Laurier Wind Orchestra: Program Notes

Feb. 9, 2026

Lights Out

Alex Shapiro (born New York City, 1962) has built an unconventional life interweaving her dynamic musical career with avid pursuits of wildlife photography, non-fiction writing, and a devotion to advocacy. Published by Activist Music LLC, her works are heard daily in broadcasts and can be found on over thirty commercially released recordings from around the world. Alex lives on Washington State's remote San Juan Island, and when she's not composing she can be found communing with the sea life, as seen on her music and photo-filled blog, www.notesfromthekelp.com and her website, www.alexshapiro.org.

When asked about her approach to creating Lights Out, Alex says

"I suppose you could call Lights Out an "opto-physico-electro-acoustic" work for wind band, because it was conceived from the onset as a visual media piece. While it can be performed in any normal concert setting, it's most compelling when presented in the dark, slightly disorienting the audience and dazzling them with the beautiful colored aura from glowsticks, smart phones, and small LEDs placed inside the instruments and on the musicians' mallets and fingers. Mesmerizing! Composing this piece, I treated the visuals and movement the same way I treat the audio track—as an equal and additional "section" in the band, organically incorporated into the piece just like the woodwinds, brass and percussion."

Rites Nocturnes

Émile Savoie, originally from Quebec, is currently located in Waterloo, Ontario where he obtained his master’s degree in collaborative performance from Wilfrid Laurier University. He holds two diplomas in piano performance and a baccalaureate degree in composition. His work has been published and performed by multiple ensembles across Canada. He is known for many compositions including the soundtrack of the short film She Wants To Cry (Festival Of Recorded Movement, Vancouver BC, 2025), the video game Ikolia (Montréal QC, 2022) and the piece Encre d’écorce (At the radio for the Cultural Event “Sherbrooke prend la parole”, Sherbrooke QC, 2022 and performed live for the multidisciplinary concert Cycles, Waterloo ON, 2025).

Rites Nocturnes was premiered in Sherbrooke, Quebec in April of 2023. Opening with the gravitas of nighttime prayer sessions, a solemn hymn keeps being interrupted with energetic bursts of dance-like sections, whirling in ostinato patterns until the energy is reclaimed and dominated by the hymn statement. The second movement “Amémoi” opens with soft brass chords before recalling the motive of the first movement in overlapping canons accompanied by the whispy and fluttering sounds of the Greek winds of mythology and coming to rest with the sonorous low brass.

Fnugg Blue

Øysten Baadsvik started playing the tuba at the age of fifteen. He soon decided to explore the tuba’s possibilities as a solo instrument, and at the age of eighteen won 1st prize in a Norwegian national competition for soloists. Within the space of two years, he had made his own programs for Norwegian Radio and had been a soloist with most of Norway’s professional symphony orchestras. Baadsvik studied under Michael Lind, John Fletcher, Arnold Jacobs and Harvey Phillips. He is in great demand as a soloist and lecturer all over the world and works constantly to expand the musical aspects of the tuba and, as well as performing solo repertoire for tuba and orchestra.

Fnugg Blue started as an improvisation with elements from the Australian Aboriginal instrument didgeridoo and Norwegian folk music. The techniques in use are multiphonics (to sing and play simultaneously) and Baadsvik’s own invention “Lip Beat” (percussive tuba). Fnugg is a Norwegian word describing something very small and weightless - like a snowflake.

First Suite in E-flat

Gustav Holst was an English composer, arranger, and educator that is best known for being the composer of his orchestral suite, The Planets. Holst’s First Suite in E-flat is regarded as one of his masterpieces and cornerstone of wind band literature. He composed the piece in 1909 to be performed by military bands, but it didn’t premiere until 11 years later by the Royal Military School of Music on June 23, 1920. Military bands had very little concert-style music written for them as they were considered more of a functional ensemble, and when required for ceremonial performances would tend to play orchestral arrangements. Holst’s Suites mark some of the first artistic literature written specifically for the ensemble.

British historical traditions influence the motive-driven work. Opening the “Chaconne” is a repeated bass line, similar to those found in the early music of Henry Purcell or William Byrd, which forms the basis for the entire musical structure. With each repetition of the chaconne melody, other instruments are paired or contrasted with it, displaying the range of timbral variety in the wind band. “Intermezzo” is an upbeat interpretation of the opening motive, chirping and cheerful that contrasts with a lyrical middle section. The “March” turns the motive upside down and shows the full strength of a military-style ensemble! Contrasts in dynamics, extreme ranges, and snappy motivic inserts keep listeners engaged until the march and lyrical themes are brought together in a final juxtaposition.

Second Prelude

American composer George Gershwin was the son of Russian immigrants. Turning to music as a form of expression happened early for him, and he began studying the piano at the age of 12. Not being academically inclined, he convinced his parents to let him quit school at 15 to become a pianist in Tin Pan Alley, demonstrating songs for the Remick Publishing Company. He began to compose his own popular-style songs while still a teenager and a succession of musicals, including Strike Up the Band (1927), with his brother Ira as lyricist. Gershwin was a sensitive songwriter of great melodic gifts and blended jazz, folk, and classical styles into a uniquely American musical form.

The Second Prelude from George Gershwin’s set of Three Preludes comes from a set of pieces for solo piano. First performed by the composer in New York in 1926, he originally planned to compose twenty-four preludes, but this number was reduced to five in public performance and editors further reduced the collection to three upon publishing. In the second prelude, Gershwin invokes his Jewish heritage as a Yiddish-influenced melody floats over gentle, twelve-bar blues pattern accompaniment. The melody is repeated in a second chorus of the blues form, followed by a bridge in a brighter, major key. The initial theme returns, dissipating as though entering a quiet sleep. Gershwin referred to the piece as “a sort of blues lullaby.”

Un Cafecito

Dennis Llinás is a Cuban-Colombian conductor and composer, and currently is the Director of Bands at The University of Oregon where he conducts the wind ensemble, teaches graduate & undergraduate conducting, and oversees the band area. A native of Hialeah, FL, Dennis studied at Florida International University & The University of Texas.

About this work, the composer writes:

“The phrase un cafecito means a little coffee. Growing up in Miami in our Cuban culture, it was customary for co-workers to bring to work an eight-ounce cup filled with Cuban coffee (basically really strong and sweet espresso) with many tiny shot cups. At certain points in the day, they would approach colleagues and pour a quick shot for them accompanied with the phrase,“¿Quieres un cafecito?” translating to “Do you want a little coffee?” Needless to say after that shot, you were ready for another few hours of daily activity.

This piece is meant to be just that -- a little bit of pick-me-up with the sounds of my childhood.”