Dr. Jerry Owen is the Alma A. Turechek Professor Emeritus of Music at Coe College, having retired from a 38-year-long teaching career in 2006. Holding a Ph.D. in composition (University of Iowa, 1974) he also holds a B.M.E. from the University of Evansville and M.M. in composition from DePauw University. His principal composition teachers have been Donald H. White, Richard Hervig, and Peter Tod Lewis. In addition to conducting the Coe College Symphony Orchestra, he directed the music theory and composition area at Coe.
Dr. Owen is the founder of the Composer-in-residence position with Red Cedar Chamber Music and served in that capacity from 2002-2005. He was Composer-in-residence and founder of the residency program with the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra (now Orchestra Iowa) from 1984-1992. His music has been recognized with many awards and special performances, including Pulitzer Prize and Grawemeyer Prize nominations, and two full-length Iowa Public Television specials devoted to his symphony, Dances of the Mind, and to his Concerto for Piano and Orchestra. His 2015 Sonatina for Piano won national competitive honors with the Music Teachers’ National Association. His music has been performed throughout the United States and in many countries in Europe and South America. Among his many commissions for new works are those by the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Iowa, Coe College, Mount Mercy College, the Iowa Composers Forum, Red Cedar Chamber Music, The Iowa String Teacher’s Association, and the Cedar Rapids Concert Chorale, among others. He has released three full-length compact discs of his music nationally. Videos of many of his compositions can be seen and heard on his YouTube channel.
“Towering Oaks” is a tone poem for orchestra commissioned by Orchestra Iowa, Timothy Hankewich, Music Director, on the occasion of the Orchestra’s 100th Anniversary Season. It is a celebration of the Orchestra’s commitment to the performance of great music, its endurance while championing the highest artistic standards, and its superb resilience in the face of such events as The Great Depression, a World War, the tumult of the 1960’s, a Great Flood, and the mighty winds of a derecho.
The opening timpani cadenza becomes a pathway to several “sound towers” (which are just the towering oak trees in musical disguise!). The bold fanfare led by the brass declares the majesty of the orchestra and its place among the Towering Oaks. Surely, this Orchestra, having survived a tumultuous century, stands as tall as any among the resilient and splendid giants of the forest - a metaphor for fortitude and beauty. Following the Orchestra’s fanfare theme are themes for three kinds of oak trees familiar to us here in Eastern Iowa: black, white, and red, each introduced by a single chime tone. First, the Black Oaks of Wanatee Creek are presented in the warm, dark colors of the brass instruments. Next, the English horn offers the theme of the White Oaks of Indian Hill. The third, the Red Oaks of Bever Woods, is introduced by the flute and violins over a dancing rhythmic background. These four themes weave their ways into a musical tapestry that culminates in their joining together in a heroic fugue and rousing coda that recalls the orchestra’s fanfare and the opening timpani cadenza.
Notes by Jerry Owen