[photo compliments of Mike Lawler]
The Vermont Wind
Ensemble performs several on-campus concerts each year and has
also performed throughout Vermont and the Northeast.
Repertoire is chosen from band "classics" like the Holst suites,
newer works, and pieces from as far back as the Renaissance.
Click here for
recent programs.
Each student takes a
yearly audition for seating. Wind Ensemble audition information.
D. Thomas Toner is a Professor
in the Department of Music at the University of Vermont, where he
conducts the Concert Band, Wind Ensemble, and Percussion Ensemble,
teaches percussion, and was Chair of the Department for over ten
years. Previously on the faculties of SUNY Fredonia,
SUNY Plattsburgh, and the Summer Session of the Eastman School of
Music, Dr. Toner was awarded both the Doctor of Musical Arts
degree and the Performer's Certificate from the Eastman School of
Music, a Master of Music degree and Artist Diploma from the Yale
School of Music, and a Bachelor of Music degree from the
University of Massachusetts/Amherst. As a percussionist, Dr.
Toner's eclectic career has included performances with the
Clifford Ball Orchestra (for the rock band Phish), before Princess
Grace and Princess Caroline of Monaco, at a world music festival
in Bali, Indonesia, and with a native troupe in a performance in a
torrential lightning storm in Ghana, West Africa. A
frequent substitute percussionist with the Rochester Philharmonic
Orchestra while studying at Eastman, he has also appeared with the
Moscow Chamber Orchestra, the Massachusetts Chamber Players, the
Bermuda Philharmonic, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, the New
Hampshire Music Festival, and many other ensembles in the
northeast. Dr. Toner joined the Vermont Symphony Orchestra at the
age of 18 and became Principal Percussionist a few years
later. He has performed a wide variety of music with
the VSO, including most of the standard orchestral repertoire,
unusual 20th Century pieces (such as the solo snare drum part in
Carl Nielsen's Clarinet Concerto with soloist Richard Stoltzman),
and "Pops" music with the likes of Peter, Paul, and Mary, and Tish
Hinojosa (where he played drum set, congas, and hand
drums). Dr. Toner is an endorser of Grover Pro Percussion, Sabian Cymbals, and Vic Firth Percussion.
An active guest conductor, Dr. Toner is one of the few people to
have conducted the Vermont All-State Band, the Vermont All-State
Orchestra, and all six of the District Wind Ensembles in Vermont
(most of them multiple times). In addition to his work
in Vermont, he has conducted and adjudicated in New Hampshire and
Massachusetts, has been a judge since the inception of the ENKOR
International Music Competition, and has conducted the New
Hampshire All-State Percussion Ensemble four times. Dr. Toner has
also appeared as guest conductor of the Yale Concert Band, the
SUNY-Fredonia Percussion Ensemble, the Green Mountain Mahler
Festival Orchestra, and was a co-presenter at the Eastern
Conference of the College Band Directors National Association.