by Emma Mae Regan ’22

Hamilton College’s 2018 Fallcoming and Family Weekend will include a variety of musical performances. All of the shows will be free and open to anyone, including students, faculty, staff, parents, alumni, and

the local community. There will be two a cappella concerts, with one on Friday, Oct. 26 and the other on Saturday, Oct. 27. Both performances will take place in the Chapel and begin at 9:00 PM.

“Some groups will be singing slightly different sets at the two concerts, but for the most part, they will be the same. We like to have two [shows] so that everyone who wants to can come, as the chapel is usually packed both nights!” said Josie Blatt ’21, one of the co-assistant music directors of Special K.

All five a cappella groups will be performing. Those groups are all-female group Special K, all-female group Tumbling After, all-male group The Buffers, all-gender group Duelly Noted, and all-gender group The

Hamiltones. At the concert, the a cappella groups will be debuting their new repertoires and showing the Hamilton community what they have worked on during the semester.

“This concert is also special in that each group usually has at least one song that they invite alumni on stage to sing, which I find to be a very heartwarming part of the concert,” said Blatt. Blatt encourages everyone to attend the concert because the show reconnects Hamilton alumni with their a cappella groups, introduces new group members to the community, and is always enjoyable for visiting parents.

“[The performance] is a great way to transport your parents back to their college days, or just enjoy some beautiful music with them! […] It is also nice to have a lot of people to welcome [the new members] […] and to see that the musical connection in the groups stays even beyond graduation,” said Blatt.

The Hamilton College Choir and College Hill Singers will be performing on Friday, Oct. 26 at 7:30 PM in Wellin Hall. This performance will be part of a combined evening program with the Department of Dance and

Movement studies.

“The College Choir and College Hill Singers will be performing pieces by Henry

Purcell, Samuel Barber, Vienna Teng, Kim Andre Arnesen, and others. The music spans the western canon of choral works from madrigals to modern works by living composers,” said Professor Danan Tsan, Interim Director

of Choral Activities.

Professor Tsan mentioned some notable pieces of the concert that viewers can look forward to. “The College Choir is excited to be performing a piece called Hymn of Acxiom by Vienna Teng,” she said. “The College Hill Singers will be featured on a piece written in 2011 by J. David Moore with text by Jack Manno, retired professor from SUNY- ESF, who will be at the concert to read his Earth Blessing. We will also have the choir president, Andi Dickmeyer ’19, leading the choir and alumni in Carissima.” She believes that the Hamilton and Clinton communities “should come to the chorus concert to enjoy a wonderful night of music that they most often don’t get to hear.”

“The choirs are terrific, the music is varied and complex, and the choral part of

the concert isn’t very long […] probably right around 35 minutes,” said Professor Tsan.

The Orchestra and Jazz Ensembles will be performing on Saturday, Oct. 27 in Wellin Hall. The Orchestra will begin the concert at 7:30 PM, and the Jazz Ensemble will follow at around 8:15 PM.

The Orchestra is playing Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony №1 subtitled “Winter Dreams.” Professor of Music and Director of the Hamilton College Orchestra Heather Buchman said she selected

the piece for multiple reasons. “[Symphony №1 is] a great icebreaker for the orchestra for the first semester. I tried to rotate different composers for a student during their four years in the orchestra and we have not played any Tchaikovsky in a while. Also, a lot of [the orchestra students] are fans of Russian music, and some of them are going to study abroad in Russia, so I thought this piece would be even more fun for them,” said Professor Buchman.

At the Family Weekend concert, the Orchestra will play three out of four of the symphony’s movements, omitting the third movement. The Orchestra will play the entire symphony at the Winter Concert on Dec. 7.

A unique aspect of Hamilton Orchestra is that, in addition to the 35 Hamilton students that play in it, there are about 15 members of the local community who are members as well. “It is a nice vibe when you have this diversity of people in the group. We have sort of made ourselves into a resource for members of the community who are looking for a place where they can play. It brings more people on campus,” said Professor Buchman. She also suggests going to the show because “you can hear two really great music department ensembles, each of which is going to sound completely different. There

will be a lot of excitement on stage with both the Orchestra and with the Jazz Ensemble. We really have a high level of musicianship

among the student body.”

The Jazz Ensemble will play an variety of pieces, including “Mission to Moscow” by Benny Goodman, a blues piece, a slow piece, and two pieces composed by students. Benny Goodman was an American jazz clarinetist

and bandleader. The students wrote their music over the summer and have worked with the Jazz Ensemble during the past semester to prepare it for this weekend’s concert. The Jazz Ensemble is a large band, which

is a type of ensemble that consists of over 10 musicians divided between the four instrument sections of saxophones, trombones, trumpets, and rhythm. “Doctuh” Michael Woods, the Leonard C. Ferguson Professor of Music, has worked with the Jazz Ensemble particularly on tempo and style in order to bring out the artistic qualities of the pieces and to make the music the “star” of the event. Doc Woods recommends attending the concerts because he believes that the presence of visual arts, music, and theater serves as a barometer of the culture of a community.

All of the conductors of these different groups are proud of the work ethic and discipline that their students and peers have put into their preparation, indicating that there is much to look forward to at the concerts this

weekend.