The Williams Symphonic Winds to Perform “The Sounds of Placeâ€
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass - The Williams Symphonic Winds will give a concert on Saturday, Nov. 15, at 8 p.m. in Chapin Hall on the Williams College campus. This free event is open to the public.Celebrating the 100th birthday of Olivier Messiaen, the Symphonic Winds lives up to its reputation for unusual and creative programming with a concert that explores how Messiaen and other composers construct identity through relationships with the concept of place, ranging from celestial villages (Olivier Messiaen's La ville d'en-Haut) to busy urban centers (Gustav Holst's Hammersmith) to solitary landscapes (John Adams's El Dorado). Also on the program is music by Eve Beglarian, John Harbison, David Lang, Ingram Marshall and the world premiere of Jonathan Newman’s My Hands Are a City.
The Williams Symphonic Winds is a 60-member ensemble dedicated to performing the most significant music written for the chamber and large wind ensemble mediums in provocative concerts. Now in his ninth year as Music Director, Steven Dennis Bodner has developed the ensemble's identity as a leading proponent of the performance of new music on campus.
The ensemble has commissioned and premiered a number of works by contemporary composers, including Williams faculty and alumni. Recognized as one of the premier wind ensembles in New England, the Symphonic Winds performed at the 2006 College Band Directors National Association Eastern Division Conference. In recent years, the Symphonic Winds has been noted both for its adventurous and creative programming and for the quality of its performance, described as "astounding" by critic-composer Barton McLean and "amazingly good" by the composer Louis Andriessen.
Music From China to Perform Cantonese Opera at Williams College
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass - Music From China will perform Cantonese Opera on Sunday, Nov. 16, at 3 p.m. in Brooks-Rogers Recital Hall on the Williams College campus. This free event is open to the public.
Actors in full costume perform selections from Cantonese opera classics! This unique chamber ensemble invokes the subtlety and power of both traditional and contemporary Chinese music with an affinity for the eclectic. “Music From China is music from heaven.” -Kansas City Star
Chinese opera, known as xiju, captures the imagination by combining singing, music, stylized acting, movement, mime, colorful costumes and makeup into a spectacular theatrical art form. Yueju, or Cantonese opera, is indigenous to the Cantonese speaking people of the southern province of Guangdong. Since the Cantonese historically made up the bulk of Chinese émigrés and sojourners to all parts of southeast Asia and throughout the world, Yueju is the oldest and longest performing art tradition of the Chinese diaspora.
Two professional actors Cindy Huang and Wai-wah Lo demonstrate the stylized acting of xiju with prescribed gestures and body movements, followed by performance of an excerpt from the Cantonese opera The Jade Bracelet. This is the charming story of how a young man woos a coquettish village maiden, with a jade bracelet becoming the go-between.
The unique singing style of Yueju is further demonstrated in a solo aria Qingwen Mends a Cape sung in the female falsetto voice called zihou. An orchestra made up of 2-string fiddles, bamboo winds, moon guitars, a hammered dulcimer, and percussion instruments accompanies the singer.
Xiju music also provides thematic material and inspiration for many instrumental compositions and arrangements. Music From China’s Artistic Director Wang Guowei leads the ensemble in instrumental arrangements with themes borrowed from various xiju styles, including The General’s Command and Medley of Cantonese Opera Tunes (Yueju), Beijing Opera Tunes (Jingju), and Song of Henan (Yuju).
