Category Archives: Uncategorized

Fall 2021

Posted on September 1, 2021 by macdonaldp

Fall 2021 semester is off to a great start. We’ve started rehearsing our contemporary percussion ensemble music, with pieces by Philip Glass, Baljinder Sekhon, Michael Colgrass, and many more. The students are digging into their parts and working hard on … Continue reading →

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New Videos

Posted on April 9, 2021 by macdonaldp

We’ve been busy this semester learning cool music and performing it and recording it. Check out this video of Kyong Mee Choi’s amazing “A New Earth”:

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New year, new projects!

Posted on January 12, 2021 by macdonaldp

2021 is looking great for WP Percussion. We’ve got some great repertoire planned, a whole new recording project, and as always a wonderful group of students, faculty, and alumni, all participating and working together. We also just loaded up a … Continue reading →

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Three Weeks, Three Festivals

Posted on February 25, 2020 by macdonaldp

Busy days for us here at WP Percussion. In the last three weeks we’ve performed at the New Jersey Music Educator’s Conference in Atlantic City, the Necessary Noise Festival in Rahway, and the Verona Day of Percussion. Our students played … Continue reading →

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Busy semester coming up . . .

Posted on January 22, 2020 by macdonaldp

Spring 2020 will be a great semester. We’re performing at NJMEA, the Necessary Noise Festival, and the Verona Day of Percussion. We’re also starting to lay down tracks for our next recording, featuring music from the 1930s. We’re going old … Continue reading →

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Memorizing Mallet percussion music

Posted on April 10, 2019 by macdonaldp

New blog post about memorizing mallet percussion music. Check it out! https://paytonmacdonald.com/2019/04/10/memorizing-mallet-percussion-music/

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Future, Present, and Past

Posted on April 7, 2019 by macdonaldp

Last night I attended the Wayne Valley High School music. It was great to see several of our WP alums up there playing trumpet and conducting (Gabe Batiz runs the band program at Wayne Valley and he’s a WP alum). … Continue reading →

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WP Percussion at the NJMEA conference

Posted on March 29, 2019 by macdonaldp

We recently made an appearance at the New Jersey Music Educator’s Area conference in East Brunswick. As usual, our WP Percussion students performed beautifully.

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Florida in January

Posted on February 3, 2019 by macdonaldp

A few weeks ago a group of WP percussion students traveled to Tampa, Florida to perform on the McCormick Marimba Festival, hosted by University of South Florida and Robert McCormick. The students played music by Guimera, Jarvis, MacDonald, and Bishop. … Continue reading →

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NJPE at PASIC!

Posted on November 17, 2018 by macdonaldp

The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble is a professional group in residence at WP and we’re delighted to be performing at PASIC this year with the legendary, four-time Grammy winner frame drum master Glen Velez. We’ve got a Showcase Concert at … Continue reading →

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