BrightonMusic Orchestra and Brighton Jazz presented their annual Homespun Concert on Sunday February 15 at 4:00 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church in Brighton.  Immediately prior to the concert was an arts and crafts show with quilts, scarves and exquisite hand embroidery by Ann Pinfield.

As the Homespun Concert is a venue to present locally composed music, Brighton Jazz claimed Fort Morgan raised and sometime Boulder based Glenn Miller as a local composer and played a rousing medley of his most familiar pieces, plus two pieces with vocalist Kathleen Murphy.  They also played conductor Kat McCusker’s  Skippin’.

The program opened with Brighton Brass ensemble playing trumpeter Tom Rudd’s Salutations, a dynamic fanfare with great tympani accents, composed as a tribute to the residents of Brighton.  The full orchestra followed with Kat McCusker’s aptly titled Step Lively, Kawika Berthelette’s  The Fallen, and conductor/violist Geoffrey Lehr’s fast moving Brighton Fanfare, with interactive orchestration and ringing punctuation.

The University of Colorado School of Music provided two works for string orchestra— thirty year old Brian Kelly’s somber Valediction and Kurt Mehlenbacher’s very complex Faded White.  Both composers were present in the moderately sized and enthusiastic audience.

Woodworks, the entire woodwind section, played Kat McCusker’s arrangement of Handel’s Hornpipe in F from Water Music.  BrightonMusic Wind Ensemble, with percussion, performed the very pleasing and emotional Playful, Pensive, and Proud, composed by French horn player Marla Seth.

William Andrews (tuba player Richard’s brother) composed an eloquent suite, Minstrel Faire, which Trillseekers (flutes plus oboe ensemble) played with great sensitivity.  The concert concluded with violinist Louis Jendras’ Tragischeflote, a hilarious spoof of Mozart’s Magic Flute overture.

The entire concert provided much diversity in music, moods, and instrumentation, and was an impressive celebration of local talented creativity in just over one hour.