NCB at the Midwest Clinic: 1980-1989
Since its founding, the Northshore Concert Band has been a driving force in the community band movement, setting high standards for musical excellence and community engagement. Nowhere has this impact been more clearly demonstrated than through its decades-long relationship with the Midwest Clinic, the world’s largest instrumental music education conference. This series chronicles the Band’s history at the Midwest Clinic, beginning with its groundbreaking first invitation in 1963 and continuing through the present day.
The 1980s marked a period of creative expansion and leadership for the Northshore Concert Band, as it solidified its role as both a musical innovator and a cultural ambassador for the community band movement. This decade saw the Band take on ambitious new formats, collaborate with legendary musicians, and experiment with inventive concert concepts that set the tone for the decades to come.
Northshore Concert Band returned to the Midwest Clinic for the 13th time in 1980, participating as the demonstration band for a clinic session entitled A Conductor’s Spectacular: Three Aces and a Joker are a Full House. John Paynter served as moderator for the session, which featured the Band under the direction of Col. Arnald D. Gabriel, William D. Revelli, and W. Francis McBeth. Highlights included McBeth leading excerpts from Paul Hindemith’s Symphonic Metamorphosis on Themes by Carl Maria von Weber and his own Kaddish, while Revelli conducted transcriptions of Verdi’s Requiem and the final movement of Mahler’s Symphony No. 3.
Northshore Concert Band at the 1980 Midwest Clinic.
In celebration of the Band’s 25th season, the Northshore Concert Band presented another double bill at the 1981 Midwest Clinic. The first performance featured brass choirs from six area community bands with close ties to NCB: the Arlington Heights Community Band, the Mount Prospect Community Band, the Northwind Ensemble, the Deerfield Community Band, the Aurora American Legion Band, and the Palatine Concert Band. This collaborative program concluded with Barbara Buehlman’s arrangement of Richard Strauss’ Festival Prelude, which placed the six brass choirs antiphonally around the hall for a thrilling sonic finale. The second concert celebrated the music of Paul Yoder, a prolific composer, arranger, and band director who served on the Midwest Clinic’s board of directors.
Northshore Concert Band at the 1981 Midwest Clinic.
The program for the Band’s 1982 Midwest Clinic appearance consisted of “Golden Oldies,” selected from a list of music submitted, at Paynter’s request, by 46 distinguished conductors, composers, and arrangers — primarily retired musicians who were his colleagues in the American Bandmasters Association. The resulting program featured beloved classics and cornerstone transcriptions, opening with William Walton’s Crown Imperial and concluding with Jacques Press’ virtuosic “Wedding Dance” from Hasseneh.
Northshore Concert Band at the 1982 Midwest Clinic.
The Band’s 17th performance at the Midwest Clinic came in 1984 and featured a roster of guest conductors and soloists. Julius Baker, former Principal Flute of the New York Philharmonic, performed Henk Badings’ Concerto for Flute and Wind Orchestra, Brian L. Bowman joined the Band for Boccalari’s Fantasia di Concerto, and Frank Scimonelli performed two works for post horn and band by Roger Barsotti. Claude T. Smith conducted his Symphonic March on an English Hymn Tune, commissioned for NCB’s first annual Adult Band Conference earlier that year. Also featured were longtime friends of the Band, Frederick Fennell and Col. Arnald D. Gabriel.
Northshore Concert Band at the 1984 Midwest Clinic. Photo courtesy of the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library Special Collections in the Performing Arts, University of Maryland.
In 1985, the Band again closed the Midwest Clinic, presenting a program that included former NCB member John Boyd’s arrangement of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Fantasia and Fugue in G Minor (The Great), the Chicago Chamber Brass in Fisher Tull’s Concerto Grosso for Brass Quintet and Symphonic Band, and tubist Harvey Phillips in an inventive interpretation of Richard Strauss’ Horn Concerto No. 1. Following the performance, local composer Ron Nelson wrote to the Band, thanking them for “breathing new life into [his] youthful war horse, Savannah River Holiday.” Phillips also expressed his admiration, writing that he wished he could be a regular member of the Band, which he described as having “established a standard and example for other community bands to emulate.”
Northshore Concert Band at the 1985 Midwest Clinic. Photo courtesy of the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library Special Collections in the Performing Arts, University of Maryland.
Beginning in 1986, the Northshore Concert Band introduced a new format to the Midwest Clinic: band music reading sessions. These sessions marked a departure from the Band’s traditional clinic concerts with their numerous guest artists and soloists, instead focusing on the rapid presentation of new repertoire. The first reading session featured 50 new works, transcriptions, and arrangements for band, all performed in under 90 minutes. Paynter, with his characteristic wit, warned the audience to “have their stopwatches and miniature tape recorders ready because things were going to move fast!”
The 1987 reading session — the Band’s 20th appearance at the Midwest Clinic — functioned similarly, offering 40 new works for band at a brisk pace. In a ceremony following this session, the Midwest Clinic presented John Paynter, then President of the Clinic, with their prestigious Medal of Honor in recognition of his enduring contributions to the field.
The Band returned to a more traditional clinic concert format in 1988, featuring Alfred Reed conducting his Golden Jubilee Overture, James Curnow leading his Rejouissance, and Frank Battisti conducting Grainger’s Irish Tune from County Derry. Trumpet virtuoso Carole Dawn Reinhart performed as soloist in Alexander Arutiunian’s Trumpet Concerto. Adding a playful touch to the concert, cartoonist Tom Batiuk — known for his popular comic strip Funky Winkerbean — joined the Band for a performance of Saint-Saëns’ The Carnival of the Animals, transcribed by Barbara Buehlman. As the Band played, Batiuk sketched caricatures of the animals described in the verses by Ogden Nash, with his illustrations projected for the audience to enjoy.
Northshore Concert Band’s final Midwest Clinic appearance of the decade took place in 1989, featuring a reading session that offered 25 new works for band. The program included selections suitable for musicians of all ages, new concerto transcriptions featuring members of the Band, and new editions of classics, including a fresh arrangement of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Flight of the Bumblebee and Frederick Fennell’s edition of Sousa’s Bullets and Bayonets.
