--> Always "reload" the webpage to be sure you have the up-to-date info.<--

I hope that with the soundfiles, you will do more listening and following along in your music rather than playing. (The more you listen and learn what the piece sounds like, the better you will play it and the easier you'll be able to jump back in when you get lost! - Note, not "if" you get lost!) We want you to get in the habit of learning it by looking at the music, not learning by ear. Just listening is not always accurate and you can end up with some pretty obnoixous mistakes that are hard to unlearn. ALSO, too much playing along with the soundfiles can get you stuck so that you can only play the piece at the recorded tempo instead of whatever tempo the conductor gives you! AND, you will end up lagging behind the group because you are listening to hear the sound then you play! That kind of thing can slow down the whole group!

IF YOU NEED MUSIC, it is located in the Dropbox folder for your instrument; hopefully saved that link. PARTS ARE NOT ON THE WEBPAGE AND MUSIC WILL NOT BE AVAILABLE AT REHEARSAL email Diane if you need the link.

To download our Practice Soundfiles, get them from our Practice Soundfile Dropbox - posted sometime late fall.

LINKS TO INFORMATION

UpdatedMay 30, 2026

FALL 2026 STRINGS and BAND TOGETHER

FALL 2026 STRINGS

FALL 2026 BAND

USING SOUNDFILES EFFECTIVELY

(let me know if soundfiles don't work OR of omissions in info OR errors)

Always "reload" the webpage to be sure you have the up-to-date info.

STRINGS & BAND TOGETHER--FALL 2026

For our combined piece at the December 2026 concert, we will be playing an arrangement of Begin the Beguine! This was the very first piece that we played, 20 years ago, in our very first rehearsal of the newly formed SUDBURY VALLEY NEW HORIZONS BAND!
(The strings were added in the 2010-2011 season.)

Begin the Beguine music will be available sometime in the fall.

STRING ENSEMBLE - FALL 2026

- RUSSIAN EASTER OVERTURE
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, arr. Austin Isaac

Directed by Oliver
Oliver says:

Oh, this piece is so gorgeous, both lush and exuberant, I've loved this piece for a long time! While the overture uses liturgical themes, Rimsky-Korsakov wrote this in memory of two of his friends, Modest Mussorgsky and Alexander Borodin (Mussorgsky passed away 6 years prior, while Borodin passed away only months before the piece was composed), so it's less about the holiday, and more about celebrating and saying goodbye to friends (not to be too depressing right away, but you know me!). The overture uses meter changes, along with tempo changes, and syncopated rhythms, so your metronome will be your best friend (there's no saying goodbye to the metronome). First violins be especially careful of the rhythm starting at 37.

Use the link below to hear the audio and watch the score of our version:
https://player.chordatamusic.com/fdefdb1f-d4c6-448b-923e-7511dc3f56c5

Listen to the Vienna Philharmonic, conducted by Seiji Ozawa, playing the original.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yak5D-6BKn0

- GYNMNOPEDIE No. 3
Eric Satie, arr. Bob Phillips

Directed by Oliver
Oliver says:

Satie has been an absolute favorite of mine, there's something so terribly haunting and pristine about his music. The title, a word Satie made up, roughly translates to "nude dances." Far from being promiscuous, it more refers to the stark quality of the pieces. On the surface, the music is very simple and minimalist, but it conceals a delicate intensity. The focus will be on bow control, creating a pure clean sound, without vibrato (yes, without!), and feeling long phrases. Easy to learn, hard to master. A great exercise is the “minute bow”, playing an open string with a single bow stroke, maintaining a beautiful tone, and trying to get as close to a full minute per stroke (start by trying for 10 seconds).

Use the link below to hear the audio and watch the score of our version:
https://viewer.jwpepper.com/smc2/?preview=true&product=10370558
 
Listen to the original version (it was written for piano) at the link below. There are 3 Gymnopedies - the 3rd Gymnopedie, which is the one we are playing - begins at 6:29
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyUNbrgLezI

- ADAGIO (from SYMPHONY No. 2, Op. 27)
Sergei Rachmaninoff, arr. Robert Longfield

Directed by Kett
Kett says:

One of Rachmaninoff's most beloved works, this piece is about the most Late Romantic of all Late Romantic music. Like a pie inside a cake covered in chocolate, it's unapologetically glorious (maybe not the best analogy; maybe I'm just hungry). The texture is full and bursting at the seams, alternating and layering eighth-note and triplet rhythms - keeping a steady pulse will guide you home. Violins, be especially careful in the section starting at measure 30, Rachmaninoff gets awfully chromatic for a few measures. And before everyone asks, the downbeat is empty, the violas start on the second eighth of the first measure.

