Visual & Performing Arts

Military Escort by Henry Fillmore, writing as Harold Bennett 

The introduction of Military Escort came from a march by Will Nicholson of Vallonia, Indiana. Fillmore bought the work for $35, revised the melody and harmony, added an additional 96 bars of his own material, and copyrighted the march in 1923 for both band and orchestra, using his Harold Bennett pseudonym. 

Designed for younger bands, Fillmore was amazed when the manuscript was read by his Shrine Band, and the members proclaimed it one of his very best marches. The composer apparently did not realize that the open-tone cornet fanfares and low brass melodies, as well as the repetitive "shave-and-a-haircut" rhythms, had been familiar to instrumentalists for centuries. Using these basic patterns, Fillmore produced an uncomplicated masterpiece which rises and falls in the band popularity polls but never disappears. According to Paul Bierley, Military Escort even outsold The Stars and Stripes Forever march for a period of about four years. A few years later, Sousa told Fillmore, "I wish that march had my name on it!" 

Henry Fillmore was an American composer and publisher and was the eldest of five children. In his youth he mastered piano, guitar, violin, and flute -- as well as the slide trombone, which at first he played in secret, as his conservative religious father believed it an uncouth and sinful instrument. Fillmore was also a singer for his church choir as a boy. He began composing at 18, with his first published march, Higham, named after a line of brass instruments. Fillmore entered the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in 1901. After this he traveled around the United States as a circus bandmaster with his wife, Mabel May Jones. 

Fillmore wrote over 250 tunes and arranged hundreds more. He gained fame as the Father of the Trombone Smear, writing a series of fifteen novelty tunes featuring trombone smears called "The Trombone Family", including Miss Trombone, Sally Trombone, Lassus Trombone and Shoutin' Liza Trombone. A number of these have a strong ragtime influence.

Amaranthus by Satoshi Yagisawa 

“Amaranthus commemorates the 70th birthday of Mr. Kikuo Atarashi, the former conductor of Tenri High School Wind Orchestra. The world premiere was in October 2023 by Gratitude New Winds, an ensemble established by his former students. 

In my third year of junior high school, as a member of the wind orchestra, I chose William H. Hill's St. Anthony Variations for a band competition. I would listen daily to the legendary Tenri High School Wind Orchestra performance, which won gold prize at the All-Japan Band Competition in 1985, under the baton of the admired Mr. Atarashi. I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Atarashi, whom I idolized when we judged together at the Saga Prefectural Band Competition. Not only did he warmly engage with me, a newcomer just starting out, but he also shared many valuable stories over dinner, which greatly encouraged me at the time. Later, as I worked throughout Asia, Mr. Atarashi, who was well-versed in the local scenes, offered much advice and support when I was filled with uncertainty. 

Although I was not directly taught by him, touching upon Mr. Atarashi's music during my impressionable middle school years and the memories of that time became one of the reasons I aspired to become a composer. His encouragement and advice have shaped my career in music. With gratitude, I composed a chorale themed around ‘Amaranth,’ which carries the floral meaning of ‘immortality; undying,’ hoping it will be widely embraced in concerts and as material to nurture a love for music.” 

Yagisawa graduated from the Department of Composition at Musashino Academia Musicae, and later completed the master's coursework at the graduate school of Musashino Academia Musicae. He studied composition under Kenjiro Urata, Hitoshi Tanaka, and Hidehiko Hagiwaya, in addition to studying trumpet under Takeji Sekine and band instruction under Masato Sato. 

His compositions for wind orchestra are popular in Japan and many other countries. They were introduced in Teaching Music Through Performance in Band, published by GIA Publications in the United States, published by De Haske Publications in Holland and Bravo Music in America, selected as a compulsory piece for the University of North Texas Conductors' Collegium, and performed at the 12th World Association for Symphonic Bands and Ensembles (WASBE) in Singapore and the Midwest Clinic (2008) in Chicago. In Japan, he has composed music for National Arbor Day, National Sports Festival, Japan Intra-High School Athletic Meets as well as numerous leading ensembles in Japan. Yagisawa was appointed Ceremonial Music Director for the National Sports Festival 2010 in the State of Chiba, Japan. 

