We’re less than 10 days out from Christmas, and while it’s easy to get caught up in the hullabaloo of the season, I often find myself reflecting on achievements or “story arcs” from my life over the past year. This sort of introverted reflection helps me process and plan for the coming year. One unforgettable experience was working with retired National Symphony Orchestra oboist, Bill Wielgus.
Bill and I have played several concerts together; in his retirement, he has made it a point to travel and give as many recitals as he can. He commissions new works, works with composers from all over South America, revives works no one has ever heard of, and shares them all over the world. He is a true inspiration to me, a person who loves travel, music, and performing!
In the past 10 years or so, there has been a huge push in the classical music industry to represent the underrepresented. At the beginning of the year, I focused heavily on discovering Latin composers and making their often quite complex music more accessible by arranging their work for intermediate pianists. Another huge theme across classical music has been standing in solidarity with Ukraine, which led me to find the composer Theodore Akimenko.
Akimenko isn’t the most underrepresented composer — both Bill and another friend had heard of exactly one piece by him, Eclogue, Op. 12, written for cor anglais but sometimes transcribed for French horn. Despite having a fair amount of compositions for solo piano, I had never come across his name.
I began arranging a set of songs entitled Trois Danses Idylliques, Op. 35. The melody in the piano part is clearly outlined, so I took it and made it for solo violin with piano accompaniment. I had to be creative with textures, and included things like pizzicato, harmonics, and double stops. I would say there is a fair amount of interaction between the violin and piano, with both parts equally fun and challenging.
Totally unrelated (or so I thought at the time) Bill and I got together at American University to discuss an upcoming trip of mine to Uruguay. He has many musical contacts in Montevideo, and I was heading there last summer to visit a friend and was interested in meeting more musicians. Towards the end of our chat, he casually asked me if I would sightread a piano part for him. We popped into a practice room and read through a few pieces by Max Steiner. He told me he was headed to Brazil in a few months to play at a festival and was looking for repertoire.
I returned home and was working on engraving some arrangements when the idea popped into my head. Would the Trois Danses Idylliques work on oboe? I’ve never written for oboe, never played an oboe, never even touched an oboe! I emailed them to Bill, and he quickly responded, “these look nice, let’s read through them next time.”
What ensued was probably every composer’s dream: several sessions of playing, revising, and recording to come up with a new version of the Trois Danses Idylliques for Oboe and Piano. Bill expertly explained some things about writing for oboe that are probably very basic knowledge among those who play the instrument, but was extremely helpful for someone like me who specializes in piano and string instruments. At our last meeting, Bill said to me, “I always wanted to play Tchaikovsky, but he didn’t write anything for oboe.” If you’re in the same predicament as Bill, these pieces may just scratch that itch!
On November 26, Bill performed my arrangement of the Trois Danses Idylliques at a festival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which I think is the most lovely way to wrap up this story arc from 2025. And moving into 2026, I might just be arranging more music for oboe, especially if it is Tchaikovsky adjacent! I’ll leave you with a recording we made before his trip during a late night, middle of the week recording session, as well as our recordings of the Max Steiner pieces for your listening pleasure. Enjoy!