CONWAY, Ark. (December 19, 2012) - Hendrix College will host the Festival of Winds Honor Band for high school students on Saturday, May 4, 2013. Approximately 90 students from Arkansas and surrounding states will gather for a day of rehearsals and present a concert at 7:30 p.m. that evening in Staples Auditorium on the Hendrix campus.
Sharing the concert with the honor band will be the Little Rock Wind Symphony, conducted by Dr. Karen Fannin, associate professor of music at Hendrix. The concert is free and open to the public.
The Festival of Winds Honor Band is open to students in grades 9-12. Students who are interested in participating should be nominated by their band director or private teacher. Nomination forms can be found at www.hendrix.edu/festivalofwinds. Nominations are due Friday, Feb. 22.
The guest conductor for the 2013 Festival of Winds will be Dr. Tim Robblee. Dr. Robblee is the associate director of bands and conductor for the Institute for New Music at Northwestern University, where he conducts the Symphonic Band and Contemporary Music Ensemble, as well as teaching courses in conducting and music education. Prior to his current appointment, he served as the director of bands at Washington State University in Pullman, Wash., and Willamette University in Salem, Ore.
Dr. Robblee holds a Ph.D. in music education and wind band conducting at the University of Minnesota, a master's degree in conducting from Northwestern University, and a bachelor's degree in music education from Whitworth College in Spokane, Wash. He also spent a year at the Munich Hochschule für Musik pursuing graduate clarinet studies.
Prior to graduate study, he taught for eight years as an instrumental music educator in the public schools of Palo Alto, Calif., where his students and ensembles were recognized for excellence on a state and national level, including recognition from the 1997 Downbeat Magazine Student Music Awards as the Outstanding High School Jazz Combo.
Dr. Robblee maintains an active schedule as a guest conductor and clinician and is published as part of GIA's Teaching Music Through Performance in Band series. As an advocate of music in the public schools, he has adjudicated at numerous music festivals and presented at music education conferences throughout North America, including the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago.
More information on the Festival of Winds can be found at www.hendrix.edu/festivalofwinds or by contacting Dr. Fannin at 501-450-1422.
Founded in 1876, Hendrix College is a national leader in engaged liberal arts and sciences education. For the fifth consecutive year, Hendrix was named one of the country's "Up and Coming" liberal arts colleges by U.S. News and World Report. Hendrix is featured in the 2012 edition of the Princeton Review as one of the country's best 377 colleges, the latest edition of Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You Think about Colleges, Forbes magazine's annual list of America's Top 650 Colleges, and the 2013 edition of the Fiske Guide to Colleges. Hendrix has been affiliated with the United Methodist Church since 1884. For more information, visit www.hendrix.edu.