Maryville College Tartanband to share ‘Great Stories’ during annual spring concert on April 9
March 26, 2024
If a picture is supposedly worth a thousand words, what’s the value of a song?
Dr. Eric Simpson may not know the answer, but he does know this: Music can be a powerful medium through which to better understand some of the richness of literature throughout history, and the Maryville College Tartanband will use it to do just that during an April 9 performance at the Clayton Center for the Arts.
The program, titled “Great Stories,” is built around music that draws inspiration from literature, according to the associate professor of music and director of bands at Maryville College.
“Stories are how we understand the world, and telling stories helps us make sense of, or deal with, various parts of our lives,” Simpson said. “A concert about stories will hopefully connect with the audience — making them recall the story, and/or experience it through music, and connect to their feelings about it.”
Works on the program, and the literature from which they draw inspiration, include:
• “Moon River,” written by Johnny Mercer and Henry Mancini for the movie “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” itself based on a novella by Truman Capote;
• “Henry V,” a medley arranged by Johan de Meij and written by Patrick Doyle for the 1989 adaptation of Shakespeare’s historical play “The Life of King Henry V”;
• “Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring,” a medley for orchestra and arranged for band, written by Howard Shore for the first “Lord of the Rings” film in 2001, based on the J.R.R. Tolkien fantasy classic;
• “The Cave You Fear,” an overture-style piece written by Michael Markowski and inspired by Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”;
• “In This Broad Earth,” a fanfare written by Steve Bryant and inspired by Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass”;
• “This Cruel Moon,” the concert’s linchpin ballad written by John Mackey and inspired by Homer’s “Odyssey”; and
• “Around the World,” a waltz written by Victor Young for the film based on the 1872 Jules Vern novel “Around the World in 80 Days” that will feature a duet between graduating seniors Esther Proctor ’24 and Mackenzie Nicholas ’24.
The spring concert, Simpson added, will be the last Tartanband performance for Proctor and Nicholas, who graduate in the spring. Four members, he said, will complete their MC degrees, and for them — as well as him — it’s been a slightly surreal experience.
“It’s kind of weird to see them go, because most all of them started their journey during the pandemic, which means that most of them started playing an instrument at Maryville College standing no less than 6 feet near anyone else, wearing a facemask, and putting a PPE cover on their instrument while they played,” he said. “Those are conditions that, honestly, would make most people quit, because they are just not conditions that make it fun to play.
“But all of these students toughed it out: They stayed with it as the masks gradually came off, as we started playing outside, and eventually, as we got to all play together again. That’s pretty amazing, and it speaks to the sort of people they are. They’ll hold a special place in my heart, and I will miss them a lot.”
Tartanband participation, however, has steadily increased every academic year since 2015, he added. While not without its challenges, recruitment has doubled the size of the student instrumental ensemble, and he hopes the trend continues in the fall. This year, the Tartanband participated in the Maryville College Homecoming Parade and in the Downtown Maryville Christmas Parade, as well as home football and basketball games.
“I think we are marching in the homecoming parade going forward, and I’d like to figure out a way to continue to integrate the band into more parts of the game day experience,” Simpson said. “But I’d also like for the game day experience to be more vibrant in general. That’s something that I, and the Athletics Department, are both trying to improve on. Both Football Coach (Ben) Fox and Basketball Coach (Raul) Placeres thanked the band for being at athletic events this year, and that was great.”
In that regard, the spring concert is a victory lap for the Tartanband — on a job well done, and on the accomplishments of those participants who balance the rigors of academics and other organizational involvement with performance that both entertains and tells stories … sometimes in more ways than one.
“All of our band concerts are very listener-friendly,” he said. “They feature a diverse variety of music suitable for anyone — you don’t have to be an academic or an aficionado of classical music to enjoy a Tartanband concert. And they are all right about an hour in length.
“There’s something really compelling for me, personally, in seeing students go for it on a concert that they’ve worked up very quickly. Hearing them try to sift through all the notes (and there are a lot, at a band concert) and find the meaning for themselves underneath those notes … that’s infinitely compelling.”
The Tartanband spring concert will take place at 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 9, in the Ronald and Lynda Nutt Theatre of the Clayton Center for the Arts on the MC campus. The performance is free and open to the public.