CLC to debut Holsapple composition
Concert to feature every music group at college
The Central Lakes College Music Department will perform a composition by Los Angeles film scorer Russell Holsapple at its concert, "Music with Some Spring in It," at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Chalberg Theatre on the Brainerd campus.
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Admission is $3 for adults and free for CLC students and children younger than 12. Refreshments will be served outside the new music wing at intermission.
The CLC Choirs and Community Band will premiere Holsapple's "Exploration for Wind Band and Choir." Holsapple, 34, attended CLC as a junior and senior at Pillager High School in 1991-92. He earned a bachelor's degree in composition from the University of Minnesota and a graduate certificate in film scoring from the University of Southern California.
Russell Holsapple is a film scorer in California.
Holsapple, a self-employed film scorer the last four years, will attend the concert. He works mostly short independent films geared toward festivals, and he is currently working on his first feature film.
If you go
What: "Music with Some Spring in It," featuring Central Lakes College Music Department.
When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.
Where: Chalberg Theatre, CLC, Brainerd.
Admission: $3 (adults), free (CLC students and children younger than 12).
Phone: 855-8215.
Two years ago, CLC instructor Steve Anderson asked him to compose a four- to five-minute work for concert band and choir.
"Luckily, commissions fall into my lap every so often and am very happy when they do," Holsapple said. "When I am working on a film, my employers are almost always the producers and directors."
"Exploration for Wind Band and Choir" is in three sections. A bold forte statement opens the work, followed by a softer section introducing the choir. The opening theme is reprised in the third section, and the work concludes with a majestic choir-band tutti statement.
Central Lakes College choir members David Waterhouse (left) of Onamia and Ryan Crosby of Montevideo rehearsed Monday with the CLC Community Band for Tuesday's concert in Chalberg Theatre.
"The text is about loving the world we live in and not letting fear put restrictions on what we can do (and) where we can go," Holsapple said.
CLC choral director Michelle Sakry-Winkelman recalled having Holsapple as a piano student.
"One day he showed me some piano pieces he had composed. These were not easy little beginner pieces, but piano rhapsodies that looked quite professional," she said.
"I asked him to play them for me and he dove right into them with the flourish and gusto of a concert pianist. I was so impressed with his compositions that I had him perform them at the CLC Piano Festival (in April 1992). The audience was as blown away by the talent of this young man as I was, and it comes as no great surprise that he is now successfully composing film scores in California."
Jeff Liebsch of Brainerd composed "Variations for Piano and Wind Ensemble," for the CLC Community Band. He plays trumpet in the band.
Also premiering on Tuesday will be "Variations for Piano and Wind Ensemble" by Brainerd's Jeff Liebsch, a trumpet player in the CLC Community Band. It is the third composition Liebsch has created for the 57-member band. Amber Tappe, Crosslake, will be featured on piano.
The Jazz Ensemble will perform "Chicago 1926," a medley of songs from the musical "Chicago" arranged by Anderson.
The Men's Ensemble, Women's Ensemble and Chamber Singers will sing under the direction of Sakry-Winkelman. Featured soloists will be Kelly Swofford, Breezy Point; Janaya Johnson, Little Falls; Gabe Franz, Cottage Grove; Ryan Crosby, Montevideo; and Abbey Olmsted, Brainerd.
For more information, contact Anderson at 855-8215 or sanderso@clcmn.edu.