Concert & Jazz Bands, and Concert & Show Choirs Perform at Spring Concert

The Gateway Regional High School Music Department will hold their annual Spring Concert on Thursday, May 17th at 7 p.m. in Huntington, and will feature the concert band, concert choir, show choir, and jazz band.

This concert marks the unveiling of a newly commissioned piece “The Dam”, composed by Allen Bonde of Mount Holyoke College. Bonde will accompany the chorus and student fiddler Leland Martin for this piece.

Since 1971, Allen Bonde has been a professor of music at Mount Holyoke College, where he teaches Composition, Music in the American Musical, Beethoven Symphonies and Brahms Chamber Music. Bonde is also an accomplished composer and performer. He has performed as a pianist at Carnegie Recital Hall, the National Gallery of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Severance Chamber Hall. His compositions have been performed by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic brass principals, the New England Conservatory of Music Chorus, and Wong Ching-Ping, a famous pipa (short-necked lute) player.

Leland James Martin is a freshman from Blandford and highly accomplished fiddler who performs and competes throughout New England. He has been playing fiddle for 9 ½ years, and studies with Becky Koehler of East Greenbush, New York. When asked what his proudest accomplishment is so far, he answered, “Taking 2nd Place in the Junior Division at a contest in Vermont with fiddlers from all over New England.”

The piece will focus on the Gateway hilltowns and is entitled “The Dam”. It will feature the Gateway Chorus and fiddler Leland Martin, with piano accompaniment.