The University of Tampa’s Departments of Music and Speech/Theatre/Dance present the premiere winter concert “Dancing With Winds”.
The show is a beautiful collaboration of the UT wind ensemble and dancers—the forty-five musicians and 30 dancers are coming together for the first time in the university’s long history for two nights only—Friday and Saturday, December 10 & 11 at 7:30pm in Falk Theatre.
The program consists of five main sections: “Cave of the Winds” by Russell Peck is a five minute piece that will start the concert off with a jazzy feel, a steady drum beating like a heart from beginning to end.
For this song, the band will actually be moving around the stage with their instruments in a choreographed routine, so memorizing the music is a must.
“’Cave of the Winds’ is going to be a lot of fun,” says Music Department Chair and Band Program Director Dr. Jeff Traster.
Next are the Symphonic Dances from Fiddler on the Roof, the well-known Broadway musical.
After Fiddler is the series of original tunes composed specifically for this concert by UT’s own Haig Mardirosian, the department Dean. His composition, “A Ritual of Dances” makes its premiere performance at this unique musical event.
There are seven parts of the composition, all very interesting and different from one another. The dances that were put to these special tunes are also unique and fit the various tones of the melodies.
“’Ritual of Dances’ conveys many different moods, creating a sense of energy more than a sense of melody,” says Dr. Traster.
“’Intrada’ is a very majestic song, and ‘Meditation in Motion’ has a soulful soprano saxophone solo in it. They’re all great.”
In the next section, entitled ‘Chorale’ there is no dancing—it is strictly a wind ensemble piece.
The finale is called “The nUTcracker”, lasting ten minutes and broken into seven segments: The Overture, Marche, Arab Dance, Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies, Russia Dance, Chinese and Reed Dances and Waltz of the Flowers.
During the Russian Dance, UT dancer and wind ensemble horn player Patrick Justin will jump up from his seat in the band and dance to the familiar Nutcracker tune.
Dr. Traster is very excited for the debut of this special event.
“I’ve never worked with dancers before,” Traster says. “We’ve been planning this since last fall; Haig was sending music over by January, and we got together with Susan in the spring.”
UT junior choreographer Preston Burris was one of the few choreographers chosen to incorporate their Fall Dance Happening piece into the show.
“I was originally told that they wanted to have a small cast. So from there I asked my dancers who would be able to do the performance and it worked out that four out of my seven dancers were able to do it.”
Although his dance was being used, he would need to rework it around the unique set design for the concert—the band will be on stage, with dancers performing in front and around them.
“I was also made aware of the new spacing we were going to have to work with,” says Burris. “So when I went to restage my dance I picked the best parts of my piece and isolated those phrases.
My dance was given a full section of music and we were all given one rehearsal to stage our pieces.”
Neither Preston nor any of the other choreographers have had the opportunity to rehearse with the band but Burris feels that the challenges presented will work themselves out.
“I feel the choreography is solid enough to stand on its own.”
Wind ensemble percussionist Mark Baccoli also looks forward to the event.
“I think this is an excellent opportunity for the wind symphony to do something a little different,” says Baccoli.
“Sharing the stage with UT dancers will be a first and exciting experience for everyone in the band. We have been preparing our music for several months and will be ready to put on one heck of a show.”
Admission is free with a UT ID. You do not want to miss this one of a kind, debut musical event. See you there!
Sophie Erber can be reached at serber@spartans.ut.edu.