The house lights dim and the focus shifts to the stage where the Utah Tech University Orchestra sits waiting for the conductor’s signal. The conductor walks on stage and the music begins. It starts soft, drawing you in, and then more and more instruments join in, overlapping and moving into a climax; this pattern of soft to loud continues throughout the concert.
The orchestra had a concert called “Evening of Concertos” Nov. 2. This concert featured many soloists playing concertos and a piece titled “An American in Paris” by George Gershwin.
Student soloists for this concert include:
- Bradley Jensen—senior music performance major from McKinney, Texas, playing the marimba
- Brooklyn Peterson—senior music education major from Payson, playing the oboe
- Jarom Brown—junior music performance major from Anaheim, California, playing the flute
- Bethany Ballard—sophomore music performance major from Cedar City, playing the viola
They each played in a concerto, which is a piece written for one or more soloists, accompanied by an orchestra.
The Utah Tech Orchestra has a program that is one of the greatest university orchestra programs in Utah and the southwestern United States. A successful program starts with having a good director.
“Dr. Abegg has done a really great job giving people incentive to be here and to hold people accountable whenever he knows they need to do better. So, I think that it all stems from the top down, from leadership,” Jensen said.
The director can’t create a successful program by himself or herself. It takes dedication from the students, a desire to succeed and the ability to rise to challenging music presented to them.
“The quality of student, talent and dedication is a big part of [creating a successful program],” Paul Abegg, director of orchestras and string studies, said. “I aim high in the repertoire that I choose. Oftentimes, it stretches members of the orchestra to improve. So, as we do that from semester to semester and year to year, that raises the level of the orchestra.”
It takes hours of preparation to put on a concert like the one on Saturday. Soloists have even more to do outside of rehearsal in preparation than the rest of the orchestra. They practice with the ensemble a couple of hours a week and then have to practice their individual piece. This piece also needs to be memorized, unlike the ensemble pieces.
“You have to make sure it is just perfect so that when you get up there and you’re scared, you only mess up once,” Peterson said.
There was one other soloist for this concert, Robert Matheson, assistant professor in the orchestra program. His concerto was unique because he was given the opportunity to play the piece on a bass the composer, Serge Koussevitzky, owned and played on himself.
“It’s the chance of a lifetime to play on an instrument with that history and to play not only that but to have the instrument here for the concerto written by the owner of the instrument,” Abegg said.
Brigham Young University also had the opportunity to feature the composer’s bass in October. The bass teacher reached out to Matheson asking if Utah Tech would be interested in featuring it as well, and he accepted. The bass will continue its nationwide tour with the University of Arizona next.
That wasn’t the only unique thing about the concert. The final piece performed in the concert was “An American in Paris.” This piece featured an instrument not typically found in an orchestra—taxi horns.
The horns were meant to signify the bustle and urgency on the streets of Paris. This piece followed the journey of an American in Paris as the name suggests. It was a rollercoaster of loud, energetic music and soft, subtle sounds.
A successful orchestra requires everyone to practice and give it their all. Each person needs to want to be there and want the concert to be successful.
“There’s so many of us that choose to be here. Everyone works super hard for what we’re able to do and practices differently so that when we come together as a group, we’re able to work efficiently,” Ballard said.
The orchestra will be performing its final concert of the semester Dec. 7, which will be a Christmas concert.
