Two Iowa City bands team up to provide holiday memories and music Sunday at the Englert
Throughout the community, musicians are preparing and sharing the music of the holidays.
The public has choice after choice. One of our favorites is the annual joint Sunday afternoon concert of the Iowa City New Horizons Band and the Iowa City Community Band, or NHB/ICCB for short. As musicians, we are excited about this chance to make public music after a long hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The NHB/ICCB concert is Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Englert Theatre in downtown Iowa City. The bands will be following the Englert’s safety policy found at https://englert.org/covid/. The Englert will be responsible for validating guests and performers. For families with children who are not yet vaccinated, there is social-distanced seating available in the balcony.
Both bands are preparing a mix of holiday music and other tunes. Among them are the familiar "Christmas Time with Charlie Brown," "Green Sleeves," "Here We Come A'Wassailing," and "Stars & Stripes for Christmas." One of our favorites is "Sleigh Ride" by LeRoy Anderson.
But we will let you in on a secret. We must rehearse and practice these familiar tunes.
We play these songs year after year and become lulled into thinking we know them. Then comes rehearsal and, to our surprise, we want to play what we think the music sounds like, not what is on the printed page. Yes, we get sloppy.
A teacher once said, the hardest part of playing music is concentration. The composers and the arrangers meant the music to sound a particular way.
We will let you in on another secret. It is easier to play what we think the piece sounds like than the “ink.” Yes, that is what is happening inside the heads of your community musicians as they prepare to present the music to you.
We are for the most part amateur musicians, playing for the fun of sharing music. Often it is thought that the difference between the amateur and the professional is one gets paid. But come the holiday season, we amateurs learn it is also about concentration. It is why professional bands, choirs and orchestras can make a piece sound fresh for repeated performance.
We hope to see you at the Englert to enjoy this holiday concert. Come knowing that we are trying our best to imitate the professional by mustering up as much concentration as we can to “play the ink.”
Our eternal hope is that "Sleigh Ride" sounds as fresh and new come Sunday as it does in your memories.
ICCB is unique in that it rehearses once and plays a concert usually the next day. Community musicians are welcome to come to rehearsal and try us out.
ICCB rehearses at Iowa City West High School on Saturday at 10 a.m. in the band room. More information can be found on ICCB's Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/ICCBand).
NHB is for all persons age 50 and older to learn and make music; see the webpage for details (http://www.iowacitynhb.org). NHB is a fun way for retirees to be engaged in the community and meet new friends.
Katie Martin serves as the publicist and plays French horn for the Iowa City Community Band. She graduated from Wartburg College and returned to her hometown of Iowa City. She works at the Iowa Memorial Union. Steve Schomberg plays tuba in ICCB and NHB. He graduated from the University of Iowa; after retiring he returned to live in Iowa City and enjoy its music opportunities.
This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: Two Iowa City bands team up to provide holiday memories and music
