Spotlight: Denver Brass

Colorado ensemble Denver Brass recently concluded its 45th season as an organization. As part of its 46th season, the ensemble will release three new albums in the coming months as part of its Legacy Recording Project. We sat down with the ensemble’s executive director, Becky Wilkins, and the ensemble’s conductor/albums’ executive producer, Warren Deck, to talk about the ensemble’s projects.

Courtesy of Denver Brass

Jamie Lammers: How has Denver Brass been?
Becky Wilkins: It’s been really great. Of course, the last six years have been kind of strange as we’ve tried to figure out how to exist in this new post-pandemic world. How do we maintain relevancy with audiences coming out of that period? We’ve had to do a lot of convincing that no, there really is nothing quite like being in a concert hall listening to live music performed by real people and having that joint experience with other people. We’ve always been very committed to telling people that music is a healing, uplifting experience; if you come to a Denver Brass concert, you’re gonna leave in a much better mood; and it’s gonna be one of the best uses of your time.
Warren Deck: The other thing that’s fun about it is there’s an Evel Knievel factor of live music, and that is: Is it gonna hang together? Is he gonna make it? Is this hard lick gonna get played? There’s just some fun in the unknown factor about live music; anything can happen. It can be awesome; it can be awesomely terrible, in which case, “I was there, I heard that!” If you’re at a live event, you come out, and you think, “Wow, I was just glad I was there.” There’s just something about experiencing any kind of event with a community, because you can walk out and talk to somebody, the person sitting next to you, and this conversation arises about it. You don’t get that if you’re just sitting there in front of your television at home.

Jamie: How have you guys tried to bring people to the live shows?
Becky: We really try to set in on a really engaging concert title and concept. We try to paint this picture to really make people go, “Oh, that sounds like something interesting that I want to experience,” people who know who we are and people who don’t know what Denver Brass is. When Denver Brass started, it was a strictly classical ensemble, and we realized that’s not a good fit for both the musicians and the audiences. Our group plays jazz, Latin, Celtic, Caribbean – you name it, we’ve probably done it.
Warren: Also, we try to make it an immersive experience when you’re there. There’s sometimes a visual component to it. The March concert has bagpipes and dancers; the December concert usually has a couple of vocalists; we’ve had some sing-alongs – (we try to) bring some level of audience participation, again, something you wouldn’t get sitting at home.

Courtesy of Denver Brass

Jamie: What’s most exciting about the upcoming projects?
Becky: We haven’t produced an album since 2020. That recording very quietly got finished and released, and there wasn’t much fanfare. These three albums are really exciting because of where the group is right now artistically and historically. For us to have one singular album comprised of pieces written just for our group is, I think, a milestone achievement for us. We haven’t done a Christmas album since 2011; we have an original Christmas tune and piece for Hanukkah on that album as well. Both of these albums are really showcasing just how far we’ve come in 45 years, and the playing is just incredible. The last album, the working title is Sketches of Courage because of the piece, the anchor of that album, written by our trumpeter Sean Schafer Hennessey. The piece is based off of a sketchbook that he found from his grandfather, who fought in World War II in the 30th Infantry Division. He died young from complications of PTSD, so Sean found this sketchbook, and it became this reckoning of how to process not knowing his grandfather, what his grandfather went through.
Warren: Sean’s piece is 26 minutes long, it has a narration, and it’s very poignant. The piece speaks to so many communities. It speaks to veterans. It speaks to anybody who cares about American history. It speaks to the Jewish community because they broke up concentration camps and rescued prisoners who were emaciated, and he saw all of that firsthand, and the PTSD community; it just speaks to so many people. It ends with a psalm that speaks to his experience. I won’t quote it. I’ll just say there’s a benediction at the end, and it includes this psalm that he had underlined in his Bible. It’s really a very, very moving piece.

Courtesy of Denver Brass

Denver Brass will celebrate the all-original album “Elevated Masterworks” and the holiday album “If You Just Believe” on Tuesday, July 21st, at 7:30 p.m. with a free album release concert at the Newman Center for the Performing Arts. The album featuring “Sketches of Courage” will be released in 2027.

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