Brevard Symphonic Winds
Kraig Alan Williams, conductor
Brevard Concert Orchestra
Keith Lockhart, conductor
GUSTAV HOLST Ballet Music from The Perfect Fool
MICHAEL DAUGHERTY Lift Up Thine Ears
SERGEI RACHMANINOFF Symphony No. 2
Brevard’s exceptional high school ensembles take the spotlight under conductors Keith Lockhart and Kraig Alan Williams in a program of dramatic scale.
Music by Holst and Michael Daugherty opens the evening, culminating in Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2, celebrated for its lush lyricism and soaring Romantic expression.
Kraig Alan Williams
Director - Brevard Symphonic Winds
Dr. Kraig Alan Williams is currently the Director of Bands, Associate Professor of Music and Director of the Wind Studies Program at the Mason Gross...
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Dr. Kraig Alan Williams is currently the Director of Bands, Associate Professor of Music and Director of the Wind Studies Program at the Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University. His duties include the artistic guidance of the Grammy-nominated Rutgers Wind Ensemble and administration of all aspects of a large, dynamic and comprehensive university band program. Other responsibilities include teaching graduate and undergraduate conducting and the mentoring of Master’s and Doctoral students in Wind Studies.
Maintaining an active schedule as a guest conductor, clinician and lecturer, Williams has appeared in those capacities in more than 15 states and with such prominent ensembles as the Dallas Wind Symphony and The United States Air Force Band. Williams has led highly acclaimed concerts before the College Band Director’s National Association Southern Regional Conference (2006, 2010), Tennessee All-West Concert Band Festival (2005), the Mid-South Low Brass Conference (2007) and the Mid-South Horn Conference (2009). His wind ensemble was featured in several Mid-South Imagine Contemporary Music Festivals featuring the works of such noted composers as Joseph Schwantner, George Crumb, JamesMobberley, Armando Luna, Hasan Ucarusu, Eric Whitacre, Michael Daugherty and David Maslanka.
Prior to arriving at Rutgers, Williams served as the Director of Bands at University of Memphis (2003-2011); conductor of the Duke University Wind Symphony and director of the Duke in Vienna program (1997-2000); director of bands and chamber ensembles at California State University, Los Angeles (1993-1996); assistant conductor of Southern California Inland Empire Symphony and Los Angeles Solo Repertoire Orchestra in Burbank, and music director of the Lake Elsinore Civic Light Opera (1990-1993).
Williams has conducted performances in Graz, Budapest, Malta,Marktoberdorf, and Prague. He has performed in Carnegie Hall, conducted live radio broadcasts on National Public Radio and has recorded for Mark Records and ADK in Prague, Czech Republic. A project featuring the wind music of Eric Ewazen will be released on Albany records in 2011.
Williams received his doctorate from The University of Texas at Austin, where he studied with Jerry F. Junkin. He received a Master’s of Music degree in performance from California State University, Northridge. Williams is a member of CBDNA, TMEA, and is a sponsor and honorary member of the Memphis chapters of Kappa Kappa Psi and Tau Beta Sigma.
Williams joined the conducting faculty at the Brevard Music Center in 2001 and was named Director of Band Activities in 2008. He has regularly achieved critical acclaim for his work with the Symphonic Band and Chamber Winds.
Ken Lam
Resident Conductor
Ken Lam is director of orchestral studies at The Tianjin Juilliard School and resident conductor of the Tianjin Juilliard Orchestra. He is artistic adviser to...
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Ken Lam is director of orchestral studies at The Tianjin Juilliard School and resident conductor of the Tianjin Juilliard Orchestra. He is artistic adviser to the Illinois Symphony Orchestra, resident conductor of the Brevard Music Center in North Carolina and serves as artistic director of Hong Kong Voices.
Lam was music director of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra from 2015 to 2022 and music director of Illinois Symphony Orchestra from 2017 to 2022. Previously, Lam also held positions as associate conductor for education of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, assistant conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and principal conductor of the Hong Kong Chamber Orchestra.
In 2011, Lam won the Memphis Symphony Orchestra International Conducting Competition and was a featured conductor in the League of American Orchestra’s 2009 Bruno Walter National Conductors Preview with the Nashville Symphony. He made his US professional debut with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in June 2008, as one of four conductors selected by Leonard Slatkin. In recent seasons, he led performances with the symphony orchestras of Cincinnati and Cincinnati Pops, Baltimore, Detroit, Buffalo, Memphis, Hawaii, Brevard and Meridian, as well as the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Seungnam Philharmonic, Guiyang Symphony, and the Taipei Symphony Orchestra.
In opera, he directed numerous productions of the Janiec Opera Company at Brevard and was assistant conductor at Cincinnati Opera, Baltimore Lyric Opera and at the Castleton Festival. In recent seasons, Lam led critically acclaimed productions at the Spoleto Festival USA, Lincoln Center Festival and at the Luminato Festival in Canada. His run of Massenet’s Manon at Peabody Conservatory was hailed by the Baltimore Sun as a top ten classical event in the Washington D.C/Baltimore area in 2010.
Lam studied conducting with Gustav Meier and Markand Thakar at Peabody Conservatory, David Zinman and Murry Sidlin at the American Academy of Conducting at Aspen, and Leonard Slatkin at the National Conducting Institute. He read economics at St. John’s College, Cambridge University and was an attorney specializing in international finance for ten years before becoming a conductor.
Lam is the 2015 recipient of the Johns Hopkins University Alumni Association’s Global Achievement Award, given to individuals who exemplify the Johns Hopkins tradition of excellence and have brought credit to the University and their profession in the international arena.