Sept. 24, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Michele Abba
Cal Poly Music Department
805-756-2406; music@calpoly.edu
Cal Poly Performing Ensembles Join for Musical Extravaganza
at Parents Weekend Concert
SAN LUIS OBISPO – Cal Poly’s 2010 Parents Weekend will kick off with a musical extravaganza at 8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 22, in Harman Hall of the Performing Arts Center.
Everyone is welcome to the Parents Weekend Ensemble Showcase, which will feature all the major performing ensembles of the Cal Poly Music Department, including the Cal Poly Symphony, Cal Poly Choirs (PolyPhonics and The University Singers), University Jazz Band I, Arab Music Ensemble and the Cal Poly Wind Ensemble.
The night will include the first appearance of Andrew McMahan, Cal Poly’s new director of bands. Music Department Chair W. Terrence Spiller will emcee.
David Arrivée will conduct the Symphony in a performance of Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D minor,” arranged by Leopold Stokowski. The music was made famous by the animated film “Fantasia.” Arrivée said this transcription for large orchestra employs every trick in the orchestrator’s bag to turn a piece for solo organ into a showcase for a 20th-century orchestra.
The Cal Poly Choirs, conducted by Thomas Davies, will follow. The University Singers will begin with Irish composer David Mooney’s arrangement of the ever-popular “Derry Air (Danny Boy)” and continue with “Beautiful City,” which quotes two spirituals, “Oh, What a Beautiful City” and “In Bright Mansions Above,” composed by André Thomas.
PolyPhonics will then perform “Hymne au Soleil” by French composer Lili Boulanger, and “Camptown Races,” arranged in a jazzy style by Jack Halloran. And the choirs will combine for a performance of “Irish Blessing,” arranged by Graeme Langager, and “Make Our Garden Grow” from the musical “Candide” by Leonard Bernstein.
The University Jazz Band 1, directed by Paul Rinzler, will perform several big band classics: “Jumpin’ at the Woodside,” one of the Count Basie Big Band’s signature pieces; “Duet,” also a Count Basie classic written by the great jazz composer Neal Hefti; and Tito Puente’s “Oye Como Va,” made famous in 1970 by Santana.
The Arab Music Ensemble, directed by Ken Habib, will perform a famous piece from the shared art-music tradition of the Middle East that features a rhythmic mode in 10/8, along with a well-known folkdance in cooperation with San Luis Obispo dancers.
The program will conclude with the introduction of McMahan in his debut as director of bands as he conducts the Wind Ensemble.
Tickets are $15 and $13 for the public, $14 and $12 for senior citizens and $8 students. They can be purchased at the Performing Arts Ticket Office between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. weekdays or 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturdays. To order by phone, call SLO-ARTS (756-2787).
A 10 percent discount is given to patrons who buy season tickets to four Music Department events through the Performing Arts Ticket office; a 15 percent discount is given on tickets to five or more events.
The concert is sponsored by the Cal Poly Music Department, College of Liberal Arts and Instructionally Related Activities program. For more information, call the Music Department at 756-2406.
###