Tucson Pops, Winds strike up the bands for spring parks series

This time of year, right around the 7 o’clock hour as the sun’s glow is slipping further and further on the horizon, you just get the urge to be outside.

Make a picnic supper, spread a blanket on the lush green slope of a tree-shaded park and hope for a band to suddenly start playing a little moonlight serenade or a Broadway tune that you’ll still be humming when the sun comes up.

That pretty much describes the experience of the Tucson Pops Orchestra and Arizona Symphonic Winds park concert series, which both kick off their spring runs this weekend.

Each ensemble plans it so that their spring series opens on Mother’s Day weekend — Symphonic Winds is first up on Saturday, May 10, at Udall Park’s László Veres Amphitheater, 7290 E. Tanque Verde Road, which is named after the Winds founder and longtime music director; Tucson Pops Orchestra, under Artistic Director and Conductor Khris Dodge, opens its series on Sunday, May 11, at Reid Park’s DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center, 900 S. Randolph Way.

Symphonic Winds’ “Music In the Park” concerts begin at 7 p.m. Saturdays through May 31; Pops’ “Music Under the Stars” concerts also start at 7 p.m. on Sundays through Memorial Day weekend May 25. Neither charges admission, but both appreciate donations.

39 years in the park

László Veres started Arizona Symphonic Winds as a complement to Tucson Pops Orchestra, which he led for 30 years before giving up the podium to Khris Dodge in 2022.

The ensemble performs a mix of classical, big band and pops music, including Broadway showtunes like the selections from “The Sound of Music” on the program for Saturday’s “Strike Up the Band with March László.”

Also on the program for the May 10 concert: the popular overture “Morning, Noon and Night in Vienna” and Veres’ Mother’s Day tradition “My Yiddishe Momme.”

• May 17: Guest conductor Renee Shane-Boyd, the director of the Catalina Foothills High School band, will take the podium for a concert of Winds favorites including Saint-Saëns’s “Bachannale” and selections from the Broadway musical “Mama Mia.” (Fun fact: Broadway In Tucson is bringing “Mama Mia” to Centennial Hall May 20-25.)
• May 24: Veres will don his John Philip Sousa hat and short coat for “An Evening with John Philip Sousa,” featuring guest vocalist soprano Dori Carden

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• s-Smith. The concert features some of the band leader’s famous marches in addition to vocal selections including “If Ever I Would Leave You” from “Camelot,” “Somewhere” from “West Side Story” and other Broadway tunes.
• May 31: Wear your toe-tapping shoes for the series finale “Beautiful Blue Danube,” featuring marches, polkas and waltzes mixed in with selections from “Gigi” and music from the Big Band Era.

70 years went by so fast

It’s hard to imagine that the Tucson Pops Orchestra has been performing “Music Under the Stars” or some variation thereof for seven decades, but when Khris Dodge and the orchestra take the DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center stage on Sunday, they will mark year 70.

Georges DeMeester and Ernest Hoffman founded the orchestra in 1955 and after playing around town, including at the VA Hospital and the Holiday Inn on Miracle Mile, they found a home at Reid Park, where they have become a Tucson tradition.

Generations of Tucson families fill the grassy slopes surrounding the DeMeester stage for concerts in the fall and spring, never paying for a ticket, although donations are appreciated.

The ensemble opens its spring series with a special concert on Sunday — which is Mother’s Day, in case you needed a reminder. They’ll pay homage to mom throughout the concert, which also features the premiere of “Sonoran Rivers,” a new work by local composer Yuanyuan Kay HE, with narration by Alison Hawthorne Deming.

The piece recounts the story of the Santa Cruz Watershed and its impact on the borderlands of Southern Arizona and Mexico over the centuries and fits with Dodge’s goal of presenting glimpses of Tucson and the region’s unique culture in every performance.

“We are always doing something new and different at each of our concerts, and this spring season is certainly no exception to that,” Dodge said.

In addition to “Sonoran Rivers,” Sunday’s concert features a performance by El Mariachi Tapatio de Tucson under the direction of Alberto Ranjel.

• May 18: Award-winning vocalist Katherine Byrnes, known as the “Golden Voice of Tucson,” will channel Carole King when she joins the orchestra to perform songs from King’s Grammy-winning sophomore album “Tapestry Album” (“It’s Too Late,” “I Feel the Earth Move”). Ballet Tucson also will join the orchestra to perform a new piece and a pas de deux
  • from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake.”
  • May 25: The Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus joins the orchestra for a Memorial Day concert that will feature a variety of patriotic favorites. The concert will mark the Boys Chorus’s finale with their longtime director Julian Ackerly, who retires in June after 45 years at the helm.

  This year, Tucson Pops is incorporating food into its events. The orchestra has tapped several food trucks to participate each week, including Sarge’s Cheesecake, Quesadillas & More, Colonel Mustard Hot Dogs, Pops Kettle Corn, Hawaiian Shaved Ice, Fiesta Filipina, Drew of Drew’s Dog and SAAFB Free Coffee Corner.