Band Shows Range With Voices
By Chris Paplior
The choir isn’t the only musical group to soothe ears with melodic vocals. Concert Band sang a whale of a song at their Jan. 19 winter concert, featuring the five movement piece by W. Francis McBeth “Of Sailors and Whales.” The song tells the story of “Moby-Dick” by Herman Melville.
Senior Trey Sorensen provided narration between each movement with excerpts from Melville’s novel.
Concert Band sing Movement 3 in “Of Sailors and Whales” by W. Francis McBeth on Jan. 19. The last time concert band introduced vocals was two years ago at their winter concert in a piece called “Symphony No. 1 (In Memoriam, Dresden, 1945).” Photo by Morgan Amundson
A ship sets sail on a peaceful sea to begin this musical adventure, which featured harmonizing melodies captured by instruments like the French horn, flute and clarinet.
In the third movement, however, these musicians put down their instruments and opened their mouths to sing a hymn resembling fatigued sailors in search of a great white whale. With lyrics like, “The ribs and terrors in the whale/ Arched over me a dismal gloom/ In black distress I call my God when I could scarce believe him mine,” the intonation wasn’t as crucial as what was actually being sung.
Senior percussionist Luke Merrill has been in band for seven years and believes he “cannot sing,” but he said the lyrics in the third movement were essential.
“Obviously the words are telling the story,” Merrill said. “The pitch shouldn’t be that important because either way the overall feel will be there.”
According to Merrill the vocals “could just be screaming and it would be good.”
In “Of Sailors and Whales,” Merrill plays the timpani that reflects the force of the whale swimming through the water.
“There’s a lot of really big sections where I just get to pretty much smash my arms onto the timpani,” Merrill said. “Every time we play it, I actually get a little bit of goose bumps just because some of the melodies are that intense, and it’s so powerful at times.”
Band Director Joe Kasparek has been teaching at the high school for six years. “Of Sailors and Whales” is a piece he has wanted to do for a long time. He was especially excited to have the students experience the third movement.
“It’s not something you would expect to hear from a band,” Kasparek said. “There aren’t a lot of pieces that utilize that stuff.”
One student in particular was amazed by the performance. Junior tenor saxaphone player Martin Heino said that the singing at the concert was better than at any of the rehearsals.
“I felt it was probably one of the best performances we’ve ever put on,” Heino said.
The concert ended with a standing ovation.
