Music
Over half of the students in the school are involved in the music program.
Williamsville East currently has the following ensembles: a Symphonic Orchestra (audition required for entry), a Philharmonic Orchestra (under the direction of Mr. Wayne Moose), a Wind Ensemble (audition required for entry), a Concert Band, a Jazz Ensemble (audition required for entry), a Chorale (audition required for entry), a Mixed Chorus and a Women's Chorus. There is also a Jazz Band (under the direction of Mr. Carl Mazzio) and a Vocal Jazz group that practice after school on a weekly basis.
The Bands/Chorale and Orchestra alternate yearly trips in the Spring in order to tour and compete nationally, and have won multiple awards for their performances. Most notably, the Williamsville East Jazz Ensemble was a finalist in the Jazz at Lincoln Center Essentially Ellington Competition in 2007. The winter concert of the Music Department, Winterfest, is known for the diversity of music presented as it includes all the major ensembles plus small ensembles created by East students.
Most recently, the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors donated a $70,000 grant to assist the Williamsville Poetry Music Dance Celebration, begun at Williamsville East in 2000 by band director Dr. Stephen Shewan and English teacher Mr. John Kryder
In 2010, the symphonic orchestra was awarded the opportunity to play at the New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA) Winter Conference. They performed Gustav Mahler's Adagietto from his fifth symphony and Leonard Bernstein's Symphonic Dances from West Side Story.
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Famous quotes containing the word music:
“So gladly, from the songs of modern speech
Men turn, and see the stars, and feel the free
Shrill wind beyond the close of heavy flowers,
And through the music of the languid hours,
They hear like ocean on a western beach
The surge and thunder of the Odyssey.”
—Andrew Lang (1844–1912)
“Poetry is either something that lives like fire inside you—like music to the musician or Marxism to the Communist—or else it is nothing, an empty formalized bore around which pedants can endlessly drone their notes and explanations.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“My love shall hear the music of my hounds.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)