The
Austin Symphonic Band has been an Austin tradition for over thirty
years. The band was formed in the summer of 1981 by brass and
woodwind players of the Austin Community Orchestra (now the Austin Civic Orchestra). They were seeking an opportunity for more playing
time than orchestral music typically provided. R. Frank Simon was
asked to be the conductor and the first Music Director.
Frank Simon Interview
In a May 27, 2003 interview, R. Frank Simon describes the beginning of the Austin Symphonic Band
Rehearsals
began in the summer of 1981. During this period the new performing group
called themselves “The New River City Wind Ensemble” and gave
concerts at Highland Mall, Barton Creek Mall, Westwood High School,
and at the Hillside Theater in Zilker Park.
Frank Simon Interview
In a May 27, 2003 interview, R. Frank Simon describes the beginning of the Austin Symphonic Band
In
June 1982 Mr. Simon resigned in order to take a new position with the
Performing Arts Center of the University of Texas at Austin. David
Parker, the Principal Horn of the Austin Community Orchestra, served
as Interim Conductor for a concert at the Hillside Theater in June
1982 and a Halloween concert in the Capitol Rotunda. While the
members sought a permanent conductor, the group’s name was changed
to “Austin Symphonic Band” as it was felt the new name more
closely identified the nature and intent of the musicians. Randol A.Bass was invited to conduct a series of Christmas concerts in various
malls in Austin and was then elected permanent Music Director in
January 1983.
During
1983, 1984, and 1985, Mr. Bass led the band at four outdoor concerts
at Zilker Park, nine indoor concerts at Bates Recital Hall at the
University of Texas at Austin, and at special concerts at Austin’s
Laguna Gloria Art Museum and at Taylor (Texas) High School, the first
Austin Symphonic Band concert outside of Austin. For
Randol Bass’ first concert as ASB Music Director, he played George
Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.
Pianist
Randol Bass plays Rhapsody in Blue March 20, 1983, Vicente
Paredes conducts
At
the end of 1985 Randol Bass left the music directorship to undertake
other endeavors. The board of directors elected Richard L. Floyd as
the third Music Director. Mr. Floyd’s first rehearsal with the band
was on January 7, 1986 at the Pierce Junior High School cafeteria.
Scenes From The Louvre
Richard Floyd conducts Norman Dello Joio’s Scenes from “The Louvre” during his first concert as ASB Music Director, March 22, 1986
William Haehnel was appointed as Assistant Music Director in 2003.
Scenes From The Louvre
Richard Floyd conducts Norman Dello Joio’s Scenes from “The Louvre” during his first concert as ASB Music Director, March 22, 1986
William Haehnel was appointed as Assistant Music Director in 2003.
The
Austin Symphonic Band performs music from the concert wind band
repertoire. When the band first formed in 1981, it owned no music.
Funds to purchase music were nearly non-existent. The first music
director Frank Simon used the words “beg and borrow” to
indicate the difficulties in getting music. Only by taking advantage
of contacts in the Austin concert band community, could the early
music directors assemble the music to play for a concert.
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The
Austin Symphonic Band has undertaken several activities during the
last three decades:
Entertain
the Public with Live Music Performances,
Bring
Guest Soloists and Musical Groups to Austin,
Premier
New Music,
Musically
Support the Austin Community,
Perform
with other Austin Musical Organizations,
Stimulate
Austin Student Music Education,
Encourage
the National Community Band Movement,
Provide
an Outlet for Wind and Percussion Musicians.
Entertain
the Public with Live Music Performances –
The primary purpose of the Austin Symphonic Band has been to
entertain Austin audiences and share the wind band repertoire with
them. Between 1981 and 2013, the band has given more than 300 concerts. For most of its three decade history, each year the band
has typically given three indoor concerts, three Austin outdoor
concerts – usually at the outdoor theater in Zilker Park, and
concerts before and during fireworks at Independence Day celebrations
in Round Rock and Bastrop. Over the years, the band has spread its
music around central Texas by giving full-personnel indoor concerts
at towns near Austin including Taylor, Cedar Park, Pflugerville,
Georgetown, Dripping Springs, Killeen, Florence, Kyle, Marble Falls,
Rockdale, San Marcos, Westlake, and Lakeway.
