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Cal Poly Symphony Fall Concert: Symphony and the Big Band
Cal Poly Symphony and the
University Jazz Band
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3 p.m., Performing Arts Center
The Cal Poly Symphony will team up with the University Jazz Band for its Fall Concert!
“This will be the symphony’s first-ever collaboration with the big band in a program that will explore the intersection of symphonic and jazz traditions,” said Cal Poly Symphony Director David Arrivée. Pieces include orchestral works written in the jazz style to big band charts with string orchestra backing and everything in-between.
First, the orchestra will perform Dmitri Shostakovich’s “Waltz No. 2” from his “Suite for Jazz Orchestra No. 2.” This work features the symphony with student saxophonists from the jazz program.
Next, the band will join the orchestra to present works for both ensembles: “Cinco Salsa,” a salsa version of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, first movement, arranged by Sverre Indris Joner; Antônio Carlos Jobim’s “Wave,” a bossa nova for jazz band, three alto flutes and strings; Claude Debussy’s “Arabesque” as arranged by Jack Matthias and recorded by Harry James; and Bert Ligon’s “Bookends.”
Ana Nelson, saxophone soloist
Duke Ellington’s “Three Black Kings,” will conclude the first half. It’s a mixed genre representation of King Balthazar (one of the three Magi), King Solomon and Martin Luther King Jr. Music faculty member Ana Nelson will be the featured tenor saxophone soloist in the second and third sections.
After intermission, the ensembles will perform “A Walk to Remember,” a contemporary jazz work by University Jazz Band Director Jamaal Baptiste.
The orchestra will close the program with George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris,” a jazz-influenced work inspired by his time in Paris in the 1920s. He wrote it so at one moment it’s in the style of the French composers known as “Les Six,” and in the next he evokes the style of the blues. He even captures the raucous noise of Parisian taxis with orchestral instruments and actual taxi horns. The music was used in the 1951 film “An American in Paris” for an extended dance sequence featuring Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron.
Tickets ($17 and $22 general, $12 students)
Cal Poly Symphony Winter Concert: Student Soloist Showcase and Pines of Rome
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3 p.m., Performing Arts Center
The Cal Poly Symphony’s Winter Concert will showcase student soloist winners and Respighi’s symphonic poem, “Pines of Rome.”
The student soloists were winners of the symphony’s Solo Competition in November: four instrumentalists, a pair of vocalists and one composer.
The instrumentalists are mechanical engineering major Apollo Wong, piano, who will play Johann Sebastian Bach’s Keyboard Concerto in D Minor, BWV 1052; marine sciences major Sophia Catania, who will play Cécile Chaminade’s “Concertino for Flute and Orchestra,” Op. 107; music major Erik Petrovich, who will play two movements from Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “Suite for Viola and Orchestra”; and music major Rose Candelaria, who will play the first movement of Dmitry Kabalevsky’s “Concerto for Violin and Orchestra.”
The vocalists are Amethyst Shanks, who will sing Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Ah, se in ciel, benigne stelle”; and Helena Fuller, who will sing Gustave Charpentier’s “Depuis le jour” from his opera “Louise.” Both are sopranos and music majors.
The orchestra will also perform “As the Seasons Change” by student composer and music major Edwin Muñoz.
Ottorino Respighi’s symphonic poem, “Pines of Rome” will conclude the concert. First performed in 1924, this work depicts four settings in Rome featuring pine trees: pines in the Villa Borghese gardens, near a catacomb, on the Janiculum Hill and lining the Appian Way. Respighi uses these settings to evoke everything from children playing to legions of soldiers returning triumphant to the capitol of the Roman Empire. He represents the song of a nightingale — both orchestrally and with an early recording of an actual nightingale — the sound of hymns emerging from catacombs, and the unstoppable marching of feet in an orchestral tour de force.
The symphony is directed by music Professor David Arrivée.
Tickets ($17 and $22 general, $12 students)
Cal Poly Symphony and Choirs Concert: Symphonic Expressions
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7:30 p.m., Performing Arts Center
Cal Poly's Choirs and Symphony will combine to present two monumental symphonic works for choir and orchestra: Stravinsky’s "Symphony of Psalms" and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9.
Tickets ($17 and $22 general, $12 students)