Austin Symphonic Band Performing Victory at Sea

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Austin Symphonic Band ( https://austinsymphonicband.org/ ). January 19, 2025. ASB performing Victory at Sea by Richard Rodgers (arr. Robert Russell Bennett). [NOTE: Click 'more' to read the program notes.] Music Director Dr. Kyle R. Glaser conducting. "Lest We Forget" concert at the Connally HS Performing Arts Center in Austin, TX.

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The 48-star American flag displayed above the band is provided courtesy of the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, Texas. While the history of this particular standard is unknown, it is of the 1912 design that flew until 1959, making it the longest-used design at the time.

Video and Sound Production: Eddie Jennings

From the program notes written by David Cross:

Victory at Sea - Symphonic Scenario (1954)
Richard Rodgers (1902-1979)
Transcribed for band by Robert Russell Bennett (1894-1981)

Program note adapted from Wikipedia and Program Notes for Band:

The documentary television series about naval warfare during World War II entitled Victory at Sea was originally broadcast by NBC in the United States in 1952 and 1953. It was condensed into a film in 1954. Excerpts from the music soundtrack, by Richard Rodgers and Robert Russell Bennett, were re-recorded and sold as record albums. The series, which won an Emmy award in 1954 as “best public affairs program,” played an important part in establishing historic “compilation” documentaries as a viable television genre.

The New Yorker Magazine describes the music as “a seemingly endless creation, now martial, now tremendously moving.” The symphonic sweep of Rodgers’s score captures the moods and variations of the panoramic war at sea in all its terror and beauty, and adds an elusive emotional dimension which neither camera nor words quite convey.

Rodgers’s music is greatly enhanced by the comprehensive arrangement of his long-time collaborator, Robert Russell Bennett. Bennett transformed 12 of Rodgers's 24 “themes” — Song of the High Seas (main theme), Submarines in a Calm Sea, Beneath the Southern Cross, The Guadalcanal March, The Sunny Pacific Islands, The Approaching Enemy, Death and Debris, The Hymn of Victory, Big Wave — into today’s symphonic scenario. Bennett also composed much more original material than Rodgers had, for which he received little credit.

Listen for
:
• Undulating woodwinds emulating the sea
• Sounds conjuring the images of ship’s bells and prowling submarines
• The return of the main theme