Picture a candle-lit chƒteau in Vienna during the 1700s, filled with aristocrats who have come from all over to listen to enchanting music composed by Mozart in a tiny chamber room. This is the feeling that Cal Poly’s director of bands, Bill Johnson, wants audience members to sense when they attend Saturday’s 8 p.m. concert, “A Night at the Mission.”
The event has been going on for at least 10 years, but this year Johnson said the concert will separate itself from past performances.
“This year our groups are really strong, much stronger than they were in the past,” he said. “I think the students this year have taken a great interest in chamber music.”
Traditionally in music history, chamber music was performed in a living room – but not the typical living room of today. It would be in a large estate or castle where people would gather together for musical and social events. Sometimes the entertainment was background music; other times it was a smaller concert in which chamber groups would perform.
The event will take place at Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa downtown and consists of some of Cal Poly’s finest student ensembles, including the wind quintet, trombone choir, clarinet ensemble, brass quintet, saxophone quartet, brass choir and horn ensemble.
Electrical engineering senior Colin McKinney, a member of the wind ensemble, said that though playing in the wind ensemble is exciting because it brings together players of all kinds of instruments to make one sound, he really enjoys the smaller groups like the wind quintet.
“For me, it’s a chance to improve my playing as well as really be able to form a good, small, effective team of people who know the ins and outs of each of the other players,” he said. “(The players) know when to come in, how to attack, how to do dynamic changes and follow each other very well because there is no conductor for the small groups.”
This is his fourth year playing with the wind quintet.
Johnson agrees with McKinney that there is a certain appeal to smaller performance groups.
“If you’re a clarinet player in the wind orchestra, you could be with 12 to 15 other clarinet players, but if you’re playing with the wind quintet, you’re the only clarinet player,” he said. “The chamber music gives the students a chance to be individuals and be soloists. If you’re playing by yourself and you get lost no one’s there to help you, you’re on your own. That’s a real strong feeling of independence.”
Audiences can expect a wide variety of music to be played at the mission, McKinney said. There will be “contemporary music written in the 20th century as well as robust classical compositions performed by the brass ensemble,” he added.
Because there are such great acoustics at the mission, McKinney said everyone would be surrounded by sound no matter where they sit.
Tickets are $8 for students and seniors and $10 for the general public. They and can be purchased at the Performing Arts Ticket Office.