SCORE STUDY EPISODE #6: ROCKY POINT HOLIDAY

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composed by Ron Nelson (1969)
published by Boosey & Hawkes
reduction and analysis by Anthony O'Toole
performed by the Dallas Wind Symphony
conducted by Jerry Junkin


Rocky Point Holiday was composed by Ron Nelson in 1968 and 69’ with most of the work being done while on vacation at Rocky Point located in Warwick Neck, Rhode Island. The piece was commissioned by the University of Minnesota band and their conductor, Frank Bencriscutto, who was also a composer and arranger for the wind band. Bencriscutto had heard Nelson’s orchestral overture ‘Savannah River Holiday’ and wanted to have him compose an overture in that style for his band’s upcoming tour of Russia.

Nelson had previously utilized the band in an unpublished Piano Concerto written in 1948 and a piece in 1958 titled ‘Mayflower Overture’. When Bencriscutto contacted Nelson and discussed the commission the composer asked him if there were any limitations in writing for the ensemble and Bencriscutto told him there were none. Nelson replied by informing him that he would write a tremendously difficult piece, and he was right. By any year or standard Rocky Point Holiday is an extremely challenging piece, with advanced technical and range demands on virtually every player in every section of the band. But the result is a virtuosic work with abundance of timbral color, infectious melodies and musical drama. Rocky Point Holiday became Nelson’s first great work for band, and the first of many musical ‘holidays’.

-Program Notes by Anthony O’Toole