UMASS HONOR BAND

FEBRUARY 10, 2024

DIRECTORS: click here to access music (password protected)

GENERAL INFORMATION

The Honor Band schedule for students will feature masterclasses with UMass faculty, a concert with the UMass Wind Ensemble, and a forum to interact with UMass music students. Lunch and dinner will be provided! Registration for accepted students on Honor Band Day will begin at 8:00am and rehearsals will begin at 8:30am. Concert performance will be at 7:00pm. The cost is $40 per student, which covers everything, including lunch and dinner.

Information about participation, ensemble assignments, repertoire, and schedule will be distributed to Band Directors soon!

***HONOR BAND SNOW DATE - SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2024***

In the event that we would have to postpone Honor Band due to weather, the top of this website page would have information about the changes.

2024 GUEST COMPOSER: Nicole Piunno

Nicole Piunno (b. 1985) is a composer who views music as a vehicle for seeing and experiencing the realities of life. Her music often reflects the paradoxes in life and how these seeming opposites are connected as they often weave together. Her harmonic language and use of counterpoint mirrors the complexity of our world by acknowledging light and dark, past and present, beauty and brokenness, confinement and freedom, chaos and order, spiritual and physical, life and death. 

Nicole holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in composition and a Master of Music degree in theory pedagogy from Michigan State University. Her composition teacher was Ricardo Lorenz. She earned a Master of Music degree in composition at Central Michigan University, studying with David Gillingham. Nicole earned a Bachelor of Music degree in Music Education and her emphasis was on trumpet.  Her music has been performed by “The President’s Own” United States Marine Band, the Principal Brass Quintet of the New York Philharmonic, the United States Coast Guard Band, and at many universities and conservatories around the country. Her large ensemble music has also been featured at multiple regional CBDNA conferences, the Midwest Clinic, and numerous all-state concerts.

*D.M.A., Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition, Michigan State University, 2014

*M.M., Master of Music in Music Theory Pedagogy, Michigan State University, 2014

*M.M., Master of Music in Composition, Central Michigan University, 2011

*B.M., Bachelor of Music in Music Education, 2007