OU Frosh Duo Teams Up For MUSICAL DELIGHT!

Trombonists William Balusik (Huntington HS ’19) and Madisyn Mason (Edison HS ’19) arranged Pavel Chesnokov’s “Salvation is Created” as a freshman project to start the spring semester at Ohio University. The intent was to pay homage to their fellow members of OU’s Marching 110.

Then came the coronavirus pandemic.

“I was a bit disappointed because I thought we’d never be able to perform this” Balusik wrote in a Facebook post. The piece, appearing to be shelved till the pandemic was over, came to life in a whole new way.

“Honestly, we did it kinda on a whim” Balusik told Litter Media, “over some fries, we decided we wanted to arrange this and it kinda came to be from there.”

The two music education majors took that conversation and ran with it. “William said that we should arrange ‘Salvation’ in a trombone quartet for the freshman trombone supply” said Mason, “but then I said, why don’t we just arrange it for the trombone choir, and then we can perform it with everyone instead of just us?”

Balusik and Mason also help to make up the 18 member OU Trombone Choir performing in the video.

Professor Lucas Borges jumped on board and the idea grew legs.

Balusik says the tweaking to his original score came when the decision was made to play the piece on line, a few adjustments had to be made, such as metronome settings for timing.

“I had to add a few measures near the beginning so we that we had a common time add a click track so that everyone could hear a metronome while it was going on” Balusik explained “and then separate all the parts so everyone could read their individual parts and record it themselves.”

The eighteen players then sent their recordings to OU grad student Calyton Yoshifuku (who also plays on the piece) for production with Sara May for the finished product.

The effort also meant something new, playing with headphones. “Oh, I hate it” said a chuckling Mason. “I tried to play with both earpieces on until one of my lessons with my professor, and he’s like ‘You know, you should move one to the side so you can hear your sound. But also, you can hear me speaking to you and hearing the recording that you’re making.’ So, it was a big adjustment for me.”

In the recorded interview, the two also reflect on their first year of participating in the Marching 110 and of their trip to Japan which was cancelled due to the world wide coronavirus pandemic.