Use the link below to hear the audio and watch the score of our version:
https://viewer.jwpepper.com/smc2/?preview=true&product=10500875 

Click the link below to hear the original performed by the Concertgebouworkest (Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra), Netherlands
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfgrXm1t69c

- WALTZ No. 2 (from Suite for Variety Stage Orchestra)
Dmitri Shostakovich, arr. Paul Lavender

Directed by Kett
Kett says:

This is piece is wonderfully iconic, and one of Shostakovich's most popular works. The Waltz feels like a mishmash of contradictions, simultaneously being playful, light, melancholic, joyful, and sinister. When I listen to it, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel, but I love it. The gorgeous melody is a passed through the orchestra, everyone getting a chance to lean into their sound and shine. For the pizzicato, it can feel a bit fast at first, and beyond simply playing slow and working up the tempo, try playing softer, to lighten the touch in the right hand. Plucking too heavily will physically weigh down the tempo

Use the link below to hear the audio and view the score of our version:
https://viewer.jwpepper.com/smc2/?preview=true&product=10081471

Click the link below to hear the original performed by the Royal Classical Orchestra of New Zealand.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LExH_6rx8Hg

BAND - FALL 2026

LISTEN A LOT to these soundfiles and any other recordings you can find.
The more you listen, the better you will understand the flow of the music and the faster you will learn to play the piece! That said, please do not try to learn the music by listening - it is never accurate enough.

- FALLING WATER
By Yukiko Nishimura

Directed by John
John says:
The composer is a Japanese pianist who studied in Tokyo and then the Univ. of Miami studying with ALFRED REED [who is the arranger for our version of Autumn Leaves] and at the Manhattan School of Music.  She is now based in LA and has won numerous international awards for her compositions.  It’s important to recognize that it’s not ONLY men who are writing music for us to play but women like Linda Murdock and Yukiko Nishimura.  It’s time to play more of it.

Originally for orchestra, the opening patterns in 6/8 are intended to elicit images of cascading water.  The descending motive in the horns and tenor sax, echoed everywhere, might reinforce this image once implanted in the listener’s mind.  The lilting feel of these 6/8 rhythms might be difficult to find at first but this is not at all out of our reach.  Listening to the attach mp3 will give you all a great sense of how your part fits within the texture of this tone painting.
Designed to be a showcase for all sections there will be particular demands on featured sections including horns, saxes, and mallet percussion.  I’m not in love with the ending but we’ll talk about it.

Use the link below to hear the audio and watch the score.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuvLqni94mo

- ALL THE PRETTY LITTLE HORSES
Arr. by Anne McGinty

Directed by Linda
Linda says:
“All the Pretty Little Horses” is a song I’ve known since childhood, but I didn't know anything then about its origin.  I just thought it was a pretty lullaby and was intrigued by the reference to the “pretty little horses.”  It turns out that it is a well-known traditional lullaby, thought to be of African-American origin.  In A Ballad of America: A History of the United States Through Folk Song, John Anthony Scott & John Wardlaw, Scott describe the song this way:

“'All the Pretty Little Horses' is a lullaby for white babies, and a lament for black ones.  The slave woman cradles the master’s child, while her own little one lies uncared for in the slave quarters.  The tenderness of the lullaby collides with a mother’s anguish for her own child that weeps alone and is not consoled.”

Understanding the song’s history and meaning will help in interpreting it and playing it.  Anne McGinty has created a beautiful setting for the song that expresses both its beauty and tenderness and the sadness underlying and permeating the melody.

The piece begins with a four-measure flowing legato introduction with clarinets, bells, & finger cymbals, which McGinty notes “should be played with a rich and woody tone color, well supported at all times.  The eighth notes should flow and a slight crescendo as the line ascends and a slight decrescendo as the line descends would be in good taste.” In general, as McGinty notes, throughout the piece “the general style should be legato, with notes played full value in a singing and lyrical style.”

As you listen to the piece and look at your part, make sure that you notice (and mark!) the meter, tempo and key signature changes — at measure 20, the meter changes to 3/4, at measure 22 the tempo and key signature change, at measure 51, the tempo changes and the meter changes back to 4/4, and at measure 59 the tempo is much slower.  And — although it is not marked, there will be a ritard in measure 57.  Finally, I recommend that you circle the quarter note rests on beat 1 of measure 32 & beat 1 of measure 38 — no one plays in either place, so if you do you will have an unintended solo!

It’s a beautiful piece and I’m looking forward to playing it with all of you.  You can listen to it on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuK1UaEsZzI

Here are the lyrics to the song, as printed in Ballad of America:

Hushabye
Don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy, little baby;
When you wake
You shall have
All the pretty little horses;
Blacks and bays,
Dapples and grays,
Coach a-six a little horses.
Hushabye
Don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy, little baby.

