The Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble, the student resident ensemble at the Hopkins Center for the Arts, premiered original compositions by the winners of the Arturo Márquez Composition Competition on Feb. 13 with the Concord-Carlisle High School’s Frontiers Ensemble. The performance of the contemporary Mexican score “Flor Violeta: Concertino for Harp and Wind Ensemble” by Omar Arellano Osorio featured guest Greta Richardson ’26 on the harp.
The works were commissioned by the Hop as part of the Mexican Repertoire Initiative, which works to foster, support and promote new wind music repertoire by Mexican composers.
“Mexican music always inspires my music,” said composer and cellist Nubia Jaime Melina Donjuan, whose work “Danzón No. 3: ‘The Lone Pine’” commissioned by the Hop was performed by DCWE.
“It is wonderful that we were invited here because in Mexico we do not have a [similar] initiative for live composers, and it raises the voice of minority groups,” Donjuan said. “We are so happy to be here, and I hope that our music reaches new audiences,” she added.
In addition to Donjuan’s composition, DCWE performed the premiere of Osorio’s composition “Flor Violeta” commissioned by the Hop.
Prior to these performances, the Concord-Carlisle High School Frontiers Ensemble performed Tasha Smith Godinez’s 2022 jazz work “Mulatta” and premiered Rodrigo Martinez Torres GR ’25’s work “Patterns in the Ether,” which was commissioned by Concord-Carlisle High School. The evening ended with the Wind Ensemble’s performance of two movements from English composer Gustav Holst’s seven-movement orchestral suite “The Planets,” including “Mars, the Bringer of War” and “Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity.”
In terms of the setlist, DCWE director Brian Messier said a “deeper emotional trajectory” of “themes of creation” linked each of the pieces.
The program was “a morphism of freeform sounds coalescing on both local but cosmic scales, making audiences think of something that brings them joy — [but also] shifting to something that causes them pain or anger,” he said.
Each year, the Mexican Repertoire Initiative sponsors a consortium that arranges the commissions of original works for wind bands from the three winners of the Arturo Márquez Composition Competition. According to the Hop website, this is a prestigious competition for young composers run by acclaimed Mexican composer Arturo Márquez held annually in Mexico City.
DCWE piccoloist Timothy Bonis ’26 highlighted how the initiative offers audiences less familiar with the Mexican repertoire “exposure” to “a new soundscape.”
Meanwhile, DCWE soprano and alto saxophonist Francisco Garcia ’28 said performing these works gave him new insight into the relationship between contemporary composers and their national and ethnic “communities.”
“I witnessed how personal composers’ music is to them and [how] their communities ha[ve] influenced their compositions and sonorities,” Garcia said.
Bassoonist John Bradley ’29 said he also appreciated the “diversity” of this program set with its combination of compositions from the Mexican Repertoire Initiative and “The Planets” movements.
Garcia noted how the Mexican Repertoire Initiative generally seeks to “expand the diversity of wind band literature” by highlighting the works of Mexican composers.
At the same time, Bonis described how this performance also displayed a diversity in wind instrumentation. For instance, Godinez’ “Mulatta” featured less common wind instrumentation such as the bassoon, oboe and piccolo.
Bonis said these unconventional sounds were characteristic of the works the ensemble has been able to play through the Mexican Repertoire Initiative.
“Often we are using impressionist instruments or techniques and rhythms that people do not listen to in their daily lives,” Bonis said.
Featured composer Osorio, who is also a pianist, guitarist and singer, said he “hope[s] that this performance influences students to listen to more Mexican composers.”