Other professional activities include festival adjudication, guest conducting, teaching, lecturing, writing columns for music magazines and advisory work for a music publisher. He is one of the most energetic young composers in Japan today. Currently he teaches wind, string, and percussion instruments at Tokyo Music & Media Arts, Shobi. He is also a member of "Kyo-En", an organization that premieres outstanding original works by Japanese composers. 

-Satoshi Yagisawa 

The Battle Pavane by Tielman Susato, arranged by Bob Margolis 

The Battle Pavane was drawn from the ninth movement of Susato’s The Danserye. The large work is a set of instrumental dances based on popular tunes of the time and was published in 1551 as Het derdemusyckboexken. With more than 50 individual dances in a variety of forms, the collection is notable for its simple textures and strict homophony. Specific instrumentation is not indicated, thus suggesting that the tunes were performed by whatever combination of winds and strings was available. 

Susato's place of birth is unknown; some scholars believe that because of his name - Susato meaning de Soest, of the town of Soest — he may be from the town of that name in Westphalia, or the town of Soest in The Netherlands. Not much is known about his early life, but he begins appearing in various Antwerp archives around 1530 working as a calligrapher as well as an instrumentalist: trumpet, flute and tenor pipe are listed as instruments that he owned. 

In 1543, he founded the first music publishing house using movable music type in the Netherlands. He could be found in Antwerp "At the Sign of the Crumhorn." Until Susato set up his press in Antwerp, music printing had been done mainly in Italy, France and Germany. Soon afterwards, Susato was joined by Pierre Phalèse at Leuven and Christopher Plantin, also in Antwerp, and the Low Countries became a regional center of music publishing. It is possible that Susato also ran a musical instrument business, and he attempted several times to form partnerships with other publishers, but none was successful. In 1561 his son, Jacob Susato, who died in 1564, took over his publishing business. The last known record of him dates from 1570. 

Susato was also an accomplished composer. He wrote and published several books of masses and motets which are in the typical imitative polyphonic style of the time. He also wrote two books of chansons which were specifically designed to be sung by young, inexperienced singers: they are for only two or three voices. Most important of his publications in terms of distribution and influence were the Souterliedekens of Clemens non Papa, which were metrical psalm settings in Dutch, using the tunes of popular songs. They were hugely popular in the Netherlands in the 16th century. 

Wild Ice by Katherine Bergman 

Katherine Bergman (b. 1985) is a Minnesota-based composer who draws on nature, environmentalism, and the intersection between art and science to create music described as hypnotic and visceral. She has received commissions and performances from leading ensembles throughout the United States and abroad, including the U.S. Coast Guard Band, Estonian Police and Border Guard Orchestra, Hub New Music, Zeitgeist, Unheard-of Ensemble, Seen/Heard Trio, Nautilus Music-Theater, and many others. 
 
Katherine’s music for band, orchestra, and chamber ensembles is frequently performed at concert halls, festivals, conferences, school band rooms, and national parks. Her work has been presented at ISCM World Music Days, The Midwest Clinic, North American Saxophone Alliance Conferences, College Band Directors National Association Conferences, IDRS, The Upper Midwest Chamber Winds Symposium, and the Liquid Music Concert Series. Her compositions have received support from the Minnesota State Arts Board, the Jerome Foundation, the Metro Regional Arts Council, and New Music USA. 
 
Katherine holds a master’s degree from the University of Northern Iowa School of Music, where she studied composition with Jonathan Schwabe and Alan Schmitz. She earned a bachelor’s degree in music from Gustavus Adolphus College in Saint Peter, Minnesota with composition instructors including Michele Gillman and Steve Wright. She has studied extensively with Mary Ellen Childs, and has received individual instruction from Samuel Adler. 
 
Her work is published under Katherine Bergman Music, and her compositions for large ensemble are distributed by Murphy Music Press. Katherine is Co-Founder and Artistic Director of the Minnesota Winds, a professional concert band with a vision to embrace the dynamic energy and inclusive culture of school band and bring it to the professional level. 

