music. He was ordained in 1703, but after two years gave up saying Mass because of difficulties with asthma. From 1704 to 1740, he taught violin at one of the four famous orphanages which occupied an important place in Venetian musical life. He traveled to many European cities to perform or to produce his operas when his health permitted. The best known and most recorded Baroque concertos, the Four Seasons, was published in 1925. A number of his works for clavier and organ were transcribed by J.S. Bach, who was among his appreciative contemporaries.

Infinite Horizons by John Cheetham

Infinite Horizons was commissioned by the Alpha Omicron chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi at Texas Tech University and was first performed by the University Symphonic Band at the Texas Music Educators Association Convention in 1991. It is dedicated to Dean Killion, Director of Bands Emeritus, who served as director of bands at Texas Tech from 1959-1980. The title of the work is based on the composer’s boyhood recollections of the topography of West Texas and the area surrounding Lubbock. The listener might sense the open expanse of this high plains agricultural region, the approach of a thunderstorm, or the flight of a hawk in the clear skies. Comprised of two main sections, the work is cast in the form of a classical overture.

John Cheetham, Professor of Music Theory and Composition at the University of Missouri-Columbia, was born in Taos, New Mexico in 1939. He holds bachelor and masters degrees from the University of New Mexico, as well as the Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from the University of Washington. During his tenure at Missouri, Dr. Cheetham has written works for band, orchestra, and numerous chamber compositions. Over 20 of his compositions have been published and recorded. He has been the recipient of numerous commissions, including those from the Kentucky Derby Museum, Tennessee Tech University, Texas Tech University, The New Mexico Brass Quintet, and the Summit Brass.

First Suite in E-flat for Military Band by Gustav Holst

I. Chaconne
II. Intermezzo
III. March

Written in 1909, the Suite in E-Flat is generally regarded as a cornerstone work for concert band and is one of the few band originals that has been transcribed for symphony orchestra. The opening theme of the Chaconne is repeated by various instruments as others weave varied filigrees about the ground theme. In the middle of the first movement, the principal theme is inverted for several repetitions. The Intermezzo is based on a variation of the Chaconne theme, presented first in an agitated style, then in a cantabile mood, the two styles alternating throughout the movement with remarkable and deceivingly simple-sounding counterpoint that is as charming as it is masterful. The March is introduced by a British band quick-march pulse from the brass and followed by Holst's Land of Hope and Glory version of the Chaconne theme in the great sostenuto tradition of the singing chorus. Eventually, the two themes are combined in a thrilling counterpoint leading to the coda with a dynamic marking of ffff !

Gustav Holst (1874 - 1934), one of England's most prominent composers, was also a professional trombonist and a teacher of composition and organ. His music includes operas, ballets, symphonies, chamber music, and songs. During the first World War, he was placed in command of all English Army Bands, organizing music among the troops under the Y.M.C.A. Army and Education program. He continued his teaching as musical director at the St. Paul's Girls' School in the Hammersmith borough of London. His First Suite in E-Flat, Second Suite in F, and Hammersmith are hallmarks in the repertoire for wind ensemble; his orchestral suite, The Planets, earns high popularity.

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