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ES Plus You
Our mission here, is to promote hands on, shared music-making, and hopefully spark interest for students and audiences to want to continue to be involved in music-making opportunities. We’ve noted, from visits to public school programs and discussions with music teachers, that there is a noticeable dip in the recruitment and retention of students in many music programs. We hope that this project will help to support and promote these programs by creating an opportunity for public school students to work alongside Eastern Standard in preparing and presenting the premieres of these new engagement-focused works. Together, we are partnering with ensembles and programs throughout the country to promote the creation of these engagement-focused pieces that will involve a collaboration between Eastern Standard and ensembles of different configurations. The end product will be a collection of pieces for Eastern Standard and ensemble (band, orchestra, and flex instrumentation), levels 2-4, which include opportunities for the students in the ensembles to shine, and also encourage audience contributions within the performance. These pieces are NOT intended to be a "Triple Concerto"--but, rather, to create an opportunity for all of us to share in music-making and fun, and get everyone in the spaced involved in the performance! The pieces would also offer some opportunities for students to experience a variety of roles (and engage with different National and State-standard benchmarks), and would also involve audience participation, the aim, again, being to create a fun shared experience for everyone.
This initiative began in the spring of 2022 to help support the creation of composer Robert Litton's "A Grand Day Out", which we then premiered and performed (with the composer as narrator) throughout our tour in November of 2022. For more information, scroll to the bottom of this page.
PRAISE THE RAIN, by Stephen ShewanThe next part of this project, "Praise the Rain" supports the creation of a work for Level 4 wind band and horn/tuba/piano trio, by composer, Stephen Shewan:https://www.jubal-press.com/biography
Based on the poem of the same name by US Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo, this piece will be premiered on December 2, 2023, 3:45 pm, at the 2023 NYSSMA Convention by Eastern Standard and the Fairport High School Band, under the direction of Bill Tiberio. The group then hopes to visit communities and perform the work with ensembles in a variety of settings. A GRAND DAY OUT, by Robert Litton Our first iteration of ES Plus You was premiered on November 15, 2022 with Katelynn Bedell and her students at P.S. duPont Middle School in Wilmington, Delaware. The work was written by Robert Litton and entitled "A Grand Day Out". Crafted in a "story-telling" style, the work features narration and sections for the audience to contribute their own improvised and creative input (sounds, movements, images, words, etc) in the performance.
Based on the poem of the same name by US Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo, this piece will be premiered on December 2, 2023, 3:45 pm, at the 2023 NYSSMA Convention by Eastern Standard and the Fairport High School Band, under the direction of Bill Tiberio. The group then hopes to visit communities and perform the work with ensembles in a variety of settings. A GRAND DAY OUT, by Robert Litton Our first iteration of ES Plus You was premiered on November 15, 2022 with Katelynn Bedell and her students at P.S. duPont Middle School in Wilmington, Delaware. The work was written by Robert Litton and entitled "A Grand Day Out". Crafted in a "story-telling" style, the work features narration and sections for the audience to contribute their own improvised and creative input (sounds, movements, images, words, etc) in the performance.
Eastern Standard with Robert Litton and Katelynn Bedell at P.S. duPont Middle School for the premiere of "A Grand Day Out".