Thursday 15 July 2004, at 8.00 pm

Loma Lina Academy
Symphonic Wind Orchestra

Philip Binkley (director)
Virgil Nielsen (organ)

Loma Linda Academy is a private secondary school in the city of Loma Linda, California, sixty miles east of Los Angeles. Operating under the auspices of the Southeastern California Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists, the school has an enrolment of 1,670 students. The Symphonic Wind Orchestra is the academy's select group of 92 student musicians, aged 13-18. Since 1986 they have taken six international concert tours, the most recent being a 2002 trip to Canada and a 1999 tour of France where they performed for international music festivals in Reims and Chartres as well as giving concerts in eight other cities. During its 2001 tour of the Washington DC area, the ensemble was invited to perform at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery. in 1995 it toured the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and Hungary where it performed at the World General Conference Session of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church and won a gold medal at the Munich International Festival of Music. In 1992 the orchestra was the first US high school wind orchestra to perform in the Goteburg International Music Festival in Sweden; it also gave concerts throughout Denmark, Norway and Sweden. In 1988 it was one of only ten North American concert bands selected to perform at the World Expo in Brisbane, Australia; it also gave concerts in seven other cities.

Philip Binkley has been director of the Loma Linda Symphonic Wind Orchestra since 1976, and also directs other four other preparatory groups as well as several small ensemble groups. Under his direction the Symphonic Wind Orchestra has made six international tours and performed in fifteen countries, not to mention many tours within the USA. He holds degrees from Andrews University in Michegan, University of Cincinnati and the College-Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, and has served as music director for several churches and various choral, orchestral and brass community musical organisations. In 1992 he was named Teacher of the Year by the Loma Linda Ares Chamber of Commerce, and has several times been selected by former students to be honoured in Who's Who Among America's Teachers.

Virgil Nielsen started piano at the age of six and organ at fifteen. He continued his studies at the Thayer Conservatory of Music, near Boston, where he received a BA in organ performance in 1977. He began medical studies at Loma Linda University that same year, and pursued postgraduate training at the University of California in Los Angeles. He has been practising internal medicine since 1987, but despite his busy medical schedule he remains an active musician, serving as an associate organist for the 6000-member University Church of Seventh-Day Adventists in Loma Linda. In addition, he is a trombonist with the Inland Empire Brass Ensemble. He has been organist and choirmaster for Roslindale Congregational Church, and organist for the Northborough Unitarian Church in Massachusetts and Highland Congregational Church in California.