Salvation is Created
Pavel Tschesnokoff/Houseknecht
        This is a marvelous setting for band of a hymn from the choral repertoire of the Russian Orthodox Church. It is, from any standpoint, a magnificent piece of music, full of reverence and dignity, solemnity and power, profound in its depth and substance. Salvation is Created can provide conductor, performers, and audience alike with an aesthetic experience unmatched in depth , power, and significance. This is truly music to nourish the soul.

La Forza del Destino
Giuseppe Verdi
        Showing unusual musical talent at a very early age, Verdi began his studies with the village organist. After being denied entrance to the Milan conservatory in 1832, Verdi studied with several private teachers. In 1839 La Scala performed Oberto, the first of a long line of successful operas from this master s pen.
        La Forza del Destino originally began as a prelude leading without break into the first act of the opera. For the revision, Verdi lengthened and strengthened the prelude, making it into an overture coming to a full close before the curtain rises. Built from melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic matters dealt within the opera itself, the overture quotes and combines several of the most strildng melodies as well as the ominous, opening, three-chord motive and the rapid, repeated, ascending accompaniment-figure associated in the opera with tragic destiny. (Smith/Stoutamire)

 
Napoli - Solo for Cornet and Band
Herman Betlstedt/Frank Simon
        Herman Bellstedt was born in Breman, Germany. His family emigrated to Cincinnati in 1867. He received his early music education from his father. His first solo cornet performance in 1873 brought him the title "Boy Wonder" and he was soon hired as cornet soloist with the famous Cincinnati Reed Band. Gilmore hired him in 1889 as assistant to the legendary Ben Bent, and he quickly developed a national reputation as a performer. He formed the Bellstedt-Balklenberg Band in 1892, serving as both conductor and soloist. Bellstedt joined Sousa s Band in 1904, remaining there until 1906. In 1913 he began a long tenure as professor of wind instruments at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. He served as mentor for many musicians of succeeding generations, including the great Frank Simon. Napoli Variations is perhaps the best known of Bellstedt s works for solo cornet. The piece is a brilliant set of variations on the popular 1920 s Italian street song Furniculi Funicula. Frank Simon bought the manuscript in 1932 from Irwin Bellstedt, the composer s son and subsequently published this arrangement. (Thomas Stone)

The Lord of the Rings
Symphony No. 1
Johan de Meij
        Born November 23, 1953 in Voorburg, Holland, Johan de Meij received his musical education at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague, where he studied band conducting and trombone. After his graduation de Meij gained an international reputation as an arranger of the classical as well as the popular repertoire. His first composition for band, the Symphony No. 1 The Lord of the Rings, after Tolkien had its very successful first performance in Brussels (1988) and was awarded a first prize in the Sudler International Wind Band Composition Competition 1989 in Chicago. Johan de Meij is more and more invited as a guest conductor to perform his own works.
        The symphony consists of five separate movements, each illustrating a personage or an important episode from the book. The first movement is a musical portrait of the wizard Gandalf, one of the principal characters of the trilogy. His wise and noble personality is expressed by a stately motif which is used in a different form in movements IV and V. The sudden opening of the Allegro vivace is indicative of the unpredictability of the grey.

Without Warning
Steve Melillo
        Steve Melillo, an Academy Award and Emmy-nominated composer, has created over 850 musical works for film, educational and professional ensembles. Other major compositions include Stormworks, A Walk in Jurassic Park. Ahab!, and Escape from Plato s Cave. Maestro Gerhadt Zimmerman refers to him as "...a new voice in the direction of music, his sound-a bridge between the serious and the immediately visceral."
        The trilogy of Honor, Courage.... Commitment was commissioned by Lt. Conunander John Pastin and the United States Navy Band of Washington D.C. in 1996. Without Warning is the exciting first movement of the piece. The piece portraits the action and adventure of the U.S. Navy at Sea. The tempo is marked at a minimum of mm= 172, creating a flurry of activity in the woodwind section which must be conquered by the brass section with force and grandeur.

 
Second Suite in F
Gustav Hoist
        Gustav Host, 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. His most popular work was an orchestral suite, The Planets, in which planets are depicted as astrological symbols. In addition to astrology, Holst was also deeply interested in folk music and in the orient. 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. His First Suite in Eb was written for military band in 1909 marking a new epoch in band literature and being rarely, if ever, equaled by the composers who imitated it. The Second Suite for Military Band-military band being the English term for a wind group with a complete instrumentation, as opposed to the British brass band- written in 1922, and Hammersmith, Prelude and Scherzo (1930), reflect a creative ability and high quality of craftsmanship assuring Holst an honored position for three truly significant contributions to band repertoire. (Acton Ostling Jr., University of Maryland)
        The Second Suite, composed in 1911, uses English folk songs and folk dance tunes throughout, being written at a time when Holst needed to rest from the strain of original composition. The suite has four movements, each with its own distinctive character.
        The opening march movement uses three tunes, set in the pattern ABCAB. Tune A is a lively Morris dance, a type of dance that was very popular in the Renaissance, and was commonly danced in England as part of the May games. There were two groups of six male dancers each, plus several solo dancers, often including a boy with a hobby-horse. In Holst s setting, the tune s opening five-note motive is heard twice as an introduction, and the tune itself begins. Tune B, a folk song called "Swansea Town," is broad and lyrical, played first by the baritone. This statement is followed by the entire band playing the tune in block harmonies-a typically English sound. The third tune, "Claudy Banks," is distinctly different from the other two having a lilting, swinging feeling derived from its compound duple meter.
        The second movement is a slow, tender setting of an English love song, "I ll Love My Love." It is a sad tune, heard first in the oboe, with words which tell of two lovers separated by their parents, and of the deep love they will always have for each other.
"The Song of the Blacksmith" is complex rhythmically, much of it being in septuple meter. It demonstrates Holst s inventive scoring with a lively rhythm being played on the blacksmith s anvil.
        "The Dargason" is an English country dance and folk song dating at least from the sixteenth century. Its peculiar property is that it does not really have an end but keeps repeating endlessly, almost like a circle. After "The Dargason" is played seven times, and while it continues to be played, Holst combines it with a well known tune, "Green Sleaves," a Christmas carol. With a complex combination of meters, "The Dargason" alone "winds down" to the final chord of the suite. (R. John Specht, Queensborough Community College)