Three Kalamazoo College music ensembles are concluding their 2023–24 academic years with spring concerts in the coming days, starting tonight, May 29.
International Percussion
Tonight’s International Percussion performance, beginning at 7, will take place outside, in front of the Light Fine Arts building. There will be chairs and grass to sit on. Bring a blanket if you would like to sit on the lawn.
Carolyn Koebel is the director of both groups within International Percussion, the West African ensemble and the Japanese Taiko ensemble, which are a combination of K students and community members who learn drumming techniques and then play together as a group.
The free concert will feature marimba player Julia Holt ’24, performing two selections written by composer Keiko Abe, who collaborated with Yamaha Corp. to develop the modern five-octave concert marimba. The Taiko ensemble will present two selections dealing with the giving of gifts to the Taiko community from special sources with music shared by Sensei Esther Vandecar.
College Singers
The Kalamazoo College Singers, under the direction of Associate Professor of Music Chris Ludwa, will present “Be Like Water.” The free concert—slated for 7:30 p.m. Thursday, May 30, in the lobby at Light Fine Arts—will present songs from a variety of sources and styles from the Renaissance, folk and popular music, each one centered on a theme of water. The concert is designed to uplift, inspire and transcend the current climate around politics, economics and war, offering a bit of hope.
Academy Street Winds
With nearly 50 years of teaching and conducting experience from elementary school through higher education, Academy Street Winds Director Tom Evans will lead the group for the last time in a concert titled, “It’s Time to Say Goodbye.”
All the music selected on this program has special meaning for him, which he will share at the concert. The compositions being performed are Festive Overture by Dmitri Shostakovich, Second Suite in F by Gustav Holst, As Summer Was Just Beginning by Larry Daehn, Canzona by Peter Mennin, Stormbreak for percussion octet and band by Jim Casella, and English Folk Song Suite by Ralph Vaughn Williams. The free performance is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Saturday in Dalton Theatre at Light Fine Arts.
For more information on any of these ensembles and their performances, contact Susan Lawrence in the Department of Music at 269.337.7070 or Susan.Lawrence@kzoo.edu.