Wild Ice is a joyful and energetic piece inspired by the natural phenomenon occurring with a combination of bitterly cold temperatures but no precipitation. Lakes in these conditions can freeze over without snow cover, creating a smooth, crystal clear layer of ice that, when thick enough, can be explored on foot or ice skates. People travel from all over the world to find wild ice, and we are lucky to experience it here in Minnesota every now and then. It can be fascinating to perfectly view the lake vegetation (and even sometimes fish!) from above the ice, and it feels surreal to lace up your ice skates and freely glide all the way across the lake – no shovel required. The piece captures the initial mystique of first arriving at the lake, and the energy and wonder of the rare experience of a wild ice adventure. 

Teeth of the Mechanism by John Mackey 

John Mackey has written for orchestras (Brooklyn Philharmonic, New York Youth Symphony), theater (Dallas Theater Center), and extensively for dance (Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Parsons Dance Company, New York City Ballet), but the majority of his work for the past decade has been for bands, and his band catalog now receives annual performances numbering in the thousands. 

Recent commissions include works for the BBC Singers, the Dallas Wind Symphony, military, high school, middle school, and university bands across America and Japan, and concertos for Joseph Alessi (principal trombone, New York Philharmonic), Christopher Martin (principal trumpet, New York Philharmonic), and Julian Bliss (international clarinet soloist). In 2014, he became the youngest composer ever inducted into the American Bandmasters Association. In 2018, he received the Wladimir & Rhoda Lakond Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He resides in New York City, with his spouse, A. E. Jaques, a philosopher who works on the ethics of artificial intelligence for MIT, and also titles all of his pieces; and their cats, Noodle and Bloop. 

John Mackey 

Dr. Martin I. Gaines proudly serves as the conductor of the UWL Wind Ensemble, Symphony Orchestra, and Concert Band as well as teaching courses in Conducting, Clarinet, and Music Education. Prior to this posting he served as the Director of Instrumental Studies at Morningside University and the Associate Director of Bands at McNeese State University. He holds degrees in conducting and music education from the University of Arizona (DMA), Middle Tennessee State University (MM), and the historic VanderCook College of Music (BMEd). 

As an active conductor, clinician, and music producer, Dr. Gaines’ most recent recording project David Maslanka: Music for Wind Ensemble was released in January 2021 on the Toccata Classics Label. He has also served as producer for an album featuring the wind orchestra music of Nigel Clarke. Prior to his academic appointments, he also served as the principal conductor for the Arts Express Orchestra in Tucson, Arizona and as the founding conductor of the UArizona chamber ensemble Solar Winds.

Prior to pursuing graduate studies, Dr. Gaines taught middle and high school bands and orchestras for fifteen years in Illinois, Alabama, Georgia, and most recently in Florida. His bands have consistently received top marks from adjudicators and were often featured in clinic performance, e.g. the Southeastern Band Clinic at Troy University (2010) and the University of North Florida Invitational Festival (2010, 2014). He was also named Teacher of the Year in 2015 for Oakleaf High School (FL). Dr. Gaines holds professional memberships in CBDNA, College Music Society, College Orchestra Directors Association, International Conductor’s Guild, NAfME, National Band Association, Tau Beta Sigma, WASBE, and is a Life Member of Kappa Kappa Psi.

Dakota Fanfare by Erik Morales 

Dakota Fanfare was commissioned in 2009 by the students, colleagues, and friends of Mr. James McKenney, the South Dakota State University director of bands from 1983-2009, in honor of his decades of tireless passion, enthusiasm, and love for his students, and the music he helped them create. The piece was premiered in 2009 by the Dakota Wind Ensemble in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. 

The piece opens with a startling, flurry of trumpets followed by the low brass stating the main fanfare theme. Woodwinds answer with a motive that is used and developed throughout the work. The composer sought to expand on the idea of a traditional opening fanfare with driving rhythmic pulses and substantial thematic development. 

Erik Morales is an American composer, conductor and trumpeter. He has composed best-selling music for many types of genres including classical, jazz, commercial. With over one hundred and fifty publications his musical works encompass a large variety of styles and settings, including works for wind, orchestral, jazz and chamber ensembles and have been part of featured performances across the globe. He studied composition at Florida International University and completed his bachelor’s degree at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette in 1989. 

