FROM: RICHARD SORENSON, conductor, Willamette Valley Concert Band & Reconstituted Monmouth Independence Town Band. 503-838-3474
E-mail sorenson@minetfiber.com
A free patriotic band concert in the park will feature the Willamette Valley Concert Band and Reconstituted Monmouth-Independence Town Band on Thursday, July 2, at 7 pm in Monmouth Main Street Park. The program is part of the annual Western Days Arts in the Park Celebration in Monmouth. The concert will feature a wide variety of traditional band music of a patriotic and popular vein Sponsor of the event is the Monmouth-Independence Community Arts Association.
Opening the program will be the Willamette Valley Concert Band, a community band drawing musicians from Benton, Linn, Marion and Polk counties which has been performing for the past 39 years. Featured soloists will be band trumpetist Steve Iverson who will play Carnival of Venice arranged by Staigers. Other selections will include highlights from the Broadway hit Gigi by Lerner and Loewe, Big Bands in Concert arranged by Lowden, Esprit de Corps by Jager, Amazing Grace by Ticheli, Grand American Fantasy by Tobani and marches by John Philip Sousa.
During a brief intermission the Monmouth-Independence Community Arts Association will have an auction for the conductor’s baton to guest conduct the grand finale of the concert.
The second half of the concert will feature the Reconstituted Monmouth-Independence Town Band, a group which organizes each year to perform for the Western Days Fourth of July Celebration.
The band, in its 37th year, comprises musicians from many mid-valley communities. Featured vocalist for this part of the program will be WOU voice professor, Dr. Kevin Helppie, who will sing selections from the Broadway musical, Paint Your Wagon. The band will also play Poet and Peasant Overture by von Suppe, Gershwin! arranged by Barker, Fanfare and Flourishes by Curnow, Patriotic Pageantry arranged by Barker, Barnum and Bailey’s Favorite March by King and Liberty Bell March by Sousa.
The two bands comprising about 80 musicians will combine for the grand finale, a performance of John Philip Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever conducted by the winner of the auction for the baton. Both bands are conducted by Dr. Richard Sorenson, Emeritus Professor of Music and Director of Bands at Western Oregon University. For further information contact Sorenson at 503-838-3474. In case of rain, the concert will be moved to the Pacific Room in the Werner University Center on the campus of Western Oregon University on the corner of Church and Monmouth Avenue.