Southeast Missouri State University’s Percussion Ensemble will host its annual fall concert. This year there will be a new twist to the usual concert with the addition of the Steel Drum Band.
The Steel Drum Band was created five years ago by Dr. Shane Mizicko, percussion professor as well as the director of the Percussion Ensemble and Southeast Missouri State Marching Band Drumline.
When the group was created in 2010, it was a small group of people. Now the group has about 12 people and half of them are non-music majors, according to Mizicko. Only 10 of its members will play in the Steel Drum Band part of the concert.
“It's a really good way to get people into music,” junior Sheila Likes, a member of the Steel Drum Band said about non-majors being in the steel drum band.
Likes, who has been in the group for three years now and is one of the more experienced members, will be playing a steelpan instrument during one song. The steelpan is a caved-in drum that produces a light medley.
The Steel Drum Band plays not only in shows like the Percussion Ensemble’s annual fall concert, but also other places on and off campus. Mizicko said that last year the band played in front of Kent Library and in front of Starbucks on the main campus. This year the members hope to return to these places to play once again, and they will also be playing in other parts of Cape Girardeau and Ste. Genevieve, Missouri.
During the rest of the concert the two groups will not be playing together.
Likes has played in the Percussion Ensemble for the past two years, but this year wanted to switch over to Steel Drum Band. She said she has missed practicing with the other ensemble performers but is enjoying playing the steel drum.
Likes said that she thinks that this new addition to the concert will draw more people to the usual low-numbers concert. In past years the concert has only had about 150 to 200 people attend. Most of these people know the performers personally.
“People are more familiar with the sound and feel of steel drum music, so I think that it is a good way to draw more people in the percussion concert,” Likes said.
Mizicko and Likes hope that the Steel Drum Band will draw more people in from the community to attend the concert and learn more about both groups that will be playing. They also believe that this new addition will draw the attention of both young and old in the audience.
The Steel Drum Band will play after the Percussion Ensemble and will open with the song “La Bamba” and will play other popular songs such as “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song).”
The Percussion Ensemble is made up of 13 members.
“Keep your ears open and eyes open to really watch and understand how much communication is needed,” Dustin Haigler, a Southeast junior, said about the advice he would give to someone attending this concert for the first time.
“Once these people come and hear the percussion, they tend to enjoy the concert,” Mizicko said.
Haigler has been performing in the Percussion Ensemble since his freshmen year and has been playing percussion instruments since junior high school. He said he enjoys working with other performers in the group and seeing learning evolve their music throughout their academic careers.
Haigler also said the group has to be a tight-knit group because they rely on each other and their non-verbal and musical cues during the concert in order for the ensemble to play cohesively. He said that they rely so much on each other's cues because sometimes they do not have a conductor for a song. One mess up or missed cue can shut the entire song down, he said.
Not only so the audience can enjoy the music, but also for the performers’ grades, according to Mizicko, this concert is their midterm, and the Family Holiday Concert at the end of the semester is their final. Haigler and Likes agreed that if the performer really enjoys performing, and the performers have practiced and bonded together, then the grade is not really what they think about when preparing for the concert.
The Percussion Ensemble and Steel Drum Band will perform at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 20 in the Donald C. Bedell Performance Hall. The concert is expected to end by 9 p.m. General admission tickets are $10, faculty, staff and senior citizen tickets are $9 and student tickets are $3 with a valid Southeast ID. Anyone who wants to purchase tickets can get them either online at RiverCampusEvents.com, at the River Campus box office or by calling (573) 651-2265.