In
addition to the regular schedule, the band has frequently presented
large formal indoor concerts for the public. The December 8, 1984
Christmas concert of the band with the First United Methodist Church
sanctuary choir at Bates Recital Hall on the campus of the University
of Texas at Austin was recorded, videotaped, edited, and broadcast by
KVUE television in prime time on Christmas Eve. The resulting
30-minute Seasonal
Sounds special won an Angel,
a public television award for distinguished family programming.
December 24, 1984 KVUE-TV broadcast, Bates Recital Hall, Good Christian Men Rejoice, Randol Bass conducts.
(Used with the permission of KVUE-TV)
In
November 2010, the Austin Civic Orchestra and the Austin Symphonic
Band gave a joint concert at the newly built Long Center for the
Performing Arts, which replaced Palmer Auditorium. The band’s
special guest group was the City Limits Brass made up of University
of Texas Butler School of Music students Jesse Cook, Chris Heldt,
Kevin Miescke, Joe Brown, and James Saliers, who played Michael
Sweeney’s arrangement of Suite for Brass Quintet and Concert
Band from Bernstein’s Mass.
Premier
New Music – One of
the goals of the Austin Symphonic Band has been to bring new music to
its audiences. More than 25% of the pieces performed at its concerts
have been less than 6 years old at the time of the performance. The
band has achieved this high level of new music in concerts through
the music director’s vigilance in searching for recently published
and even about-to-be-published works and a band budget that permits
new music purchases. As a result of these ongoing activities, Austin
Symphonic Band audiences hear freshly written or arranged music, as
well as the familiar standards. Occasionally, the band plays pieces that
have not been previously performed in Austin or Texas by any group.
For example, the band’s November 21, 1993 performance of deMeij’s
Symphony No. 1 “Lord
of the Rings” was an
Austin premier. Sometimes the music performed is so new it causes a
problem; Mr. Floyd had to program the band’s performance of John
Mackey’s Sheltering Sky near the end of the April 21, 2012
concert to prevent it from being played before the intended world
premier, which was scheduled elsewhere on the same day.
Bring
Guest Soloists and Musical Groups to Austin
– The band has frequently brought in guest soloists and groups to
perform with the band. With these collaborations, Austin audiences
have had the opportunity to see and hear live performances by these
talented musicians.
Rhythm
and Brass was one of the earliest outside groups to perform with the
band. Their precise playing and entertaining presentation of their
music is delightful. Soloists who have performed with the band
include Charles Villarubia, tuba; Wiff Rudd, trumpet; Brent Phillips,
trombone; Dale Underwood, alto saxophone; Jim Walker, flute; Lynn
Klock, saxophone; and Michael Sizer, clarinet. All have special
stories. Craig Morris, former principal trumpet of the Chicago
Symphony Orchestra, performed Broughton’s Excursions with the
band at the Long Center for the Performing Arts in 2012.
The
band has also performed with guest soloists who happen to live in the
Austin area. Soprano Claire Vangelisti has been accompanied by the
band on several occasions. University
of Texas professor of trumpet Ray Sasaki performed Robert Russell
Bennett’s Rose Variations with the band in 2003. Former local
television news anchor and tenor Ron Oliveira sang What Child Is
This? with the Austin Symphonic Band accompanying him at the 1984
Christmas concert.
Musically
Support the Austin Community
– As one of the important musical organizations in the Austin area,
the Austin Symphonic Band has had the opportunity and the honor to
serve the community in various ways besides just performing concerts.
In
1986 the band began a long relationship with KMFA-FM, Austin’s
classical music radio station. That autumn the band played a concert
in the station’s parking lot to support the station’s
fund-raising musical garage sale of used electronics and recordings.
