In a new effort to help middle school orchestra students get excited for orchestra in high school, the Chambers and Camerata groups joined with the Level 1 and Level 2 Trailridge orchestras for a side-by-side concert on Dec. 6.
To begin the concert, the String Ensemble played Roundeau by Jean Mouret and Ashokan’s Farewell by Jay Ungar, with the solo played by senior Johnathan McDaniel.
“When I stood up I wasn’t all that nervous, but as I started playing and got into it, I got extremely nervous,” McDaniel said. “I started shaking pretty badly, but in the end it turned out great. I was extremely happy with the way it turned out.”
Next, the freshmen orchestra played Toccatina (William Hofeldt) and Erebus, written by teacher Jeffrey Bishop. After a presentation of gifts to Bishop and student teacher Robyn Duvall, the Camerata orchestra then took the stage to play Lullaby, also by Hofeldt, and three movements of Don Quixote by G.P. Telemann. The Trailridge Level 1 orchestra members then joined their appointed high school partners to play two Christmas tunes.
After that, the large group left the stage to allow the Chambers orchestra to come on. This concert was not only a joint concert with Trailridge, but the debut of Symphony for Strings No. 3 “Nativitas,” Bishop’s newest work. The symphony (his third written) was about 16-18 minutes in duration, with four movements.
“What was cool about featuring Bishop’s new piece was that it was sharing a really personal piece of Bishop with your orchestra family,” Orchestra Leadership Team president Sarah Crosley said.
The eighth grade orchestra and Chambers then played Santa Plays the Viola, arranged by Mark Williams, and A Fiddling Christmas by Craig Duncan. Concluding the show was Jingle Variations, also written by Bishop, which was played by a massive orchestra of the seventh grade, eighth grade, Camerata and Chambers groups combined.
Because of tuning issues caused by the cold weather and the time it took to transition between groups, the concert ran much longer than normal, with a time of approximately two hours.
For their next performance, all orchestras will play Christmas carols throughout the day next Wednesday in the mall.