His composing career began shortly after graduation from high school in south Florida when his former band director offered to pay him to arrange music for the marching band (1985). This inevitably led to more music arranging jobs and would open doors to the educational music publishing industry. In 2002 Mr. Morales signed an exclusive contract with the FJH Music Company for his educational wind and string works. With trumpet as his primary instrument, Mr. Morales has made a substantial contribution to the trumpet music repertoire. As a performer Mr. Morales was a finalist in the 1990 International Trumpet Guild solo competition which features the brightest young trumpeters in the world. 

Mr. Morales is an outspoken advocate of music education in our schools and community. In 2016 he was inducted into the Louisiana Association for Jazz Education’s Hall of Fame and was presented a lifetime achievement award for dedication, support, advancement and continuance of jazz education in the state of Louisiana. In 2020 Mr. Morales was appointed musical director of the newly formed Covington Concert Band and currently is conductor of this community-based music project. In 2022 he was instrumental in forming the Northshore Music Alliance, a non-profit organization with the goal of promoting concert and jazz music in the Northshore region of Southeastern Louisiana. Mr. Morales currently serves as president of that organization. Also, in 2022, Mr. Morales was awarded “Musical Artist of the Year” at the 16th annual St. Tammany President’s Arts Awards. Mr. Morales is currently a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), Jazz Education Network (JEN) and the International Trumpet Guild (ITG). 

Currently, Mr. Morales maintains an active composing, performing and conducting schedule. Mr. Morales’ works are published by The FJH Music Company, Inc. and Alfred Publishing. All of Mr. Morales’ trumpet and chamber music editions are self-published and are available exclusively through MoralesMusic.com. 

-Erik Morales 

American Hymnsong Suite by Dwayne S. Milburn 

Major Dwayne S. Milburn is an American composer, conductor and military officer.  

American Hymnsong Suite is firmly rooted in my family history as church musicians. I grew up singing and playing many different hymns, including the four tunes featured in this work. The final impetus to compose this particular treatment came during the course of an organ concert in Atlanta, Georgia. One section of the program featured innovative settings of three hymns. With the gracious consent of composers Joe Utterback and Brooks Kukendall, I adapted their settings to act as the inner movements of the suite, bracketed with my own original treatments of favorite hymns. 

The Prelude on Wondrous Love (“What Wondrous Love is This”) opens with a chant-like statement of this Southern tune before proceeding to a more kinetic retelling. Ballad on “Balm in Gilead” features a rich jazz harmonization of this familiar spiritual. The Scherzo on “Nettleton” (“Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing”) contains all the rhythmic playfulness inherent in the best orchestral third movements, and the March on “Wilson” (“When We All Get to Heaven”) calls to mind the wildest marching band ever heard. 

While audience members will certainly make various connections to this piece, the ongoing goal is to introduce all listeners to the richness of our American musical heritage. 

In 1986, Dr. Milburn graduated from UCLA with a BFA in music and received a Master's of Music in orchestral conducting from the Cleveland Institute of Music in 1992. He received his Ph.D. in music from UCLA in 2009. 

During his undergraduate career, Maj. Milburn was an arranger for the UCLA band and choral programs, as well as the Special Projects Division of ABC-TV. Upon graduation, he became the director of cadet music for the United States Military Academy, West Point, New York, serving as the conductor for the internationally renowned West Point Glee Club. During graduate studies in Cleveland, he contributed several arrangements to the Cleveland Orchestra. 

Prior to his Ph.D. studies, Maj. Milburn served as one of 24 commissioned officer conductors in the United States Army Band Program. His assignments included duties as the associate bandmaster for the U.S. Continental Army Band, Fort Monroe, Virginia; The U.S. Army Band “Pershing’s Own,” Washington, DC; and the U.S. Army Europe Band and Chorus, Heidelberg, Germany. He also commanded the Army Ground Forces Band in Atlanta, Georgia. Since he completed his Ph.D. studies, he resumed his military service and currently serves as the commander and conductor of the U.S. Army Europe Band and Chorus in Heidelberg. Among his military honors are the President Benjamin Harrison Award, the Meritorious Service Medal, Army Commendation Medal, and the NATO Medal. 

