NATCHITOCHES – Northwestern State University’s bands will welcome composer Randall Standridge to the Natchitoches campus this week along with five bands in the Third Annual Northwestern State Invitational Band Festival on April 23-24.
Bands from Pickering, West Monroe, Benton and Parkway High School along with Benton Middle School will participate. The NSU Concert Band & Wind Ensemble will perform on April 23 at 7:30 p.m. The NSU Wind Symphony will perform on April 24 at 7:30 p.m. Both concerts are in Magale Recital Hall. Admission is free and open to the public. A livestream of the NSU ensemble concerts will be available at nsula.edu/capa/capalivestream.
“I am excited that we will have Randall Standridge on our campus and working with our students and the students of five visiting band programs from around the region,” said NSU Director of Bands Anthony Pursell. “Having a composer of his caliber will certainly be the highlight for our students and those attending the festival.”
The festival will feature each invited band to perform a concert in the acoustically treated Magale Recital Hall followed by a 20-minute clinic by Standridge and then a short clinic by visiting music educator Scott Dudley.
“The format will be used to assist band programs prior to their final performances of the academic year,” said Pursell. “While we are having this festival in April and most bands in the region have already attended their formal assessment, the idea is to evaluate how to best serve these high school band directors and their program in the immediate future and be an end-of-year celebration.”
High school students will also be treated to open rehearsals with the NSU Wind Symphony and Wind Ensembles, dining on campus and enjoying masterclasses by Standridge.
The festival will also employ current NSU music education majors to serve as adjudicators for each band.
“Giving our students the opportunity to evaluate a band’s performance begins to formulate priorities in their mind of the things they will eventually need to assess when they are in front of their own ensemble,” said Pursell. “No matter if it is pre-assessment evaluations or simply getting ready for an end-of-year pops concert for their community, our NSU music education majors will benefit through active listening and assessing that performance in real-time.”
NSU students will also enjoy an open Q&A session with Standridge and Dudley and composition students will receive a lesson with Standridge.
The NSU Wind Symphony will conclude the festival with a performance featuring both Standridge and Dudley, a retired band director from Benton (Texas) ISD, conducting the ensemble.
“Giving our NSU students an opportunity to experience music by being led by the composer and a visiting master educator will greatly enhance their performance experience,” said Pursell. “When I was 18 years old, my college band director brought in a composer to be our guest conductor. I remember thinking to myself that is the person whose name is on top of this piece. It is an experience that I still value today, even after 29 years of leading bands of my own.”
This year’s festival not only expands from three to five visiting bands but also includes all three of the NSU concert ensembles. All performances and open rehearsals will be held in Magale Recital Hall. Admission is free and open to the public
On April 23, Pickering High will perform at 10:30 a.m. An open rehearsal with the NSU Wind Symphony is at 1 p.m. West Monroe High performs at 2:30 p.m. An open rehearsal with the NSU Wind Ensemble is at 4 p.m.
On April 24, Benton Middle School performs at 1 p.m. Benton High presents a concert at 2:30 p.m. and Parkway High performs at 4 p.m.
The Northwestern Invitational Band Festival is made possible from the generous support of the Dear School of Creative and Performing Arts, the National Association of Future Music Educators (NSU chapter), the Theta Nu chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi and the Eta Pi chapter of Tau Beta Sigma.
