Fresh off its sold-out performances of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, the Rocky Mountain Symphony Orchestra (RMSO) is gearing up for its next show – March Winds. Featuring music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Richard Strauss and Charles Gounod, the March 6 concert will be held at 7:30 p.m. at the Polaris Centre for the Performing Arts in Balzac.
According to RMSO music director Carlos Foggin, the event will showcase the woodwinds instruments, such as the oboe, flute and clarinet. In an orchestral setting, he added, the wind musicians might often be overlooked.
“They sit in the middle, they’re not loud and not the strings,” he said. “When most of us were in junior-high band, we played clarinet, or something like that, so they’re sometimes seen as the band instruments and not the orchestra instruments.
“But what they do is provide a majority of the colour in an orchestra – the woodwinds are really what gives the music its flavour.”
The centrepiece of the concert will be Mozart’s Serenade No. 10 for Winds. Also known as the Gran Partita, Foggin said, the piece is widely acknowledged as one of the most important compositions for woodwinds of all time. He added listeners will likely be familiar with the music, as it was featured in the Oscar-winning film, Amadeus.
Complementing the seven-movement piece by Mozart will be Strauss’ Serenade For 13 Wind Instruments and Gounod’s Petite Symphonie.
While RMSO boasts 45 players, the performance will include just a third of that number, according to Foggin.
“We’re very excited to showcase our local players,” he said. “There’s no exotic soloist this time, but we’ll showcase the local players in the orchestra, who are each soloists in their own right.”
Along with the well-known wind instruments, such as the flute and clarinet, Foggin said, the concert will also feature the less-familiar contrabassoon – a paperclip-shaped instrument that plays some of the lowest notes possible in an orchestra.
“Back in the olden days, they were 10 feet long and went straight up into the air,” he said. “Now, we curl them up, so it looks somewhat like a coiled-up bazooka. It’s about 12 feet of tubing and plays almost one note off the bottom note of a piano, but is a wind instrument.
“It makes a very low sound, can be very loud or quiet, and is a very unique instrument that I guarantee 99 per cent of people don’t know exists and have never heard.”
Founded in 2016, RMSO is continuing to grow and mature as an orchestra. It offers concerts nearly every month and has performed close to 50 shows in Alberta to date, including appearances at Waterton Lakes National Park, Spruce Meadows, the National Music Centre and the Jack Singer Concert Hall.
“We started out strong, but now we’re seeing write-ups and views in our YouTube page in the thousands, and comments from musicians all over the world,” Foggin said. “What started out as a small band travelling to small towns to give people a sample of classical music has now turned into a bona-fide organization that is really putting its stamp – not just locally, but regionally, provincially and even nationally, as well.”
Tickets to March Winds are $5 for children 12 and under, $20 for students or $30 for adults, and are available at rockymountainsymphony.ca
Scott Strasser, AirdrieToday.com
Follow me on Twitter @scottstrasser19