Maj. Milburn is active as a composer, conductor, and adjudicator. He has received commissions from the instrumental programs at UCLA, the University of North Texas, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His choral and wind ensemble works are published by the Alfred, Kjos and Ludwig Masters Music companies. 

Several of his works for band, including American Hymnsong Suite, Variations on "St. Patrick's Breastplate", and Emerald Suite are featured in volumes six through eight of Teaching Music Through Performance in Band, edited by Richard Miles. 

From 2005-2009, Major Milburn was the composer-in-residence for the Music Guild of St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church (Pacific Palisades, California). During that time he wrote three major works for the St. Matthew’s Chamber Orchestra and contributed over 25 anthems, several psalm settings, and a major service music setting to the parish choral music program. Major Milburn continues to serve as an instrumental adjudicator for the Heritage Music Festival series, and is currently completing commissioned works for Pacific Serenades Chamber Ensemble (Los Angeles, California) and Vocal Arts Ensemble (Ann Arbor, Michigan). 

In 2024, Dr. Milburn was teaching composition and conducting at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). 

-Dwayne Milburn 

Irish Tune from County Derry by Percy Aldridge Grainger 

(George) Percy Aldrige Grainger was an Australian-born composer, pianist and champion of the saxophone and the concert band. Grainger was an innovative musician who anticipated many forms of twentieth century music well before they became established by other composers. As early as 1899 he was working with "beatless music", using metric successions (including such sequences as 2/4, 2½/4, 3/4, 2½/4). 

In December 1929, Grainger developed a style of orchestration that he called "Elastic Scoring". He outlined this concept in an essay that he called, "To Conductors, and those forming, or in charge of, Amateur Orchestras, High School, College and Music School Orchestras and Chamber-Music Bodies." In 1932, he became Dean of Music at New York University and underscored his reputation as an experimenter by putting jazz on the syllabus and inviting Duke Ellington as a guest lecturer.  

Irish Tune from County Derry was one of hundreds of tunes collected by Grainger on his travels of Europe where he recorded, on a portable Victrola Grammaphone, native people singing the songs of their land. This tune was collected by Miss J. Ross, of New Town, Limavady, Co. Derry, Ireland, and published in The Petrie Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland, Dublin, 1855. Of the tune, George Petrie wrote: 

For the following beautiful air I have to express my very grateful acknowledgment to Miss J. Ross, of N.-T.-Limavady, in the county of Londonderry — a lady who has made a large collection of the popular unpublished melodies of that county, which she has very kindly placed at my disposal, and which has added very considerably to the stock of tunes which I had previously acquired from that still very Irish county. I say still very Irish, for though it has been planted for more than two centuries by English and Scottish settlers, the old Irish race still forms the great majority of its peasant inhabitants; and there are few, if any, counties in which, with less foreign admixture, the ancient melodies of the country have been so extensively preserved. The name of the tune unfortunately was not ascertained by Miss Ross, who sent it to me with the simple remark that it was "very old," in the correctness of which statement I have no hesitation in expressing my perfect concurrence. 

Irish Tune is based on earlier settings that date back as early as October 1902 with an essentially identical setting of this melody for wordless mixed chorus. Later versions for solo piano (1911) and string orchestra with two optional horns (1912) followed. The wind band setting is cataloged as British Folk Music Setting Nr. 20, and like all his settings of British folk music is “lovingly dedicated to the memory of Edvard Grieg.” 

National Emblem March by Edwin Eugene Bagley 

E. E. Bagley was an American composer from New Hampshire. He began his music career at the age of nine as a vocalist and comedian with Leavitt’s Bellringers, a company of entertainers that toured many of the larger cities of the United States. He began playing the cornet, traveling for six years with the Swiss Bellringers. After his touring days, he joined Blaisdell’s Orchestra of Concord, New Hampshire. In 1880, he came to Boston as a solo cornet player at The Park Theater. For nine years, he traveled with the Bostonians, an opera company. While with this company, he changed from cornet to trombone. He performed with the Germania Band of Boston and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. 

