Music
Wooster Symphony Orchestra
A performing organization comprised of students and members of
the community devoted to the study and performance of the standard
orchestral repertoire from the baroque to the contemporary. Admission
is by audition. Four hours per week. Four regular concerts per year.
One-eighth course credit per semester. Annually. Fall and Spring.
Founded in 1915 by Daniel Parmelee, then Professor of Violin at
Wooster College, the Wooster Symphony Orchestra is the second-oldest
orchestra in continuous performance in the state of Ohio. Originally
a community organization, the WSO was taken under the aegis of The
College of Wooster and adopted as an important component of the
Music Department's curriculum. The College realizes the important
curricular opportunity of such an ensemble by supporting such a
town-gown ensemble and including it in the curriculum. Enrolled
students are given the opportunity to play in a large symphony orchestra
(60-70 members) which performs a variety of literature, an opportunity
normally not available to a student enrolled at a small liberal
arts college.
As an auditioned orchestra, today's Wooster Symphony offers participating
instrumentalists experience performing orchestral literature of
musical genres ranging from the baroque period to the contemporary,
including music by living composers. As part of the College's curriculum,
the Wooster Symphony Orchestra offers its members the opportunity
to improve skills requisite for fine ensemble playing: rhythmic
accuracy, correct intonation, excellent tone quality, attention
to balance, sight reading, and correct stylistic interpretation.
In addition to these peda-gogic and interpretive skills, students
are expected to pursue the performance of the ensemble's music with
an understanding of the place a given work has in its historical
context, including po-litical and social parallels, as well as its
relation to other artistic movements.
The Wooster Symphony Orchestra's performance schedule includes
three subscription concerts during the school year as well as other
performances scheduled when opportunities present themselves. In
addition to the full symphony orchestra, the Wooster Symphony Chamber
Orchestra, an ensemble selected from the membership of the parent
organization, is a 35-piece fall-semester ensemble that concentrates
on the chamber orchestra literature.
Director
Prof. Jeffrey Lindberg