Hushabye
Don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy, little baby;
Way down yonder,
In the meadow
There’s a poor little Lambie,
The bees and the butterflies
Picking out his eyes,
Poor little thing cries, “Mammy!”
Hushabye
Don’t you cry,
Go to sleepy, little baby;

- AUTUMN LEAVES (Les Feuilles Mortes)
By Joseph Kosma/arr. Alfred Reed / Ed. R. Mark Rogers

Directed by Diane
Diane says:
Ah… one of my all-time favorite songs. (Do you hear my “sigh”?)  Although this song has become a jazz standard, and is one of the most recorded pop or jazz tunes (over 1000 recordings!), it was originally written as the melody for a ballet!  

There are as many different interpretations of this song as there are people performing it.  The simplicity of the piece lends itself to a freedom to emote in many ways.  As you listen to the recording of our version, you will notice that each section has a slightly different interpretation, from just relaxed and gentle, to clearly very sad, to almost angry in pain!  (This is our challenger for fall.)

This is the classic concert band arrangement of Autumn Leaves, by Alfred Reed (1921-2005).  Mr. Reed was one of the true great band arrangers and composers, with over 200 pieces (band, vocal, orchestra) to his name.  However, if you notice his birth/death dates, most of his work was doing in the mid-20th century and the style of arranging was much different than modern day works.  You may find that some of your harmony parts don’t make sense by themselves (thus the importance of listening A LOT!) or that when we put it together you struggle to keep your place (but not as tough as the Bach was!)

Here is the recording of our version of Autumn Leaves:
https://www.halleonard.com/product/236109/autumn-leaves-les-feuilles-mortes
(scroll down to Sample Pages and Audio)

PREPARATION and THINGS TO MARK (automatically think, “Key changes, accidentals.”:

1. Please listen to the recording a lot!!  It is such a gorgeous arrangement!
2. Listen for the tempo and style changes.  (Mark)
3. Look up all of the tempo markings, abbreviations and other words that you don’t know.  Write the meanings into your music.  For ex: “Tempo rubato” (you should know rubato; we’ve talked about it a lot!); “Poco più mosso”; “Con moto”; “espr.” and “molto espr.”; “allarg.” and all the rest of them!  Do you know the difference between “soli” and “solo”?
4. Trumpets, note that you need CUP MUTES, not straight mutes.
5. Note the triplets and the triplets over 2 beats.
6. There are several solos and solis – for now, everyone will play them.  We may make them solos as we get closer to the December concert.
7. Woodwinds, don’t panic about measure 58. The sextuplet sixteenth notes, “just” slide upwards in a chromatic scale, starting on the 3rd note of the key.  If you are thinking, “Right… not me!” no problem.  Play the trill for 2 beats and stop on beat 3 (short!), join in again on the octave higher beat 1 of the next measure.  AND… everyone please notice the “sfz >p” - it means, hit the note hard and decrescendo as you play the trill.
8. Trills go from the note written to the next note higher in the key signature.  Ex: flutes are in Bb (Bb and Eb key signature) and the trill starts on D, so they trill from D to Eb.

GOING DEEPER: SOME HISTORY OF THE SONG and links to performances:
Joseph Kosma (22 October 1905 – 7 August 1969) was a Hungarian composer who immigrated to France, and he wrote the melody.  Later, Jacques Prévert (French; 4 February 1900 – 11 April 1977) wrote the lyrics, a poem, and the (original) French song was published in 1945.  The song was first sung by Cora Vaucaire, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPR2GJxTLioand then in 1946, featured in the movie, “Les Portes de la Nuit” (“The Gates of the Night”) starring Yves Montand https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWfsp8kwJto&t=62s  

This was a song of regret – regret for the lost love and the time gone by, but memories saved.  For more info on the original French version, go to: https://performingsongwriter.com/autumn-leaves/

Johnny Mercer (the great American Tin Pan Alley songwriter – “Moon River”, “Days of Wine and Roses”) picked up the song and wrote English words, and titled it, “Autumn Leaves”.  Mercer’s version was not a literal translation, but maintained the sad and wistful feeling while leaving the meaning vague.  He also shortened it to two verses:

The falling leaves drift by the window
The autumn leaves of red and gold.
I see your lips, the summer kisses,
The sun-burned hands I used to hold.

Since you went away the days grow long,
And soon I'll hear, old winter's song.
But I miss you most of all, my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall.

As I said, there are MANY different interpretations of this song available.  Personally, I do not like the really slow ones (dirge), nor the real fast ones.  I like to hear the song moving along at a gentle, leaf-falling-from-the-sky tempo.

