SHREWSBURY — When the combined eighth- and ninth-grade band takes to the stage next Friday, the musicians will be performing a piece written just for them.

The piece, "Shrewsbury Fair," is a three-movement piece written by composer and City University of New York music professor George Lam, that depicts different images from town. 

Lam composed "Shrewsbury Fair" in the fall of 2017 after working with the Oak Middle School students in two workshops in April, where he showed them how he develops a new piece of music based on different images. 

"It's a musical interpretation of a place," Lam said.  "I'm really excited to share it with the students and the community."

Lam, who will attend the performance, said that while he has been commissioned to write other pieces, this is the first time that he had written for a middle school band. 

"I had a lot of fun working with the students," he had.

The first movement is “General Ward Marches Home,” an imagined parade towards the Artemas Ward House on Main Street, followed by “Dean Park in Autumn.” The work concludes with “Quinsigamond Race Day,” a boat race on the lake.

"The second movement is slower, because it's autumn," Roma Khanna, an eighth-grade flute player, said.  "And the third movement is faster because it's a race."

As part of the creative process, Lam would send different versions of the piece to band director Anthony Uglialoro who rehearsed them with the students and then provided feedback to Lam. 

Uglialoro said that it will be the eighth- and ninth-graders playing the premiere of "Shrewsbury Fair," since those students were the seventh- and eighth-graders who worked with Lam during the workshops in April.  The Shrewsbury High School band is expected to play it during its spring concert as well.

Uglialoro said that he has known Lam for many years, and had been wanting to have a piece commissioned for the Oak Middle School band for some time. 

"Shrewsbury Fair" came about thanks to grants from the Shrewsbury Cultural Council and Shrewsbury Schools Music/Theater Association, which funded the cost of the workshops with Lam and the piece. 

The world premiere of "Shrewsbury Fair" will take place at 7 p.m. Jan. 26 in the Oak Middle School auditorium, with Lam in attendance.  In addition to the eighth and ninth grade band, there will also be performances by Oak Middle School Select Band, Shrewsbury High School Chamber Orchestra and Oak Middle School Select Choir. Snow date is Jan. 27.