The Sacramento Mandarins Drum and Bugle Corps have completed their 2022 summer competitive tour on organization highs. The Mandarins finished their 2022 season in 10th place at the Drum Corps International World Championships tying their highest ever placement at the event. The drum corps finished with a score of 90.013, the highest score in the Mandarins' 59-year history. This marked the first time ever the Mandarins have met the benchmark of scoring 90 or higher at a DCI World Class event. The Mandarins are also the first 10th place corps to score at least a 90 at the annual Finals event. 

This was my first year on the brass staff with the Mandarins primarily teaching the music for the baritone/euphonium section. Super proud of my students, and grateful for the opportunity to work with all the staff!

This past weekend, "Stutter Step" returned to the Leonard Falcone International Euphonium and Tuba Festival, but not as a competition piece. "Stutter Step" was on last year's required music list for the artist euphonium division. This year adjudicator, Jason Casanova, performed on recital alongside other judges. In his performance, "Stutter Step" was heard for the first time in the crisp air of Blue Lake, Michigan. This was the festival's first in-person event since 2019.

​A fitting live premiere for the work at Falcone, Jason Casanova gave the world premiere of the work virtually at the 2020 International Euphonium Tuba Festival. "Stutter Step" was subsequently added to the Falcone required music list for the following year just a couple months later. 

The World Youth Wind Symphony (WYWS) performs "Deep River" tonight at the Interlochen Summer Arts Camp. Tonight's concert is the final program of the six-week camp concert season for the ensemble. The WYWS is the most advanced wind ensemble at the Interlochen camp according to their website. The conductor for tonight's concert is Steven D. Davis. Alongside his duties as one of the conductors for the WYWS, Davis also serves as the Rose Ann Carr Millsap Missouri Distinguished Professor of Music and Professor of Conducting at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory. 

You can view the webcast from the concert at the following link: www.interlochen.org/media/archived-webcast-world-youth-wind-symphony-wyws-8-06-2022

Deep River for wind band has been added to the Indiana State School Music Association (ISSMA) High School Concert Band Required List beginning in the 2022-2023 school year. The work has been added in the "group 1" category. Deep River saw its premiere in November 2021 by the University of Georgia Wind Ensemble conducted by Dr. Jaclyn Hartenberger. The work sets the traditional spiritual for wind band while also paying homage to the history and notable artists who brought the tune to live including Paul Robeson and Henry Burleigh. Deep River is published by Murphy Music Press.

Stutter Step has been included on the Florida Bandmasters Association Solo and Ensemble List. The work is listed in the grade 6 difficulty range for the euphonium solo category. Stutter Step premiered in June 2020 at the International Euphonium Tuba Festival by soloist Jason Casanova. The work has since been featured on several international solo competition lists and was most recently performed by Mark Jenkins, principal euphonium of "The President's Own" United States Marine Band, at the Midwest Regional Tuba-Euphonium Conference in May 2022. Stutter Step​ is published by Pinnacle Brass Publications. 

**Edit: Stutter Step was also been added to the University Interscholastic League (Texas) Solo list in 2020. 

I will be interviewed as part of a composer forum discussion today hosted by Margaret McGillivray. This forum is a launch event for a new collaborative consortium led by McGillivray to bring new works for the student horn player by black composers. I along with 10 other composers will be contributing new works for an anthology book of horn pieces. McGillivray teaches at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, D.C. The contributing works will serve as jury selections for those students.