An Upcoming Audition and Something completely different

Audition news from the Milwaukee Festival Brass

Mark May 23rd on your calendar. The Milwaukee Festival Brass will hold auditions for adults wishing to be on their sub list, but there are immediate openings in the group for Bb tuba and Eb tuba. Also included will be auditions for the Milwaukee Festival Brass High School Apprentice Program. This is a new program and looks to be a wonderful way for high school musicians to gain more experience. See the Milwaukee Festival Brass web site for more details: http://www.mfbrass.org/.

A different type of Community Music Group

There is a community music group based in Appleton that is different from all of the groups I've written about before. The group is the Fox Valley Horns, all french horns all the time! The group is made up of many middle and high school students, as well as adults. Everyone volunteers their time to make music, french horn style. I think this group is special because it allows those just starting out on the horn to play with more accomplished and experienced horn players. Everyone has fun...and that's what music should be!


The Fox Valley Horns have a concert coming up on Saturday May 10th at 1 PM in the Bethany Lutheran Church, 520 West Parkway, in Appleton. The featured soloist is Bruce Atwell, professor of Horn at UW Oshkosh. He will perform Jimmy Van Heusen's Here's That Rainy Day. Also on the program is Norwegian Suite, arranged by Cynthia Carr, a former professor of Horn at Lawrence University. The featured piece is an arrangement of the 1812 Overture for Horn Choir. This will be a fun concert and I encourage everyone to attend.


I heard a great story about how the Horn Choir was able to get the music for the 1812 Overture. Last year the Horn Choir performed an arrangement of music from the movie Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves for horns. The performance was captured on video and posted on YouTube. It turns out that a horn choir in Japan saw this and posted their performance of the 1812 Overture as well. Don Krause, the director of the Horn Choir, contacted the group in Japan to find out where they got the music. Turns out that the arranger is in Florida and was kind enough to send the music to Don. And so it goes...


Groups like this are special in my view. Everyone enjoys themselves, good music is made, and young students learn a bunch. It doesn't get any better than this.


See you on the 10th.