MMS to Present Winter Concerts

Millburn Middle School's will host its annual Winter Instrumental Music Concerts on Wednesday and Thursday this week.

Students in the 8^th Grade Band, Wind Ensemble, Symphonic Orchestra, Select Strings and 6^th Grade Orchestra will be perform on Wednesday evening.  The concert Thursday’s concert will feature the 6^th Grade Band, 7^th Grade Band and Jazz Ensemble.

Marie Tracy will lead the orchestra program on Wednesday evening with a variety of music for both strings and full orchestra. The 6^th Grade Orchestra will perform Tchaikovsky’s Russian Dance. The first movement from Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 is one of the highlights from the 7^th and 8^th Grade Orchestra program. The middle school’s premiere string ensemble, the Select Strings, will be performing Vivaldi’s Spring from Four Seasons. Meanwhile, the full Symphonic Orchestra will entertain with Rossini’s William Tell Overture.

Wednesday night will feature more of the MMS wind bands. The 8^th Grade Band is performing Air Force One, a patriotic work from composer Chris Bernotas, and music from the hit Broadway show The Phantom of the Opera. Fred Czarnecki will lead the 8^th Grade Band in their performance. The Wind Ensemble, the middle school’s premiere wind group, will play a challenging and creative selection entitled Old Churches by acclaimed composer Michael Colgrass. Brian Fleming will conduct the Wind Ensemble.

The 6^th Grade Band, under the direction of Fleming, will perform a diverse program of music on Thursday evening. Included is Comet Ride, an exciting piece from composer Brian Balmages, and Nottingham Castle, from composer Larry Daehn. The 7^th Grade Band, conducted by Czarnecki, will perform the theme song the TV show Mission: Impossible  and a wonderful piece by Rob Romeyn called Hocus Pocus. Czarnecki will also lead the Jazz Ensemble performing hits like Down for Double and Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’.

Both concerts are free to the public and will begin at 7:30 p.m. in Millburn Middle School’s auditorium.