September 1987 marked the live broadcast of the 30-minute concert –
the first live broadcast for the band and a live broadcast of
a large musical ensemble for KMFA.
The Austin Symphonic Band welcomes home the troops, June 30, 1991. |
Richard Floyd conducts The Battle Hymn of the Republic featuring Barbara Conrad, the Austin Choral Union, and the Austin Symphonic Band, June 30, 1991.
Blue Santa Concert in Bates Recital Hall, November 24, 1991. |
Each
winter the Austin Police Department sponsors the Blue Santa project,
which provides Christmas gifts for needy children. From 1990 to 1995
the Austin Symphonic Band gave Blue Santa “kick-off” concerts in
Bates Recital Hall at the University of Texas at Austin. SSgt. Sam Cox was the announcer for each concert.
Some of the memorable pieces include Tom Sawyer’s Saturday narrated by Cactus Pryor,
Tom Sawyer's Saturday
Cactus Pryor narrates John Dankworth’s Tom Sawyer’s Saturday November 24, 1991. Richard Floyd conducts.
Orff’s Carmina Burana, John Moss’ The Night Before Christmas narrated by Cathy Conley of KXAN-TV, Mars, the Bringer of War from Holst’s The Planets, and the Austin premier of deMeij’s Symphony No. 1 “The Lord of the Rings” with Don Toner of the Live Oak Theater acting out the narrations preceding each movement.
Some of the memorable pieces include Tom Sawyer’s Saturday narrated by Cactus Pryor,
Tom Sawyer's Saturday
Cactus Pryor narrates John Dankworth’s Tom Sawyer’s Saturday November 24, 1991. Richard Floyd conducts.
Orff’s Carmina Burana, John Moss’ The Night Before Christmas narrated by Cathy Conley of KXAN-TV, Mars, the Bringer of War from Holst’s The Planets, and the Austin premier of deMeij’s Symphony No. 1 “The Lord of the Rings” with Don Toner of the Live Oak Theater acting out the narrations preceding each movement.
On
April 24, 1999, the Austin Symphonic Band, under the direction of Van
Henry, provided the music – actually, an entire concert – for the
dedication ceremony at the new Barbara Jordan Passenger Terminal at
Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. Dedication remarks were made
by mayor Kirk Watson, U.S. representative Lloyd Doggett, former U.S.
representative J.J. “Jake” Pickle, and former Austin mayors Bruce
Todd and Roy Butler.
Annual
recognition of our nation’s birth traditionally contains fireworks
and patriotic music. The Austin Symphonic Band is proud to have
provided concerts before and during fireworks for thousands of people
every year at the Independence Day celebrations in Bastrop since
1991 and Round Rock since 1994.
The Stars and Stripes Forever with fireworks
The Stars and Stripes Forever with fireworks, Round Rock Old Settler's Park, July 4, 1996, Richard Floyd conducts.
The Stars and Stripes Forever with fireworks
The Stars and Stripes Forever with fireworks, Round Rock Old Settler's Park, July 4, 1996, Richard Floyd conducts.
The
band has frequently been invited to provide music at Memorial Day
observances at the Texas State Cemetery. A 35-member subset of the
Austin Symphonic Band, known as the MicroBand, forms to play special
events, such as these, where the full 90-piece band is not required.
The MicroBand also plays the Christmas carol Sing-Along concerts
(with hot chocolate for the audience) in December at the Trail of
Lights in Zilker Park and concerts at retirement homes and children’s
hospitals.
Perform
with other Austin Musical Organizations
– The Austin Symphonic Band is musically active in the Austin
community, not just by presenting its own concerts, but also by
joining with other Austin arts groups to bring varied entertainment
to audiences.
