Tonight will bring several parking problems to the Iowa State Center’s Stephens Auditorium and Hilton Coliseum because of two major musical events — Elton John’s concerts and the Iowa State music department’s “Celebrate America.”

For the past six months, the music department has been planning “Celebrate America,” a tribute to American music encompassing seven departments and approximately 200 people within the music department, associate professor of music Jeff Prater said.

“It’s very up-tempo family programming,” Prater said. “It’s fast-paced and educational. There will be a narrator there to explain [the music].”

The “voice of the Cyclone marching band,” Bob Lindemeyer, will be the emcee for the event.

“I’ll try to provide a little edu-tainment,” Lindemeyer said. “I’ll give background information on the composers and introduce the performers.”

It’s going to be a “potpourri” evening “with diverse programs, different types of music and genres and a movement between small and large groups,” he added.

From jazz to showtunes to concert hall classics, the different departments will be representing the different types of American music. The evening will begin with “Off the Record,” the ISU Jazz Choir composed of eight singers each on their own microphone and “concentrating on harmony,” director Sheryl Monkelien said.

The group will be performing “Stella by Starlight” and “I’ll be Seeing You.”

The ISU Orchestra will follow the jazz choir. Directed by Kirk Smith, the 60-member orchestra will perform the American folktune “Shenandoah, I Long to Hear You.”

“[This song] is truly an example of amazing American music,” Smith said.

“The concert as it is intended will be of great service to the community, and I am very excited for it,” he added.

The performance will change from folk to Stephen Foster ballads when director Carl Bleyle leads his group of vocalists to the stage.

“People won’t get bored,” Jennifer Porto, a sophomore in vocal music performance, said. “It’ll keep going and has a wide range of attractions.”

Porto and three others will be performing music from Foster’s “American Dreamer.” Faculty duo-pianists Sue Haug and Susan Flaskerud will follow the vocalists with three piano pieces by Louis Gottshalk and the “king of ragtime,” Scott Joplin. The pieces include “Pineapple Rag,” “The Banjo” and “Arkansas Traveler.”

Director Robert Molison will then lead the Oratorio Chorus with choral selections from John Williams’ “The Empire of the Sun” and two selections from Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide.”

“It will be extremely exciting and invigorating,” Molison said.

One of the pieces, “Exultate Justi” [from the Empire of the Sun] translates into “Let the Riteous Rejoice.”

“The piece is heard in the mind of a little boy who is a prisoner in a camp during WW II,” Molison said. When he finds that the war is over, this is the song that goes through his mind.

Performing music from the Civil War and Revolutionary War eras will be the ISU Flute Ensemble, directed by Elizabeth Sadilek, and the ISU Percussion Ensemble, directed by Barry Larkin.

Music will include “Yankee Doodle,” “Reveille-The Three Camps,” “The Quick Scotch,” “Garryowen” and “Dixie.”

Ending the evening will be the ISU Jazz Band, directed by James Bovinette, which will perform George Gershwin’s “Strike up the Band” and Chuck Mangione’s “Land of Make Believe.”

The jazz band will be joined by Monkelien in a solo and “Off The Record” will also make another appearance with the jazz band for “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.”

After six months of planning this event, the music department has had another factor fitting into their evening — Elton John is coming to Hilton Coliseum, which seems to stir mixed reactions between the directors and the students.

“Everyone was disappointed,” and a little angry, Porto said. “It’s too bad it’s the same time as our show because it takes publicity away form us.”

The music department put in a lot of time just to be told “somebody really big is going to come and take some of your audiences away,” she added. “[He’s] a huge name and people will want to go see him more than their fellow students.”

“The crowd will be different,” Kelsey Hanrahan, a junior in music and English, said. “It will be different in that people who would normally come to this concert may choose to go to Elton John because we put on several a year and he [performs] sporatically.”

The choice to schedule Elton John on the same evening as “Celebrate America” was not necessarily the choice of the Iowa State Center.

According to advertising and promotions coordinator Sara Huber, these decisions usually are made by the artists’ publicist.

The Iowa State Center’s publicist gives a list of open dates, and the artists’ publicist decides which will work best for them. The Iowa State Center also gives a schedule of what else in happening in Ames on their open weekends, Huber said.

“Unfortunately, other events sometimes get overlooked by the artists,” Huber said. “This date worked best for him [Elton] because he is coming from Moline, Ill.”

“I don’t feel it will be a problem,” Prater said. “And I wish the people the very best for those who were lucky enough to get Elton John tickets.

“However, most people will be coming from places like Des Moines and Kansas City, and that is not the audience we are trying to reach,” he added.

“We want ISU students and people from the Ames community.”

“When an international pop star says he wants to do a performance in a town on a night, there’s nothing you can do about it,” Monkelien said. “Besides, we were here first.”

The over-riding problem of the evening will be parking, Prater said.

“Get there early,” he added.

“Celebrate America” will be performing at Stephens Auditorium tonight at 7:30 p.m.

Tickets are $5 for ISU students and $8 general admission and are available at the door.