Deerfield Music Presents "A Celestial Journey" at Spring Concert

THIJS WITTINK/DEERFIELD SCROLL

On April 24th, in the Elizabeth Wachsman Concert Hall, the Deerfield Music Program showcased its year-end performance: The Spring Concert - A Celestial Journey. From Gustav Holst’s The Planets, Op. 32, to excerpts from the Star Wars film scores, students delivered a wide range of celestial-themed music. 

The concert showcased a range of musical genres performed by the Deerfield Orchestra, Concert Band, and Jazz Band, spanning 13 pieces. Most notably, it featured both senior concerto winners, Lynn Sung '26 and Janis Zempare ’26, alongside Brandon Smith ’26 and Kwasi Oten Adu-Gyamfi ’26, in their student-coordinated piece entitled Sophisticated Lady. 

For Music Director Thomas Bergeron, the inspiration for this year's spring concert stems from his desire to explore the major works of Gustav Holst’s The Planets and John Williams’s Star Wars soundtrack. “They’re both, in my mind, two of the greatest works composed for an orchestra,” he explained. Crediting John Williams’s movie scores as a main inspiration as to why he decided to pursue music, Mr. Bergeron further said that, “initially there was no agenda, I just wanted the orchestra to have the experience of playing these amazing orchestral works that happen to be themed on the topic of space.” Naturally, once the orchestra programming was decided, other ensemble directors continued to embrace the celestial theme and selected complementary pieces inspired by “space, the planets, or the music of the spheres.” 

Coincidentally, the concert’s timing further enhanced its celestial theme amid heightened news coverage of space exploration. Occurring just one week after the completion of the Artemis II mission, the concert coincided with the renewed interest in human space travel. “In fact, the concert’s promotional poster image was a photo from Artemis of the Earth as viewed from the moon that one of the astronauts took on the spaceship,” commented Mr. Bergeron. 

At the same time, global conflicts and ongoing space exploration in the weeks leading up to the concert were unintentionally reflected in the music. “It was a very strange time to read the news because there’s this horrifying war going on on Earth, while, at the same time, humans are being launched into space to explore the outer reaches of the universe,” explained Mr. Bergeron. By playing music from Star Wars, a saga about war set in space, the music captured this juxtaposition of “the majesty of space travel and adventure, but also the strong theme of war and conflict.”

When reflecting on his experience playing in the concert, music student Jason Ko ’27, who played in all three ensembles, noted that the celestial theme was ever prominent in the Deerfield Orchestra’s performance of Gustav Holst’s The Planets. Composed as a seven-movement orchestral suite, each movement draws inspiration from the planets’ astrological interpretation by associating each with its corresponding Roman deity. “For Mars, the God of War, there were a lot of 5/4 time signatures which had this powerful marching beat,” explained Ko when reflecting on the deific and “out of this world” quality of the pieces in The Planets. “However, for Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity, there is this 'godlike' tone and feeling that the audiences are being lifted out of their seats with the fast-paced rhythm and use of wind instruments.” 

Among the variety of repertoire played, fellow music student, Iris Zhu ’28, stated that the piece she was most excited to play was Jupiter from Holst’s The Planets. “There were many sections that felt very grand because the orchestra was playing as one, and to me, that was very powerful to listen to,” stated Zhu.    

Adding to the performances from the Jazz Band and Orchestra, the Concert Band complemented the program with the pieces Shepherd’s Hey, Earth Song, and Saturn, which all centered around similar celestial aspects. Apart from Deerfield’s musical ensembles, the concert also featured student-led performances, giving them the opportunity to exercise their artistic freedom and experiment with a range of musical compositions. 

In their senior appearance, Smith and Adu-Gyamfi collaborated to arrange their senior piece, Sophisticated Lady. The original composition is a renowned 1932 jazz standard composed by Duke Ellington, who was inspired “by the school teachers who taught in the winter and traveled in the summer, crediting the melody to contributions from his orchestra members,” explained Ko. Despite the concert’s celestial theme, Sophisticated Lady is characterized as a romantic piece unrelated to the other celestial repertoire. “It is distinguished by its slow and lyrical melodies,” said Ko. “It represents a bittersweet and melancholic tone that is supposed to capture a feeling of nostalgia.” 

Behind the scenes, however, the production and preparation process required immense logistical coordination and dedication from everyone involved. From aligning schedules to sharing practice spaces, “most people don’t realize the amount of coordination happening behind the scenes,” noted Mr. Bergeron. “Designing a program that feels cohesive as a concert, even with many different ensembles performing, is always a challenge.” 

Yet, the result was a concert that stands as a testament to the music program’s growth over the year. “My freshman year, I did a lot of performances by myself because there weren’t a lot of musicians to play with me,” said Sung. “But now we perform in a lot of school events as a chamber group, or even with acapella groups.” Ko shares Sung’s sentiment, saying, “These opportunities showcase all that Deerfield provides for their musicians, which has strengthened my musical skills but also shows how the program grew over the year.” 

Reflecting on his final orchestra concert after his nine years at Deerfield, Mr. Bergeron notes the incredible growth of the music program from a relatively small one into one capable of playing professional-level repertoire. “When I got here, there was barely an orchestra,” he reflected. “At that time, the orchestra would never have been able to play the music of John Williams or Gustav Holst.” 

For both teachers and students involved, this concert showcases the result of what happens when you “really devote yourself to your craft,” noted Mr. Bergeron. “It’s been great to see student interest in the orchestra and student commitment to working on difficult music really grow here so that we can put on concerts like this one.”