Scene from Act II of Austin Lyric Opera's 2009 Production of La Boheme |
In
its close relationship with KMFA-FM, the radio station staff members
have sometimes been special guests. In 1991 radio announcer Randy
Harriman narrated Copland’s Lincoln Portrait while the band
was conducted by Peter Bay, newly appointed conductor of the Austin Symphony Orchestra. In 2011 David Crews narrated Walters’ Duty,
Honor, Country, which is based on General Douglas MacArthur’s
1962 West Point speech.
The
concert “A Highland
Fling” combined the
bagpipes, costumes, and dancing of the Silver Thistle Pipe and Drums
and the Hill Country Highland Dancers with the Austin Symphonic Band.
The Austin Handbell Ensemble and the St. Martins Lutheran Church Bell
Choir have performed with the Austin Symphonic Band to add sparkle to
Christmas concerts. For the large-scale work The
Many Moods of Christmas,
the voices of the Austin Civic Chorus joined the Austin Symphonic
Band with the Visser-Rowland pipe organ at Bates Recital Hall on the
University of Texas at Austin campus.
Stimulate
Austin Student Music Education
– One of the goals of the Austin Symphonic Band has been to
stimulate and support music education in the Austin area. Many Austin
Symphonic Band members make use of their musical knowledge to
volunteer as judges during with the annual auditions for regional,
area, and all-state band seats. Members also volunteer their skills
to help make up the workshop band that the University of Texas at
Austin uses for its annual Conductor’s Workshop. Aspiring Texas
school band conductors are critiqued on their conducting skills and
given suggestions for improvements while conducting the workshop
band.
The
band has also advanced music education by giving joint concerts with
school bands and concerts where band students are interspersed within
the Austin Symphonic Band during the performance. One of the early
outside-of-Austin concerts was given in 1990 at Rockdale (Texas) High
School. For the last three numbers, members of the Rockdale High
School Band joined the Austin Symphonic Band. The MicroBand has given
joint concerts and mingled-seating concerts with Mendez Middle School
and Pierce Middle School music students and a wind instrument
demonstration concert for St. Gabriel Catholic Elementary School. The
Dripping Springs High School brass section created antiphonal brass
effects for the Finale of Kalinnikov’s Symphony
No. 1 in G minor.
Showing another side of concert-making opportunities, the band was
joined by Travis High School’s strings-and-brass mariachi group
Mariachi Rebeldes del Sur to create the specialty concert “Viva
Mexico!” In June 1993,
the band entertained the parents and children of Metz Elementary
School with a special Friday evening concert featuring the music of
Mexico and Spain.
For
many Austin Symphonic Band concerts that have ticket sales, the band
offers free tickets to Austin Independent School District wind band
students. The band arranges for master classes given in Austin
schools by guest soloists who will be performing at upcoming Austin
Symphonic Band concerts. This gives students an opportunity to meet
and learn from professional musicians and then, soon after, to see
them perform.
The
Austin Symphonic Band also gives music students attending the
University of Texas the opportunity to perform as soloists with a large
ensemble accompaniment. Recent concerts have included undergraduates
Alex Glen, Josh Balleza, Matt Carr, and Jeff Arredondo playing
Koetsier’s Concertino for Trombone Quartet, Daniel Frost
playing Broughton’s Tuba
Concerto, and soprano
Stephanie Lange singing the beginning and end of Ticheli’s Angels
in the Architecture from high in Dell Concert Hall at Austin’s
Long Center for the Performing Arts.
Encourage
the National Community Band Movement
– A largely unrecognized musical resource produced by our primary
and secondary schools is the large number of adults who have
instrumental skills but no longer play their instruments. To
encourage the formation and development of more and better community
bands, the Austin Symphonic Band has actively demonstrated the
potential for amateur adult musicians to form adult bands for the
enjoyment of making and listening to music in communities all across
the country. To make this demonstration, the band applied to,
received invitations from, and performed at several major national
music conventions that are attended by composers, arrangers, and
conductors. Invitations are made only to the best-sounding groups who
can deliver polished performances. In some cases the Austin Symphonic
Band’s performance was the first time a community band had been on
the program.
