TAMIU Symphonic Band Presents Concert Sunday, Oct. 17

Texas A&M International University' s Symphonic Band will present a special concert on Sunday, Oct. 17 at 4 p.m. in the University's Center for the Fine and Performing Arts' Recital Hall.

Admission is free of charge and open to all.

Under the direction of Dr. Michael Stone, the 60-member Symphonic Band will present a highly impressionistic program designed to intrigue and delight with evocative soundscapes that range from a traditional march and tone poems to an unusual klezmer rhapsody and a Scottish musical fantasy.

The program opens with the symphonic poem, "Loch Ness" by Johan de Meij. Five sound sketches provide impressions of the mysterious Scottish lake.

Stephen Bulla's "Heather Ridge Sketches" follows, with a three-movement work that takes its name from an area in Bowie, Maryland, where the composer lived for a short time.

The British Eighth Army is immortalized in Zo Elliott's "British Eighth March," by the composer most familiar for "There's a Long, Long Trail."

Frank Ticheli's "Postcard" is a sound memorial to Ethel Virginia Curry, mother of the great band conductor Robert Reynolds and seeks to capture her energy towards life.

Typical Jewish folk songs form the backdrop for Piet Swerts' "Shirim (A Klezmer Rhapsody)." "Shirim," Hebrew for "Songs," incorporates the Klezmer tune "Zemer Atik." Klezmer music refers to a form of music developed by professional Jewish musicians, primarily from Eastern Europe, prior to World War II. The clarinet generally offers the central melody in Klezmer music, which has experienced a revival in recent years.

The Concert will come to a stunning close with "The Titanic Saga," also by Swerts. This composition traces the arc of the Titanic's fated journey from the ship's boarding in Southhampton, England to its grim plunge into the ocean's cold waters. Throughout the composition, listeners will hear the ship's engines, its Morse code signals warning of an iceberg and the panic that accompanies its last moments above water.

The TAMIU Symphonic Band includes student and community members.

For additional information, please contact Dr. Stone at 326.2640.

University office hours are from 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. Monday-Friday.