Audition registration for the 2025-2026 Academic Year is currently open until September 1st, 2025. Audition information, including registration instructions and audition excerpts, may be found at this link. More information is available on the “Join Us” tab.
About Us
The Princeton University Wind Ensemble is Princeton’s only concert band. PUWE is entirely student-run and places an emphasis on superior musicianship, inclusivity, and musical community-building, offering a fun, lower-stress alternative to other large ensembles available to students at Princeton. PUWE rehearses once weekly in the Lee Rehearsal Room (on the forum level of the Lewis Center for the Arts) and regularly performs both in Richardson Auditorium and off campus.
PUWE currently programs 2 full concerts per school year, one at the end of each semester. In addition to these full performances, PUWE also sponsors 2 optional chamber music concerts per year where we feature self-formed student chamber ensembles. PUWE also plays off campus, including performances at music festivals and collaborations with other universities. Our repertoire ranges from classical concert pieces to movie and Broadway scores, with everything in between. Check us out on YouTube and Instagram to watch previous performances and stay up to date with upcoming events!
For more information or if you have any questions, please send us an email at puwe@princeton.edu, or reach out to any of our officers.
The Ensemble
The Princeton University Wind Ensemble, although officially founded in the fall of 1997, initially grew out of the long-standing band tradition cultivated by the Princeton University Symphonic Band, the now-defunct concert branch of the Princeton University Band. Following the Princeton Band’s shift in focus towards sporting events and evolution as a scramble band, the Princeton University Wind Ensemble was established to provide wind musicians on campus with a space to perform concert band repertoire at a high level.
Founded in 1997 by Rick Modica ’99 and reestablished in 2023 by Jacob Jackson ’26, Wesley Sanders ’26, Henry Freligh ’25, and Cas Royalty ’25, the Princeton University Wind Ensemble performs both traditional and modern concert band literature, with an emphasis on repertoire by underrepresented composers. Past programs have included works by a wide variety of composers, including Julie Giroux, Leonard Bernstein, Germaine Tailleferre, and Viet Cuong, as well as several undergraduate student composers.
This season, the Princeton University Wind Ensemble is thrilled to welcome Joe Bongiovi, director of bands at Princeton High School and director of the Philadelphia Jazz Orchestra, to the conductor’s podium!