In
1989 the band first appeared in Chicago at the Midwest International
Band and Orchestra Clinic (Mark Custom Records recording MW89-MC-23). The Dallas Brass was featured with the
band, and H. Robert Reynolds, Director of Bands at the University of
Michigan, was one of the guest conductors. The 1997 Midwest
performance featured guest soloist Patrick Sheridan on tuba (Mark Custom Records recording MW97-MC-26). Each
Midwest conference has a special clinic given late on one evening.
The 1997 Midnight Madness clinic “Looking Beyond the Notes” was
given by composer Frank Ticheli with the Austin Symphonic Band
playing excerpts from Cajun Folk Songs, Amazing Grace, Sun Dance, and Blue Shades. The 2007 performance
featured Rhythm and Brass (Mark Custom Records recording 7322-MCD). At that conference Keith Brion presented
the clinic “Keys to Unlocking the Secrets of Sousa Marches” (Mark Custom Records recording 7336-MCD) using the full Austin Symphonic Band
to demonstrate his points.
The
band was invited to perform at the 1993 and 2006 meetings of the
American Bandmasters Association. The 1993 New Orleans concert
included many well-known guest conductors including John Paynter,
Director of Bands at Northwestern University and Music Director of
the Northshore Concert Band. Frank Ticheli conducted his Vesuvius in the 2006 ABA Richardson, Texas concert.
Saxophonist
Lynn Klock was the featured soloist at the band’s concert at the
2004 Western International Band Clinic in Seattle. The band
accompanied him for Catherine McMichael’s Sapphire and
Ferrandino’s arrangement of Hora Staccato.
Sapphire
Catherine McMichael’s Sapphire, Lynn Klock, saxophone, February 22, 2004. Richard Floyd conducts.
Sapphire
Catherine McMichael’s Sapphire, Lynn Klock, saxophone, February 22, 2004. Richard Floyd conducts.
Provide
an Outlet for Wind and Percussion Musicians
– For over thirty years Austin-area wind and percussion musicians
have been welcome to sit in on rehearsals of the Austin Symphonic
Band. Auditions have never been required to become a member. However,
membership in the organization has always been subject to the
availability of an opening. The resulting size of the band has been
consistently in the 70 to 90 member range. The membership is a sample
of the wide range of occupations of Austin-area residents. The
membership is always changing. A study of the 25-year roster from 1982 to
2006 shows the band has over 750 alumni. The earliest known band
roster (June 1982) indicates that four early members are still in
the band today: Beverly (Foreman) Lowak (flute), Jerry Schwab (euphonium), Karen VanHooser (piccolo
and band music librarian), and Chuck Ellis (horn and band equipment
transportation manager). Since 1981 over 100 members have served as band officers and served on the Board of Directors to support the band’s organization.
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City of Austin Proclamation
In
Palmer Auditorium, at the March 1994 Sousa-style concert, Noah Lee,
president of the Association of Concert Bands, presented the Sudler Scroll award to the Austin Symphonic Band on behalf of the John Philip Sousa
Foundation.
Sudler Scroll Presentation
Noah Lee presents the Sudler Scroll, March 8, 1994.
Texas
governor and future U.S. President George W. Bush recognized the
selection of the Austin Symphonic Band to perform at the 1997 Midwest
International Band and Orchestra Clinic in a letter that was included
in the concert program.
Sudler Scroll Presentation
Noah Lee presents the Sudler Scroll, March 8, 1994.
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Financial
Status –The band
operates on funds received from concert ticket receipts, member dues,
private individual donations, business donations, and cultural
contracts from the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division.
The Austin Symphonic Band was incorporated as a 501c3 tax-exempt
organization on April 26, 1984. Tax-deductible donations are welcome
and may be sent to: Austin Symphonic Band, P.O. Box 6472, Austin,
Texas 78762-6472.
Archives
– The archives of the Austin Symphonic Band are kept at the Austin
History Center, 810 Guadalupe Street, Austin, Texas.
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