(audience applauds) - Welcome to our evening of Pops music. We're opening with a wonderful suite that members of the orchestra
brought to my attention. This is an animated film called
"How to Train Your Dragon." There are three actual
movies in the series, a wonderful score by John Powell, and we're going to demonstrate
three of those tonight with photographs throughout
the entire program to sort of give you a
sense of the atmosphere and the theme that's
going on with the music. I'm very excited
. I actually watched two of these movies. I have yet to see the third installment. I'm really excited to see
a much older character. It sort of follows his path from young boy to adolescence into young adulthood. So it's a great set of movies and a great theme about a young man who sort of comes into his own and overcomes the
disappointment of a father to really be a sort of
champion for the environment. So I won't say more than that. You'll hear three of
the main themes of this. I'm very excite
d to give you
this wonderful music tonight. Enjoy "How to Train Your Dragon." (orchestra playing) (audience applauds) We'll be playing three of the planet's, Mars, Venus and Jupiter, accompanied by beautiful photographs. Each one Gustav Holst
and try to characterize what the mythology of
each planet sort of meant. You know, we get the days of our week from some of these planets and enjoy very characteristic
and powerful vision that Holst had for these three planets. Enjoy. You'll also note where
John Williams gets
some of his ideas from for his music. (orchestra playing) (papers ruffling) (orchestra playing) (audience applauds) So "Star Wars" is the
reason I became a pianist. I was nine years old when
"Star Wars" came out in 77, and like many young
kids around the country, I waited in line for hours to get tickets and I did, and we were all blown away. So I've been a "Star Wars" fan since then. When my mother forced me to play the piano to keep me out of baseball, hell, she would often
say I was one season away from chewing tobacco, (audience laughs) doing whatever. So she got the local church organist to come to our house and give me lessons. Well, I didn't really wanna play, but she brought a sheet
music of "Star Wars" and as a result, she
said, I wanted to play it. So I reached for it, she pulled it away and she said, "Okay, you can have it "when you finish all the music books." And I did and I was hooked. So I have Mrs. Baird to
thank for that motivation. I've been workin
g with student conductors for the last few years of this program, and although Covid interrupted so much, we were able to bounce back very rapidly. And that's why you have
this incredible orchestra in front of you of 60 plus students. And these young conductors of (audience applauds) Last year's conductor
has actually decided, and he may be listening now,
I won't name him by name, but he knows who he is,
has actually decided to possibly pursue orchestral conducting as a career early in his life
before maybe going on to other things or going on to conduct in the
New York film, you never know. So this is a very rich program and I'm happy to introduce to you the student conductor for
this year, Joanne Duke who is a senior and going
on to wonderful things after graduating from Bowdoin, she's worked with me very diligently and she is going to conduct
the opening of "Star Wars." And then I'm going to take over. So you'll see some
logistics happening up here. So please give a warm welcome to
Senior Joanne Duke. (audience applauds) Is there something the matter? - I can't find my baton. - You can't find your baton? - [Luke] Joanne? (audience laughs) - Oh my God. I think it's Luke Skywalker. (audience laughs) (audience laughs) (audience cheers) (audience laughs) (audience applauds) (orchestra playing) (audience applauds)
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