Dallas Wind Symphony to Premiere Composition by USU Faculty Member

The Dallas Wind Symphony will present the premiere of High Maintenance for Brass Ensemble by Utah State University faculty member Thomas P. Rohrer Tuesday, Feb. 13 at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas, Texas. The work was selected from among 84 entries in the ensemble’s 2006-07 composition contest, from which seven works were selected for performance during this concert season.

Rohrer is director of bands and director of music education at Utah State in the department of music.

 

This is the second honor for Rohrer in the five-year tenure of the annual competition. Earlier, his composition The Heart of It All won the 2003 competition and is now part of the brass ensemble repertoire.

 

Rohrer has composed more than a dozen works since 2002 for wind ensemble, symphony orchestra, brass ensemble and saxophone quartet. His works have been performed throughout the United States and in Australia.

 

High Maintenance is a descriptive term for the energy and virtuosity in this composition, Rohrer said.

 

“Tempo in the work is incessant and the combination of tuneful melodic material and derived polyphonic — sometimes polytonal — interjections provides ample continuity along with fiery contrasts,” he said.

 

The form is a short rondo, with an added introduction and coda.

 

“All of the themes are derived from the opening motive, with rondo sections introduced by a three-measure syncopated figure,” Rohrer said.

 

The work also exists in wind ensemble form under the title Symphonic Manifold.

 

Rohrer’s earlier award-winning work, The Heart of it All, now exists as the first movement of Homeland Suite for Wind Ensemble, and the work’s second movement, “The Black Swamp,” is published by Kendor Music in a saxophone quartet version. The original work was premiered by the Dallas Wind Symphony in March 2004.

 

At USU Rohrer conducts the music department’s Wind Orchestra and the Aggie Marching Band as part of his leadership in a diverse college band program. He has established an international reputation as a conductor and clinician. His regional work takes him to Salt Lake City, where he is music director and conductor of the Salt Lake Symphonic Winds, a group that performed at the 2006 MENC — National Association for Music Education — national conference to high praise from colleagues and composers.

 

Rohrer is a supporter of new music for winds and percussion and has conducted more than 10 premieres in the last five years. He has composed seven original works for various ensembles.

 

A frequent conductor and clinician, Rohrer is published in the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, UPDATE: Applications of Research in Music Education, Journal of Band Research and Instrument, as well as several state professional journals. He has presented at regional College Band Directors National Association and individual state conferences.

 

Rohrer is also recognized as an outstanding teacher, most recently as USU’s music department Fine Arts Teacher of the Year. He was honored in 1997 as a top-five finalist in Bowling Green State University’s Master Teacher Award, where he was on faculty prior to joining USU. He has also held positions at Northern Arizona University and the University of Cincinnati. He has public school experience teaching instrumental music in the schools in southwest Ohio.

 

A proponent of music education, Rohrer has visited hundreds of classrooms and he maintains strong ties with pre-service and in-service teachers.

 

Rohrer earned degrees in music education and wind conducting from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He received his doctorate in music education from Florida State University.