American composer Roger Cichy wrote the Divertimento as a tribute to three American composers who had incorporated elements of jazz into their music: Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein and George Gershwin. He used the musical notes C (Copland), B (Bernstein) and G (Gershwin) to form the nucleus for much of the thematic and harmonic material in this work; these three notes are dominant in three of the four movements. Cichy, who is a music educator as well as composer and conductor, wrote this work originally for the Des Moines Symphony Orchestra; it was re-orchestrated for concert band and premiered in 1994 by the Iowa State University Band. --James Huff 23:50, March 25, 2007 (EDT) (from the program notes of The Claremont Winds, submitted with permission)