FSU’s Department of Music, Theatre and Dance Presents Wind Ensemble Concert
Feb 24, 2026 9:00 AM
Frostburg State University’s Department of Music, Theatre, and Dance presents a concert program performed by the FSU Wind Ensemble titled “Angels Among Us” on Thursday, March 12 at 7:30 p.m. in the Pealer Recital Hall of the Woodward D. Pealer Performing Arts Center. The concert will feature the music of Learnard Bernstein, John Williams, Frank Ticheli and H. Owen Reed.
“Overture to Candide” by Leaonard Berstein (1956) is operetta based on Voltaire’s “Candide”. Voltaire's 1758 novella satirizing the fashionable philosophies of his day, Bernstein takes a more comedic approach in the vein of Offenbach and Gilbert and Sullivan. Its music has all the wit, élan, and sophistication that is associated with that genre. It begins with a fanfare which serves as a motto and as a basis for development, throughout the entire operetta, just as Voltaire wrote in 1758, Bernstein’s overture travels through the landscape of exuberance, love, rebellion, and triumph.
“Angels in the Architecture” was commissioned by Kingsway International and received its premiere performance at the Sydney Opera House on July 6, 2008, by a massed band of young musicians from Australia and the United States, conducted by Mathew George. The work unfolds as a dramatic conflict between the two extremes of human existence -- one divine, the other evil. The work's title is inspired by the Sydney Opera House itself, with its halo-shaped acoustical ornaments hanging directly above the performance stage. The work presets two angels, light and dark, that are represented by a solo soprano voice sung by Katie Hendrix, a music educator in the ACPS music department. Just as Charles Ives did more than a century ago, “Angels in the Architecture” poses the unanswered question of existence.
“The Theme from Schindler's List" is a 1993 American epic historical period drama film. It is based on the novel “Schindler's Ark” by Thomas Keneally, an Australian novelist. The film is based on the life of Oskar Schindler, an ethnic German businessman who saved the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees during the Holocaust by employing them in his factories. The Wind Ensemble is proud to feature one of Frostburg State University’s violinists, Chassady Redhead (BS MusEd ’26), as the featured soloist.
Owen Reed has composed many works for band and orchestra that have remained in the standard canon for each respective discipline. His Mexican folk song symphony, “La Fiesta Mexicana,” is no exception. This programmatic piece evokes a variety of styles, depicting fireworks, a parade, a mass (with cantor), a circus, a bullfight, and a mariachi performance. The work is both serious and comical, festive and solemn, devout and pagan, boisterous and tender as it depicts three Fiestas of traditional Mexican culture in the form of an ‘Aztec Dance’, a ‘Mass’, and a ‘Carnival’.
Ticket prices are adults $20 cash/$21.09 credit/debit card; seniors, military, youth (13-18), and FSU ID $10 cash/$10.69 credit/debit card; and free for children 12 and under. Purchase tickets online at tickets.frostburg.edu or at the University Box Office, Lane University Center 203 (Mon.-Fri. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.), 301-687-3137; or at the door the evening of the performance.