NAU Percussion Ensemble Concert
Building 37A, Performing and Fine Arts
Flagstaff, AZ
86001
Double check the event details for directions.
The NAU Percussion Ensemble, under the direction of Dr. Steve Hemphill, will perform in concert on Friday, November 6, 2009, at 7:30 p.m. in Ardrey Auditorium. Admission is free. From Joseph Haydn (a string quartet transcription), to Christopher Rouse’s tribute to the Hawaiian God of War, to a Caribbean-style steel band, there just might be something for everyone on this percussion ensemble concert.
Senior music education major, Kinna Nordstrom, will be featured marimba soloist in Minuro Miki’s Marimba Spiritual, a quartet invoking the festival drumming energy of the Chichibu area northwest of Tokyo. The first movement of Haydn’s String Quartet Number 66, Op. 77 (No. 1), performed on four marimbas, will exhibit stark contrast in percussive offerings. John Wyre’s Marubatoo (1988) features a quintet of three marimbas, vibraphone, and crotales, in a episodic voyage through diverse music styles and rhythmic overlapping (the original work was an unusual duo for tuba and marimba).
Changing Woods (1983) by European composer and percussionist Ruud Wiener is a minimalist composition for a trio of marimbas. Rouse’s quartet Ku-Ka-Ilimoku (1978) might best be viewed as a savage, propulsive war dance, honoring the important god, Ku, in Hawaiian mythology.
The concert will close, once again, with the sounds of Caribbean and American pop music performed by NAU’s Panorama Steel, a small steel pan ensemble developed through the NAU Percussion Club. This group entertains with the island sounds of calypso, pop, and Cha-cha-cha – from Jimmy Buffett to Tito Puente.
The Arizona Daily Sun, Copyright 2009 © 1751 S. Thompson, Flagstaff, AZ