Audience members got a rare viewing opportunity last week when the CWU music department’s performance was accompanied by a composer in residence on Thursday. Throughout the past quarter, the Symphonic Band and Wind Ensemble practiced with and studied music created by Dr. Nicole Piunno. Her speeches throughout this concert helped enhance the meaning behind the pieces and connect the audience to the music.
A total of 71 musicians made up the combined personnel for this event. Two of them gave a perspective into their concert experience, one being Dillon Lopes from Symphonic Band, the other being bassoonist Noel Virgen from Wind Ensemble.
Lopes spoke about the level of preparation that went into the final concert of the year, “As far as preparedness I would say definitely over-prepared. My band director puts it a great way, how he plans our quarter is like the shape of an hourglass,” Lopes said. “His instructions that he gives us based on little tweaks that we make in the song is the first half, and when we’re about at that point in the quarter where we can do full run throughs of the concert, like of the material, then the rest of the concert is focusing on what the music means. I, and very likely everybody else in the ensemble, felt very prepared playing our first sounds during the concert since we had already ran through the material a bunch of times.”
Virgen praised the work of Dr. Piunno and noted how much they appreciated the advice she shared. “We get the music at the start of the quarter and have been working on it since. We just got to learn it bit by bit, as we get closer to the concert, especially this week, we were able to work with Dr. Piunno who composed some of the pieces we played, and that was really cool getting some insight directly from the composers about more nuanced things, what they had in mind for how it should be played. Start learning the notes, then you get to play them with intention, that was really interesting and cool.”
When asked if they were satisfied with their performances, Lopes commented “Yeah, absolutely, we had some really great moments,” Virgen said. “I would say so, I think there’s always room to improve. [Dr. T. Andre Feagin] always says, ‘If we’re comfortable we’re doing something wrong, we’re always striving for more.’”
The ten pieces in this performance featured complex sequencing, often having massive changes in atmosphere that brought an optimistic and fast piece down to a slower and more emotional mood almost instantaneously, then back up before the piece ended. Dr. Feagin gave speeches in between, thanking the audience, congratulating the ensembles and shouting out graduating seniors.
When asked about his favorite piece, Lopes said, “We had a composer in residence, Dr. Nicole Piunno, it was very exciting to get to work with her. One of her pieces was called safely rest and it’s a really cool piece, it’s based on two popular songs that in Dr. Piunno’s eyes mean two opposite things, it was a combination of Caps and Amazing Grace, and it was just a really pretty song and getting to perform it in the concert hall it sounded very nice.”
Several pieces throughout this performance featured multiple sections with pauses in between. During these moments the room became almost completely silent, with the only sounds being the turning of pages and the occasional footstep on stage.
“Sunflower Studies: Symphony for Wind Ensemble” was one of these, featuring an introduction from Dr. Feagin. Feagin explained how the way the sunflower tracks the sun throughout the day, sets in the west then turns back to the east in waiting overnight mirrors how faith leads us to turn and wait for light in times of darkness. Towards the end of the first movement, a bright solo shined from oboist Pedro Lopez Aguilar and delighted the room.
Virgen named this piece as one of his favorites. “Sunflower Studies, the last piece, one of the ones by Dr. Piunno, was really great. Overall the sound was fun to play and everything, but also just when we got to work with her, getting to learn more about what it means and just, it’s cool to bring that to life.” Virgen said. “I really loved the quintet section going on with the Soprano Sax, Trombone, Trumpet, and forget the other two, I know French horn was in there. They did such a good job, it was incredible.”
Lopes described the perspective of being in the mind of the performer during long pauses. “The moment in between the two movements, it can be a little awkward, people are turning pages in their silence, maybe less experienced crowd members are deciding if they should clap or not. What really goes through my head is towards the end of the first movement, my mind is already in the second movement, thinking what’s gonna happen there musically. When the second movement starts, that way it’s not a surprise, I’m ready to play in a slightly different style.”
