by Wayne DeMello

It was a weekend of music beginning on Friday, April 27 at McKinley Auditorium with Band 4 performing for adjudication. This talented ensemble played two difficult and extremely different compositions – Malcolm Arnold’s Tam O’Shanter Overture, arranged for band by John Paynter, and Eric Leidzen transcription of Saint-Saens’ Danse Bacchanale  from his opera Samson and Delilah. The Arnold  piece was very dissonant, utilizing the wind instruments to simulate bagpipes and taking advantage of the various tone colors and special effects that the instruments are capable of producing. This terrific arrangement clearly demonstrated our students’ superb talent in making musical sense of what could have been total cacophony.

The second piece was a fine treatment of this very familiar operatic ballet music. The band created the appropriate mood and developed, through dynamics, tempo and intensity, the colorful and  descriptive music.

Saturday morning, April 28 at the Pearl City Cultural Center, Band 3 performed for the same adjudicators. This young ensemble performed two moderately difficult compositions written for band  - Jared Spears’ Fire Dancer and James Swearingen’s Majestia. These two pieces were appropriate for this group and the students performed them well.

Band Director Richard Hotoke did an excellent job in preparing these two bands for competition. The community looks forward to hearing all of the 'Iolani bands on May 19th at their final concert at McKinley Auditorium.

On Sunday afternoon, April 29 at the Hawaii Theatre, Orchestras 4 and 5 presented their final concert of the year. Orchestra 4, directed by Joan Kellner Wehrman, presented a varied program, opening with Edvard Grieg’s Wedding Day at Troldhaugen in a transcription of this work originally written for piano. The strings were brilliant and vibrant in their reading of this score. This was followed by senior Audrey Knuth’s rendition of Monti’s Czardas for violin and orchestra. This very familiar Hungarian Gypsy solo alternated between very slow and very fast sections. Audrey did a wonderful job in making this musically and technically challenging piece come to life.  This was followed by several tunes from Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story featuring many of the wind and percussion players. Orchestra 4’s portion of the concert concluded with a very stately and dramatic performance of Pyotr Tchaikovsy’s Marche Slave, which brought rousing applause from the audience.

Following a short intermission Orchestra 5, under the direction of Katharine Hafner, began its portion of the concert with an exciting rendition of Carl Maria von Weber’s Overture to Der Freischutz. This technically challenging work was performed brilliantly and showcased the French horn section, the clarinets, the cello section and the violins.  Aaron Copland’s Variations on a Shaker Tune provided a complete change of mood and displayed the wonderful string sound of the group as well as fine solo playing in the winds. 

The orchestra was then joined by soprano soloist Vicki Gorman for Gaetano Donizetti’s bel canto aria O Luce di quest’anima from his opera Linda di Chamounix. Her precise technique, great sense of pitch and musicality produced an exciting performance of this virtuosic showpiece. This was followed by O mio babbino caro, one of the most well-known and beloved arias in the repertoire. Puccini is noted for his beautiful melodies and this is certainly one of the best. Gorman’s vocal line and style was perfect for Puccini’s music. Guest harpist Connie Uejio added  beautiful color to the lovely orchestral accompaniment. Continuing with the operatic theme, Giuseppe Verdi’s extremely challenging Overture to La Forza del Destino was played with enthusiasm, opening with a beautiful dark sound in the brass and continuing with Verdi’s turbulent themes, eventually developing into other melodies from the opera and bringing the piece to a fierce and dramatic finish.

The concert ended with the Nimrod variation from Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations. As Assistant Headmaster Emeritus Charles Proctor read the names of all of the seniors, they were presented with lei by members of the orchestra. What a fitting climax to a tremendous weekend of music produced by our students and teachers!