Bagley is best known for composing marches. National Emblem March is one of America's best loved and most popular marches. The Chatfield (Minnesota) Music Lending Library includes 14 different arrangements for band or orchestra among its holdings. Reginal Bagley, a third cousin of the composer, believed that the march was begun in 1902 and first rehearsed in a train baggage car en route from Bellows Falls to Greenfield, New Hampshire. It was first played in manuscript by the Keene, New Hampshire, City Band, was revised, and was copyrighted in 1906. A vocal arrangement, with words by M.F. Sexton, was copyrighted two years later. A copy of Bagley's revision was presented to the University of Florida's Bachman Band Library in 1965. 

In addition to The Star-Spangled Banner, which provided melodic material for the first strain and trio, Bagley's memories of the herds of buffalo he had seen while crossing the Western prairies in the 1870s and 1880s inspired the heavy, repetitive beats heard in the trio. The march is commonly featured in national celebrations such as for Independence Day, Inaugurations, among others. 

-Norman E. Smith 

Carnival de São Paulo by James Barnes 

James Charles Barnes is an American composer, conductor and educator from Oklahoma. Barnes studied composition and music theory at the University of Kansas, earning a Bachelor of Music degree in 1974, and Master of Music degree in 1975. He studied conducting privately with Zuohuang Chen. Professor Barnes is member of both the history and theory-composition faculties at the University of Kansas, where he teaches orchestration, arranging and composition courses, and wind band history and repertoire courses. At KU, he served as an assistant, and later, as associate director of bands for 27 years. 

His numerous publications for concert band and orchestra are extensively performed at Tanglewood, Boston Symphony Hall, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. Barnes has twice received the coveted American Bandmasters Association Ostwald Award for outstanding contemporary wind band music. He has been the recipient of numerous ASCAP Awards for composers of serious music, the Kappa Kappa Psi Distinguished Service to Music Medal, the Bohumil Makovsky Award for Outstanding College Band Conductors, along with numerous other honors and grants. He has recorded three commercial compact discs of his music with the world-famous Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra. More recently, he completed a CD of his works with the Koninklijke Militaire Kapel (The Queen’s Royal Military Band) in Holland. He has also been commissioned to compose works for all five of the major military bands in Washington, DC. 

Mr. Barnes has traveled extensively as a guest composer, conductor, and lecturer throughout the United States, Europe, Australia, Japan and Taiwan. He is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP), the American Bandmasters Association and numerous other professional organizations and societies. 

Carnival de São Paulo was one in a series of encores for symphonic bands composed for his residencies with notable Japanese bands, Senzoku Gakuen Symphonic Winds and the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra. It is a delightfully fun samba that celebrates the Rio de Janeiro Carnaval. It highlights the talents of each section in the band. 

Dr. Martin I. Gaines proudly serves as the conductor of the UWL Wind Ensemble, Symphony Orchestra, and Concert Band as well as teaching courses in Conducting, Clarinet, and Music Education. Prior to this posting he served as the Director of Instrumental Studies at Morningside University and the Associate Director of Bands at McNeese State University. He holds degrees in conducting and music education from the University of Arizona (DMA), Middle Tennessee State University (MM), and the historic VanderCook College of Music (BMEd). 

As an active conductor, clinician, and music producer, Dr. Gaines’ most recent recording project David Maslanka: Music for Wind Ensemble was released in January 2021 on the Toccata Classics Label. He has also served as producer for an album featuring the wind orchestra music of Nigel Clarke. Prior to his academic appointments, he also served as the principal conductor for the Arts Express Orchestra in Tucson, Arizona and as the founding conductor of the UArizona chamber ensemble Solar Winds.

Prior to pursuing graduate studies, Dr. Gaines taught middle and high school bands and orchestras for fifteen years in Illinois, Alabama, Georgia, and most recently in Florida. His bands have consistently received top marks from adjudicators and were often featured in clinic performance, e.g. the Southeastern Band Clinic at Troy University (2010) and the University of North Florida Invitational Festival (2010, 2014). He was also named Teacher of the Year in 2015 for Oakleaf High School (FL). Dr. Gaines holds professional memberships in CBDNA, College Music Society, College Orchestra Directors Association, International Conductor’s Guild, NAfME, National Band Association, Tau Beta Sigma, WASBE, and is a Life Member of Kappa Kappa Psi.