Every December, the Point Pleasant Boro High School Concert Band comes together to put forth all of their hard work over the past 4 months and perform their Winter Concert. On December 6th, the band played a couple of select pieces for friends and family to help start the holiday season.

After performing the “Star Spangled Banner”, the PPBHS band played “Ukrainian Bell Carol” arranged by Richard L. Saucedo and followed by an arrangement of “Amazing Grace.” The band played “Amazing Grace” as a tribute to Superintendent Mr. Smith’s wife, who had unfortunately passed away recently therefore the director of the band Mr. Visco, wanted to honor her. This beautiful song was then followed by the song “Africa“ by Toto, which is a song that the band had played during the high school football games this past season. After “Africa” were the songs from the Competition Marching Band Show “Red”, which included “Mars” by Gustav Holst, “Dies Irae” by Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem, “Romeo and Juliet” by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, and ending with “Firebird Suite” by Igor Stravinsky. After a short intermission, the band would go on to play “Festa!” by Elliot Del Borgo, “Danse Macabre” which is written by Camille Saint-Saëns, and finally ending the show with “Sleigh Ride” by Leroy Anderson.

When Mr. Visco was asked what his favorite piece in the concert was, he replied, “ I like them all for a different reason… “Festa!” was challenging and made the students really work hard and practice their music. I also really enjoyed “Amazing Grace” because the students did a great job with bringing out the intended emotions of the song … I picked all the songs for a reason”. He then went on to say that he wished he had added the song, “12 Twelves of Christmas” to the mix, but in the end he did not want to have to replace anything with it.

Overall the concert was a huge success as the audience members enjoyed hearing all of the different parts, the incredible solos, and getting to relive “Red”. If you were unable to make it to the Winter Concert,  the band will be having their Spring Concert on May 16th, 2019.