Here are some wonderful versions of the English song:
   -Frank Sinatra (slow): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DWY5y7QAZo
   -Nat King Cole (medium): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEMCeymW1Ow&list=PLJLX_U95esv5XqorGiJiSG_sqweItJqqX&index=4
   -Edith Piaf (medium in French and English!):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A94YFmLl60g
   -Jazz Version – Chet Baker with Hubert Laws, Paul Desmond and others
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gsz3mrnIBd0

- BARBER OF SEVILLE
By Gioacchino Rossini/arr. Mark Williams

Directed by John
John says:
Composers don’t have to be funny to write comic opera. They just have to wisely choose a funny story written by someone else. Rossini’s opera, The Barber of Seville, is a comedy that brought down the house when it first showed up in Rome in 1816 - but not in the way Rossini would have liked. The audience heckled the onstage performers mercilessly as many mistakes were apparently made, ruining the comedy that was inherent in Pierre Beaumarchais’ original play of the same name (1775). Beaumarchais had written three comic plays around the life of a fictional barber named Figaro and yes, this is the same “Figaro” featured in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, which was based on the second of the three plays.
Many composers had been drawn to Beaumarchais’ plays and this first play was set into an opera by at least four composers prior to the 1816 disaster that Rossini started out with. However, it is Rossini’s opera that has survived while all the others are nearly never performed today. (Remember, Mozart set the second play - completely different and certainly still wildly popular.)
If not funny, Rossini was certainly prolific. He wrote at least two full operas every year between 1810-1829. He wrote 39 of them and RETIRED at age 39, living another 38 years on the fortune that he’d amassed. We should all be so funny!

Our version of The Barber of Seville as arranged by Mark Williams
Demonstrated in this recording is the clarity of articulation, wide ranging contrasts in dynamics, and juxtaposition of delicacy and bombast that we will strive to emulate. https://viewer.jwpepper.com/smc2/?preview=true&product=2703015
Going Deeper: Other recordings to check out:
1.The full “Overture to the Barber of Seville” from the Sinfonia Rotterdam, original orchestral version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjwSI84ylcw&list=RDCjwSI84ylcw&start_radio=1
Note the contrasts of dynamics! The lightness of the staccato backgrounds. We will NOT be going at this pace (ca. 180+bpm for the quarter)
2. Michael Spyres as Figaro, performing “Largo al factotum”, featuring the famous repeated “Figaro” that we all remember from the cartoons (Tom & Jerry).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAWkeUXV9Tg
3. Bugs Bunny’s version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYBce9Gsz7g&t=10s

Funny quotes from the “unfunny” Rossini:

•  “One can’t judge Wagner’s opera Lohengrin after a first hearing, and I certainly don’t intend to hear it a second time.”
•  “Monsieur Wagner has good moments but awful quarters of an hour.”
•  “Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind.”
•  “How wonderful opera would be if there were no singers.”
  

HINTS FOR EFFECTIVE USE OF SOUNDFILES IN YOUR PRACTICE

There are several really good reasons for listening to the soundfiles of music you are playing:

1. *To get a sense of how the music sounds, its style, its phrasing, its harmonies (Most important reason!)
2. Following your music while listening to the soundfile (not playing) helps you learn how your part fits with the whole and helps you learn to keep your place. If you can't keep your place while listening and following in the music, you will struggle to keep your place when you are playing!
3. Playing along with the music gives you more opportunities to "practice with the group" than you can get just in rehearsals. You will not be able to determine when to play the very first beat, so come in on the next measure.
4. If it goes by too quickly, see the next bullet
5. Purchase the software, Amazing Slow Downer (from http://ronimusic.com/) and you can practice with the soundfile slowed down to where you can play along. (Soundfiles must be on the same device where the Slow Downer resides; you can not use YouTube, AppleMusic or soundfiles that are streamed from the web). For those of you cautious about what you download, this software site is safe according to Norton)
6. You can also slow down YouTube by clicking the gear and adjusting the percentage. You don't have the minute control of the speed, but it is better than nothing!

If you are new to working with soundfiles, DO NOT try to play along right away. Your first task is to listen several times while just following along in your own music (not playing), perhaps even using your finger to keep your place in the music. See if you can stay with the music, whether or not you can hear your own part (sometimes it doesn't sound like your instrument because you are playing the same thing as some other instrument and your part adds to the overall, but isn't itself distinguishable). Watch for things like holds or sudden loud spots or a change from legato to staccato to see if you can hear those as you listen. Until you can reliably follow along & keep your place in your music while listening and looking at your part, you will never be able to successfully play along. Be sure to do the listening first or it is just frustrating! Once you get good at that, try listening and speaking your rhythms. Once you can do that, then try playing with it, although you may find that it is too fast for you to keep up. (See bullet #5 above)

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Sudbury Valley New Horizons Music, Inc.