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Tickets for Brandeis concert (see below) will be available at the door. See you there! (And please note: Brandeis has mistakenly advertised the time as 5 p.m. It's really 3 p.m. Don't be late!)
A Busy January Coming Up!
We've been so busy rehearsing that we forgot to post our schedule. And there's quite a bit to post. In January we're doing a local "tour," playing five concerts with a really exciting program. The centerpiece will be John Harbison's magnificent Quintet for Winds, a modern classic that has become a benchmark of the quintet repertoire - our four-minute mile - very challenging for us and exciting for the audience. We'll also include Jim Parker's Mississippi Five, which gives us the unusual opportunity to pay tribute to the jazz greats King Oliver, Bessie Smith, and Johnny Dodds - as well as to imitate a paddle wheeler, a Dixieland band, and a variety of animals, including donkeys, roosters, and bulls. An arrangement of Beethoven's delightful opus 71 Sextet - rarely performed in its original instrumentation - balances these twentieth-century works and illustrates the range of the quintet repertoire. Keeping these major compositions company will be Joseph Turrin's sprightly Three Summer Dances.
Here's the schedule for January:
When: Sunday January 8 at 3 p.m.
Where: The Timken Room, Graves Hall, Phillips Andover Academy, Andover MA
Admission: Free
When: Tuesday, January 10 at 12:15 p.m.
Where: King's Chapel, Tremont and Beacon Street, Boston, MA
Suggested Admission: $3 (Note: this is a 30 minute lunchtime concert and will not include the Harbison.)
When: Thursday, January 12 at 7 p.m.
Where: Gammons Recital Hall, Groton School, 282 Farmers Row, Groton MA
Admission: Free (Note: the Beethoven will not be included on this program.)
When: Saturday, January 21 at 7 p.m.
Where: First Parish Church of Stow and Acton, 353 Great Road, Stow MA
Suggested Admission: $12 students/seniors; $15 adults
When: Sunday January 29 at 3 p.m.
Where: Slosberg Recital Hall, Brandeis University, Waltham MA
Admission: $15 students/seniors; $20 adults
Enter Solar Winds' Family Concert Composition Competition
Hello composers! We're excited to be launching a contest for new compositions. Let's see if you can make Prokofiev move over or create the definitive Young Person's Guide to the Wind Quintet. Check this page from time to time for updates.
Here's how:
Entries must be unpublished, unperformed works for traditional wind quintet (flute, oboe, clarinet, French horn, and bassoon - with piccolo, alto flute, English horn, and bass clarinet as possible extras). They will be fifteen to twenty minutes in length and will include a script for an independent narrator, which may tell a story or give musical information suitable for family audiences. For the type of family program we perform, click on Family Concerts on this website - but feel free to be creative. We are interested in exciting music and entertaining narration. Any script that includes previously published material must be in the public domain or include written permission from the publisher.
Submit two hard copies of the score, one set of parts, and a CD with a midi version of your composition. Identify all of these items with a pseudonym only. Entries that include your real name will be disqualified. Attach an entry fee of $35 in a check made out to Solar Winds Quintet.
In a separate, sealed envelope, include your own biographical details and contact information. Write only your pseudonym on the outside of the envelope.
Mail your entry to Solar Winds Quintet, 157 Mt. Vernon St., Arlington MA 02476.
Remember not to include your name in the return address section of the outer envelope.
Judging Procedure
Solar Winds will endeavor to read through all entries in rehearsal and will select the winners. If the number of entries is too great to allow us to accomplish this, we will appoint a panel of judges whose role will be to assess the scores and listen to the midi versions in order to create a manageable short list for us to read.
Prizes
First prize: $700, plus a premiere performance in the Mosesian Theater at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, Massachusetts
Second prize: $250, plus a performance, venue TBA
Third prize: $150, plus a performanc, venue TBA
Deadlines and Dates
January 31, 2012: submission deadline
April 15: winners announced
Concert venues and exact dates will be released in the New Year. Return to this site for further information.
About That Fee
We're not very happy about it either! But the process of creating a short list - whether accomplished by us in rehearsals or by a panel of judges - will be time-consuming. No one's going to get rich as a result of this competition, but we do want to avoid going completely broke!
About That Deadline
Yes, we changed it to January 31, 2012. We realized that we'd have no time to look at submissions in January because we'll be too busy playing. And we figured that another month might make the project more accessible.
Some Further Competition Notes
Someone has asked whether the music has to be continuous. Not at all. There may be moments when the narator and musicians are performing simultaneously and other times when they are working solo. A little variety is always welcome. And we wind players like to catch our breath.
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