Marshall band offers 2 concerts this week, one in Arrow Rock

The Marshall Municipal Band will perform a pair of concerts this week, according to band Director Kevin Lines.

The first will be this evening in Arrow Rock on the green next to the historic Old Tavern. This special concert will begin at 7 p.m. The band will return to Marshall for their regular concert Thursday evening on the Saline County Courthouse lawn at 7:30 p.m.

The concert will open with the exciting Henry Fillmore march "Orange Bowl."

Fillmore was a prolific composer from the turn of the century, according to Lines.

He wrote, arranged and edited more band music than any other composer/bandmaster in history, with over 250 compositions (113 of them marches) and more than 750 arrangements.

He published using eight different names to prevent his name from saturating the market.

The first overture of the evening is Clare Grundman's "American Folk Rhapsody No. 3."

"Grundman actually composed four folk rhapsodies," Lines said. "Each one highlights well-known folk songs and gives them a fresh treatment."

Featured songs in this rhapsody include: "Colorado Trail," "Get Along, Little Dogies," "Careless Love," and "Turkey in the Straw."

Dean Somerville will be featured on the tuba solo "The Happy Farmer." This work is based on the children's song by composer Robert Schumann.

Continuing their summer-long celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Leroy Anderson the band will perform "The Rakes of Mallow."

This work was dedicated to the legendary Arthur Fiedler who was the long-time conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra. Anderson was a favorite composer of Fiedler and the orchestra regularly performed his works.

"The history of our next selection is an interesting one," Lines said. "'Colonel Bogey,' with its memorable two-note melody, was written by the well-known British composer Kenneth J. Alford. The story goes that Alford was strolling across a golf course, not being a golfer himself, and failed to respond to a golfer's traditional shout of 'fore!' The impatient golfer finally resorted to the loud whistling of two clearly distinct tones to get Alford's attention and that became the inspiration of this well-known march."

The band turns to the music of Broadway with "Highlights from Fiddler on the Roof."

The original Broadway production of the show, which opened in 1964, was the first musical to surpass the 3,000-performance mark, and it held the record for longest-running Broadway musical for almost 10 years.

The show was highly acclaimed and nominated for ten Tony Awards, winning nine, including Best Musical, score, book, direction and choreography.

This medley includes; "Fiddler on the Roof," "Sabbath Prayer," "Matchmaker," and "To Life."

"The Pathfinder of Panama" is a march by John Philip Sousa.

"The 'Pathfinder' of Sousa's title was not an individual but the Panama Canal itself," Lines said. "The march was composed in 1915 and was dedicated to the Panama Canal and the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco."

The closing trilogy will begin with James Ployhar's arrangement of "Crusader's Hymn."

It will be followed by the World War I medley "Over There." This work includes: "Goodbye Broadway, Hello France," "My Belgian Rose," "It's A Long Way to Berlin," "The Rose of No Man's Land," "K-K-K-Katy," "Keep Your Head Down, Fritzy Boy," "Where Do We Go From Here, Boys?" "Homeward Bound," and "Over There."

The concerts will conclude with "Uncle Sammy."

The Marshall Municipal Band will perform two concerts opening day of the Missouri State Fair next Thursday, Aug. 7, on the Touchstone Energy Stage.

The band will return to Marshall and perform yet a third concert at their regular time on the Marshall Square.