Join the UCLA Wind Ensemble for the second concert of their 2023-2024 season with a performance led by Visiting Professor of Music, Gary Hill.
The UCLA Wind Ensemble is the premier wind band at the University of California, Los Angeles. Comprising both graduate and undergraduate students, its 50 members are highly skilled and versatile musicians selected by competitive audition each fall.
As a flexible and inclusive medium that honors its rich history while also fostering living composers, the wind ensemble provides an ideal laboratory for students to encounter a wide range of musical viewpoints. Innovative programming, interaction with faculty and guest artists, and vibrant outreach programs position the wind ensemble as a musical nexus, bringing together professional players and artist-teachers, composers, academics, school band directors, and audiences — with student-musicians at the core.
About Hill:
Gary W. Hill is Professor of Music and Director of Bands Emeritus at Arizona State University, where he taught from 1999-2019. Prior to Hill's appointment at ASU, he was Director of Bands at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music (1986-99), at East Texas State University (now Texas A&M-Commerce, 1982-86) and Associate Director of Bands at the University of Colorado, Boulder (1980-82). He also served as Music Director for the Kansas City Youth Wind Ensemble and for newEar, a chamber ensemble devoted to contemporary music. Hill began his teaching career in Michigan, where he was Director of Bands for the Traverse City (1977-80) and West Bloomfield (1974-77) public schools.
High school, university, and professional ensembles under Hill's direction have given performances for the National Band Association, the Music Educators National Conference (NAfME), the College Band Directors National Association, the American Bandmasters Association, the International Horn Symposium, the National Flute Association, at many state conventions, and throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. Performances conducted by him have consistently drawn praise from composers, performing musicians, and critics alike for their insightful, inspired, and cohesive realizations, and for their imaginative programming.
During Professor Hill’s 39 years as a collegiate conducting teacher, he taught scores of undergraduate and graduate conducting students and served as the primary mentor for 53 wind band conducting majors, 8 who are serving as conductors of US Armed Forces’ ensembles and other professional groups, and 42 who won university teaching positions.
Gary W. Hill is one of the most sought after guest conductors and clinicians in the instrumental music education field. As a conductor, appearances in more than a dozen countries and throughout the United States have included performances with myriad high school honor bands, numerous college and university wind bands and orchestras, many professional ensembles, at the Midwest International Band and Orchestra Clinic, and at World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles' conferences As a clinician, Hill has presented hundreds of workshops on conducting and rehearsal technique for music teachers of all levels and has worked with thousands of bands and orchestras and their teachers. Professor Hill is currently a Conn-Selmer Educational Clinician.
Hill remains passionately involved with research concerning the exploration of biochemical reactions spawned by the musical process, the art and craft of conducting, and the past, present, and future of instrumental music in schools. He is the author or co-author of numerous articles published in music trade journals (CBDNA Journal, WASBE Journal, Bands of America, National Association of Schools of Music, AMEA Journal, etc.) and in scientific journals, proceedings, and books, including: the Acoustical Society of America; The Oxford Handbook of Making Music and Leisure; and in the Journal Hormones and Behavior.
Professor Hill is a member of many professional organizations, including the American Bandmasters Association and the College Band Directors National Association, for which he hosted the “Fiftieth Anniversary National Conference” (1991), co-hosted the 2019 biennial national conference, as well as the joint conferences of the North Central and Southwestern Divisions in conjunction with The Society for American Music (1998), served as president of the Southwestern Division (1989-91), and as national president (2003-05).
This performance is made possible by the David and Irmgard Dobrow Fund. Classical music was a passion of the Dobrows, who established a generous endowment at The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music to make programs like this possible. We are proud to celebrate this program as part of the 2023-2024 Dobrow Series.