Grammy winner returns home for Dover Steel Drum Band show
DOVER – A Grammy winner is coming home to Dover to perform with the unique high school band that helped get him started on a music career.
Josh Quillen, 1998 Dover graduate, won a Grammy last year in the Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance category with the group “So Percussion.”
On Sunday he will be a guest performer with the Dover Steel Drum Band at its annual Pantasia Concert at 4 p.m. in the high school auditorium.
Band Director Chris Redd says it’s amazing to think that Quillen, the director of the New York University Steel Band, got his Grammy-winning career started in Dover.
“Joan Wenzel founded the Dover Steel Band in the 1990s, and Josh played steel band,” Redd said. “Had Joan not founded this group, he probably never would have played steel pan and probably wouldn’t have gone on to play it professionally. I think it’s a real testament to the power of education and the impact that Joan had on the Dover music program.
“It is so neat to be able to say there is a Grammy winner from Dover who is playing professional percussion but also someone who has taken the steel pan and has made it his life. I think that’s such an amazing thing.”
Mount Union Band Director Jeff Neitzke will return as another guest performer. He and Quillen were college roommates. Redd calls him a phenomenal percussionist.
Neitzke introduced the Dover band to an arrangement of Prince’s “Purple Rain,” which the band now plays every year. It’s had a resurgence recently after being featured in “Stranger Things” on Netflix.
The Dover High School Steel Band will perform other annual favorites and arrangements by the two guest artists – including Amazing Grace and The Lion Sleeps Tonight.
Tickets for the 90-minute concert are 12 dollars for adults and 8 for students and seniors. They are available at the door.