UK Wind Symphony to Give Featured Concert at KMEA Conference
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 4, 2016) — The University of Kentucky Wind Symphony, under the direction of John Cody Birdwell, will be a featured performing ensemble at the Kentucky Music Educators Association (KMEA) Conference. The symphony will perform 1:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 5, at the Kentucky International Convention Center, in Louisville, Kentucky.
UK's Wind Symphony will perform three musical selections at the conference: "Short Ride in a Fast Machine" by John Adams, "Gone" by Scott McAllister and "Bells for Stokowski" by Michael Daugherty. The ensemble’s performance of “Gone” will be dedicated to the memory of Ken Haddix, a UK alumnus and former associate director of bands and professor of trombone at Eastern Kentucky University.
This marks the second time since 2006 that the UK Wind Symphony has been invited to perform at the annual KMEA conference, which is attended by as many as 10,000 teachers, students and performing artists annually. The UK Wind Symphony consists of the finest wind and percussion graduate and undergraduate students in the nationally recognized UK School of Music. As the centerpiece of a band program that has served the Commonwealth of Kentucky for over 100 years, the symphony continues a rich tradition of performing the finest traditional and contemporary compositions in the concert band/chamber winds repertoire.
The UK Wind Symphony has been invited to perform at many of the nation’s most prestigious concert band events, including recent appearances at the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA) National Conferences at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, University of Minnesota and University of Georgia. The symphony was also recently invited to perform at the Southern Division CBDNA Conferences in Nashville, Tennessee, and Oxford, Mississippi. In 2008, the UK Wind Symphony performed a 10-day concert tour of the People’s Republic of China.
Next up, the UK Wind Symphony will be a featured performing ensemble at the 83rd Annual Convention of the American Bandmasters Association to be held March 8-11, 2017, in Lexington.
For more information on the UK Wind Symphony, contact Director of UK Bands John Cody Birdwell at cody.birdwell@uky.edu.
The UK School of Music at UK College of Fine Arts has garnered a national reputation for high-caliber education in opera, choral and instrumental music performance, as well as music education, composition, and theory and music history.
MEDIA CONTACT: Whitney Hale, 859-257-8716; whitney.hale@uky.edu