CANTON -- St. Lawrence University’s Wind Ensemble will perform a concert, titled “Anniversaries: Band Music for Celebration and Remembrance,” at 2 p.m on Sunday, Dec. 9, in Peterson-Kermani Performance Hall. The performance is free and open to the public.

Some of the “anniversaries” celebrated will include three centennials: The ensemble will perform “West Side Story Medley” by the iconic American composer Leonard Bernstein, who was born in 1918. That same year marks the end of World War I, and the group will play “The Vanished Army” by Kenneth Alford. This poetic march was dedicated to the memory of the first 100,000 soldiers who perished in the war.

For music-lovers, 100 years ago saw the premiere of English composer Gustav Holst’s entire seven-movement suite, “The Planets,” a powerful and exciting work popular to this day with bands and orchestras as well as with audiences world-wide. The Wind Ensemble will perform the first movement of the suite, “Mars.”

Celebrating a bicentennial this year is the famous carol “Silent Night,” which was first performed on Christmas Eve in 1818 at St. Nicholas parish church in the small town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg, Austria. Organist Franz Xaver Gruber composed the music to lyrics by Joseph Mohr. Julian Bond’s arrangement, “Fantasia on Silent Night,” is a beautiful, sensitive rendition that uses contemporary harmonies and shows off the full palate of colors available to a wind band.

Other music on the program includes two smaller anniversaries: Leroy Anderson’s beloved “Sleigh Ride,” written 70 years ago, and “St. Lawrence Chronicles,” composed just 10 years ago by David Eastmond. Rounding out the program will be Franco Cesarini’s “Greek Folk Song Suite” and the Celtic-flavored “Sòlas Ané” by Samuel Hazo.

The St. Lawrence University Wind Ensemble is comprised of students, faculty and staff as well as players from the community. This will be Theresa Witmer’s first concert as the group’s new director.