Contact: Paige Watson

STARKVILLE, Miss.—A range of musical styles will be covered during the Mississippi State University Wind Ensemble’s 2016 spring concert.

Sponsored by the music department, the free Thursday [April 7] program begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Bettersworth Auditorium of historic Lee Hall.

“Highwire,” contemporary composer John Mackey’s attempt to musically capture the acrobatics and excitement of trapeze artists, opens the performance. 

“Roma Sacra,” an interpretation of sacred Rome by University of Southern Mississippi composer Luigi Zannelli, also will be featured.

Others on the program include:

—“Four Scottish Dances” by British composer Malcolm Arnold and “Lads of Wamphray” by Australian-born Percy Grainger. Both selections are considered among the cornerstones of wind-band repertoires.

—An orchestral transcription of the first movement of Russian composer Alexander Borodin’s “Second Symphony”; and

—Selections of works by contemporary composers Roger Cichy, an Ohio native, and Julie Giroux, a Louisiana State University alumna now residing in Jackson.

The wind ensemble is the premier performing group of Mississippi State’s band program led by university alumna Elva Kaye Lance, director of bands.

For more information about the department, band program or ensemble, visit www.music.msstate.edu or contact Lance at 662-325-3070 or eklance@colled.msstate.edu.

MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.