Heroes Among Us: Concert Review

The ensemble is arranged with string instruments in the front and center in a semicircle around the conductor with brass behind the violins

The had the lines or the music where the drums were in the back and the other instruments were more towards the front. With that, you could tell that this was suppose to be a jazz show. Now there were not any brass instruments, but this was also a jazz fusion show so it was not going to be 100% original jazz.

The instrumentation of the show included a piano, bass, drums, saxophone, trumpet, fugal horn, and soundboard. The use of popular jazz instruments further reveals the performer’s intention to give the audience a taste of the sentimental, antique tones of jazz music. As the instrumentation reveals the genre of the music being performed, the stage for the show was set up in a way that highlighted the artists performing solos during the improvisational pieces. For example, the use of lights played a large role in visually isolating the soloists. The lights used during the show only illuminated the performers that were located upstage, while there were no lights used to illuminate downstage. Thus, as performers were not playing in the piece they would move downstage into the darkness. This would cause the focus of the audience to shift to the other performers that were still playing. The intentional movement of the artists downstage reveals the artist’s intent to highlight each individual instrument in the sextet and the improvisational skills of the artist playing them. Also, the visual depiction of an artist emerging from the shadows located downstage and playing prompted the audience to clap. The clapping was also prompted after a musician finishes the personal solo improvisational piece within a song. The clapping from the audience when an instrument

During intermission there were minor changes/additions in the seating of the orchestra however it stayed relatively the same. All members of the orchestra were wearing all black with a white suit jacket. The conductor had the center of the stage and around him were violins, cellos, and basses. Then behind those north of him were the woodwind instruments. Next to the flutes in the woodwind family was a harp and a spare piano. Behind the woodwind family was the brass family (trombones and trumpets) and farthest were the percussions (bass drum and timpani) . However, directly behind the conductor’s podium was the main piano.

The first half of the concert was only instrumental. There were two violins, two violas, and two cellos. They sat on stage with the violins one my right, then the violas in the middle, and the cellos on the end. The violins played a few songs solo. The second half of the concert was only the choir and a piano. Their performance started with the song Daybreak. The song Daybreak also had a few girls playing percussion, one of them had a tambourine. Using SHMRG, the Harmony of most of the choirs songs were very homophonic. The Melody of most of the songs were mainly slow, though a couple songs were very fast, and upbeat.

The stage was brightly lit from both on stage and the front of house and the musicians were arranged in a semi circle around the podium. The back rows of the strings section were mounted on risers and high stools. They were all wearing black formal wear. They seemed confident in their playing and very relaxed and used to the stage. They all had excellent posture and were concentrating on the music without talking.

25 in G Minor composed by W.A. Mozart, Winter Wind composed by the high schooler Thaddeus Maximillian Gotcher, Concerto for Two Violins in D Minor composed by J.S. Bach (one of my personal favorites), and Intermezzo from “Cavalleria Rusticana” composed by Pietro Mascagni. One detail about the concert that really impressed me was the fact that Sinfonia played all of the full and originally written versions of the pieces except for Intermezzo from “Cavalleria Rusticana” which was arranged by Carl Simpson. To me this shows Sinfonia’s advanced playing abilities, because they were able to play those pieces using the same complex rhythms, melodies, and dynamics the composer had written into their music. Another thing that left an imprint in my mind about the concert was the many soloists including Frank Almond that stood up and played for the Concerto for Two Violins. I was very impressed by the soloists’ abilities to stay together and start and end at the same position of their bows. Not only had these soloists been able move in sync with their bows but the whole orchestra in did within their own sections. This also shows the advanced level of the Sinfonia players and the amount of dedication and hard work those

The performance from the symphonic band was great! This was their spring concert. The songs consisted of Golden Jubilee March, Corsican Litany, In the Temple of Zion, Grieg, and The Hounds of Spring. The songs were correlated around the spring time feeling. The songs were happy, and cheerful. I had a electronic excited feeling throughout the concert. The artist talked about some vacations taken during spring break; some of these trips consisted on going to Moab Utah, and Colorado. During the songs being played the notes felt like I was going on an adventure.

The first concert took place at Bronx Community College on a Wednesday, March 30, 2016, at 12:00 pm in the Gould Memorial Library Auditorium, was the string family, which it was the violin, viola, and cello on the performance at Bronx Community College. Moreover, the first song was “FIVE (1987)”

The National Symphony Orchestra performed on Saturday evening, March 5, 2016 at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The show was divided into three parts with different performance; the conductor for this group is Christoph Eschenbach, the National Symphony Orchestra Debut name is Ray Chen, Violin, & Adriana Horne, Harp, and play Bruch / 2 Prokofiev symphonies. The venue where the performance took place was at the Concert Hall with high-tech acoustical canopy, new seating sections and handicap-accessible. The atmosphere was beautiful and so vintage because of the Hadeland crystal chandeliers that was given by the government of Norway. The seating capacity was 2442 with audience mostly elderly caucasian people, families with their kids, and random young adults with a significant others.

There were two students with violas and two students with cellos. They began with “My Lady Hundson’s Puffe” by John Dowland. At the beginning of this song from the Renaissance Era, they plucked the strings of their instruments. One of the cellists left and began to play the harpsicord. I could not tell when this work ended and when the next work, “John Come Kisse Me Now” by William Byrd began. I felt awkward because neither I nor the audience gave applause. This work was also from the Renaissance Era. The harpsichord solo was very unpleasant to listen to. Their final performance was, “Two masquing dances” which featured “The Goates Masque” and “The Witches’ Second Dance”. The works were composer was anonymous. Even though, these two works were from the Renaissance Era, they had more melody and somewhat of a sonata form. This was my least favorite section of the concert.

There were four other performances. Five Sketches for string trio Op.23, Quintet in d minor, Concerto Grosso Op 3, No. 4 in F major and the last one was Symphony No. 104 in F Major (London). All of them were not that long. I noticed that on the last two performances they added more people. On the Concerto Grosso there was 15 members in total and on the Symphony there was 26. After each performance there was a “break”. On that break all they did was prep the stage for the others. Some of the things they did was, add/ remove chairs and music

Scroll was one of the most interesting because of the long paper that the use to put the notes on (maybe that’s why they named Scroll). They start playing slowly then they start playing everything fast but it would sound like if everyone was doing a different note or a different style and that’s why it makes this more unique than the other ones. They also perform “December 1952 By Earle Brown. This one I dint like it some much because it wasn’t like the previous one. This one was quieter and more relaxing. Than they did “Timbres #1” By James Tenney, Play By Christian Wolff and the improvisation that was also amazing, how they combine every instrument and how they mix their on rhythm.

by an orchestra and was definitely a performance I enjoyed to watch and listen to.

The stage was brightly lit from both on stage and around the entire auditorium. The musicians were arranged in a semi-circle around stage. The back rows of the strings section were seated on risers and high stools. They were all wearing silky smooth burgundy shirts, the boys wore black pants, and the girls wore black skirts. They seemed confident in their playing, very settled, and accustomed to being on stage. Each student on stage had excellent posture and concentration. I was very impressed with the level of skill they played with, being only in high school.