The LSU Wind Ensemble is the premier concert organization of the LSU Department of Bands and is comprised of the finest music major and non-major wind, brass, and percussion students at LSU.

Through the performance of a wide range of repertoire, the LSU Wind Ensemble provides an opportunity for students to thoroughly develop and refine their musicianship. The ensemble enjoys a rich history of collaborating with faculty soloists, composers, and guest artists from around the world, including a recent collaboration with GRAMMY-winning composer Michael Daugherty for a world premiere performance at the prestigious College Band Directors National Association Conference in 2019.

In addition to their regular series of on-campus concerts, the LSU Wind Ensemble has toured and performed at both regional and national music conventions. The LSU Wind Ensemble performs repertoire including original band works, chamber works, and selected transcriptions.

Equally skilled as a soloist, chamber, and orchestral violist, Kimberly Sparr has garnered praise for her versatility and virtuosity across the United States and beyond. She is a founding member of the Atlantic Chamber Ensemble and is the assistant principal viola of the Colorado Music Festival Orchestra.

As an orchestral violist, Sparr was the assistant principal violist of Virginia’s Richmond Symphony from 2008-13 and has performed with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, and the Washington National Opera, among others. Her festival participation includes the New Hampshire Music Festival; Tanglewood Music Center; the Verbier Festival Orchestra in Switzerland; the Festival Mozaic and Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in California; the Sarasota Music Festival; and the Lake George Music Festival in New York.

Sparr has appeared as a concerto soloist with the Amarillo Virtuosi, the Pittsburgh Civic Orchestra, the Texas Tech University Symphony Orchestra, the Colorado Music Festival Orchestra, and the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra.

An enthusiastic educator, Dr. Sparr has been on the faculties of Texas Tech University, The College of William & Mary, and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). She received her degrees from Rice University, New England Conservatory, and the University of Maryland. Her teachers include James Dunham, Daniel Foster, Heidi Castleman, Victoria Chiang, and Martha Strongin Katz.

Damon Talley serves as Director of Bands and the Paula G. Manship Professor of Conducting at Louisiana State University School of Music, where he oversees all aspects of the LSU Department of Bands, conducts the Wind Ensemble, and teaches graduate conducting. The nationally recognized Band Department at LSU serves as an integral component of the thriving School of Music.

Under his leadership, the Department has established an annual conducting symposium, high school, and middle school camps that serve hundreds of students annually, and numerous outreach events for public school educators. The Golden Band From Tigerland has been selected to present at national conferences on multiple occasions, and most recently, the LSU Wind Ensemble has been selected to perform at the CBDNA College Band Directors National Association National Convention.

Talley is a strong supporter and advocate of music in the public schools. He regularly serves as a guest conductor, clinician, and adjudicator throughout the United States and abroad, including appearances engagements in Germany, Switzerland, England, and Spain, among others.

Before his appointment at LSU, Talley held the position of Director of Bands at Shenandoah Conservatory, where he was responsible for guiding the wind band program, conducting the EDGE New Music Ensemble, and teaching graduate conducting. He has also taught on the faculties at The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Michigan. He has recorded on Best Classical Records and received favorable reviews from publications including Gramophone magazine and the American Record Guide. He has also served as producer or associate producer on commercial recordings by the Naxos, Klavier, and Equilibrium, record labels, and is published in the Teaching Music Through Performance in Band series, distributed by GIA Publications.

As an avid supporter of new music for the wind medium, Talley has conducted numerous world premiere performances and has commissioned composers to write for the wind band. He has won praise for his work from composers such as William Bolcom, Steven Mackey, Kevin Puts, Joseph Schwantner, David Maslanka, Donald Grantham, and Michael Daugherty, among others. He regularly hosts visiting composers of national and international status on the campus of LSU, and is a strong advocate for young composers, often premiering pieces by student composers.

Joel Puckett is a composer leaving both audiences and the press buzzing. His music has been described as “soaringly lyrical” (Minneapolis Star Tribune), “Puccini-esque” (Wall Street Journal), and “containing a density within a clarity, polyphony within the simple and––most importantly––beautiful and seemingly spiritual” (Audiophile Audition). Parterre Box recently proclaimed, “Puckett should be a household name” and the Philadelphia Inquirer’s David Patrick Stearns mused, “If the name Joel Puckett isn’t etched into your brain, it should be.” In 2011, NPR Music listed him as one of the top 100 composers under 40 in the world.

Hailed as “visionary” (Washington Post) and “an astonishingly original voice” (Philadelphia Inquirer), his music is performed by the leading artists of our day and is consistently recognized by organizations such as the American Composers Forum, BMI, Chorus America, National Public Radio, and the American Bandmasters Association.

Puckett’s music attracts diverse performers and listeners through its emotional energy and commitment. Melding tradition with innovation, his distinctive style grows from his power to create transcendent experiences using charismatic musical language.

The Fix, a grand opera commissioned by Minnesota Opera, premiered in March 2019 to packed houses, enthusiastic audiences, and largely effusive praise. With a libretto by Academy Award and Tony Award winner, Eric Simonson, the work depicts the rise and fall of the 1919 Chicago White Sox. It is a tragedy ripe with power, romance, and redemption, set against the backdrop of America’s favorite pastime. Puckett’s earlier commissions have been premiered and performed worldwide, to exuberant critical acclaim.

His double concerto for clarinet, flute, and orchestra, Concerto Duo, was premiered by the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra in 2012 when Puckett was Composer-in-Residence with soloists Anthony McGill and Demarre McGill. The Chicago Tribune’s John von Rhein praised the piece, saying that it “soar[ed] in intertwining dialogues, jazzy and lyrical, with shimmering waves of post-minimalism.”

His flute concerto, The Shadow of Sirius, premiered in 2010 and has received more than 200 performances and has been recorded multiple times, including 2015’s Naxos Surround Sound disc, “Shadow of Sirius,” which received a 2016 Grammy Nomination. Currently the Chair of Music Theory, Ear Training, and Piano Skills at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore where he has received a 2022 Johns Hopkins Catalyst Award, the 2022 Johns Hopkins Alumni Association Excellence in Teaching Award, and the 2021 Peabody Conservatory Student Affairs Mental Health Ally Award, Puckett presents workshops nationwide and frequently serves as an adjudicator at competitions for rising composers. His music is represented worldwide by Bill Holab Music.

Late one night before a long journey to see my ailing father, I thought of Merwin’s poem, "I wake in the dark and remember." I rolled over some of the phrases from the poem: "wake in the dark and remember," “rain journey,” and "listening to the black hour." Lying awake in the dark, listening to the rain, I thought about my father, our time together, and tried to remain grateful for the time we still have.