United Kingdom 4^th July 2008

Clicking here  opens the Tim-Pod which allows you to play this month's background music while you browse: L'homme Arme by Chris Marshall.

Many greetings from Leyland , UK – have a really productive second half of the year wherever you are and I hope that you will enjoy browsing this Homepage. I am off to Crete, celebrating my 70^th birthday with thirteen of the family (hope its not unlucky), so we shall investigate the dances of Crete and Knossos, the home of the Minotaur, featured below in the programme for Philharmonic Winds, Singapore, June 15^th, when we played Adam Gorb’s splendid Dances from Crete. You can watch our joint birthday performance with Chethams School here.

The logo alongside gives an idea of the sheer professionalism of the Philharmonic Winds, Singapore . An audience of nearly a thousand were present in one of the world’s greatest concert halls, Esplanade, Singapore, to hear a very taxing but enjoyable programme played at professional level. Wind concert reviews are so rare, that I have included that from the Straits Times in toto.

This Homepage is primarily about repertoire, and links to repertoire ideas, so happy browsing.

INDEX this month:

1 BROWSING LINKS   
2 TWO OUTSTANDING NEW SCORES: ORGANUM-TAMBURA & FAREWELL
3 RECENT PREMIERES
4 BRITISH AND EUROPEAN REPERTOIRE
5 FAREWELL TO DEPAUL UNIVERSITY AND DON DEROCHE
6 PHILHARMONIC WINDS
7 RNCM CONCERT NOTES
8 HORN CONCERTOS

1. BROWSING LINKS

WIND REPERTORY PROJECT  Over 500 scores presented with programme notes, errata, composer biographies, further reading

CBDNA BLOG Dozens of fascinating links about music, not all about band (I am not convinced about the newest blog entry – look instead at Simon Rattle and the  jazz viola.)

WIND BAND FM Wind music 24/7 and links for purchasing over 500 compact discs

Your links to the world of wind music:
 
                       

MARK CUSTOM RECORDS with the biggest selection of recorded wind music

SHATTINGER for wind ensemble and chamber music

JUST MUSIC for British music which you just cannot get from your local supplier 

2. TWO OUTSTANDING NEW SCORES

ORGANUM-TAMBURA By Jeff Myers    

FAREWELL by Adam Gorb

STEVEN STUCKY WRITES:  I have just heard a terrific new work for large wind ensemble, Jeff Myers's Organum-Tambura, premiered this year by the University of Michigan Symphony Band. Three movements, total 22'. I think it's just so original and compelling that all wind conductors owe themselves a look and listen! Jeff's data and downloads are easy to find at www.jeffmyers.info

ENGLISH PREMIERE OF FAREWELL 1^ST JULY

I wrote about Adam Gorb’s most recent work, Farewell, in the Homepage for 21^st May:

While Adam has scored enormous successes with his lighter works such as Yiddish Dances and Dances From Crete, Farewell represents a marked departure from his more populist works. This is stark tragedy – I talked to the National Youth Wind Orchestra of Wales about having recently seen a production of King Lear in Stratford, Ontario, performed with the passion of Grand Guignol, horridly realistic scenes of murder, (and I’ll swear it was real blood when they gouged out his eyes.) Musically Farewell  is incredibly strong, the first part characterized by a series of sharply defined fragments which gradually climax together, giving place to a bleak ostinato on horns or bassoons under more lyrical phrases in solo woodwind. There is a brief flourish of activity, with virtuoso reminiscences of a Klezmer Band, a return to the bleakness before both elements, and orchestras, join in an incredible Mahlerian climax, followed by a coda. I believe that the work takes the wind orchestra on a journey of tragic dimensions, and that this is an important a statement in tragedy for the wind repertoire as his two sets of dances are in comedy.

After another week of work on the piece, I am convinced that it is a major masterpiece, plumbing Mahlerian depths rarely explored in the wind repertoire.

3. PREMIERES

BRAZIL         
Toshio Mashima - Concerto for Marimba and Wind Ensemble, premiered by Makoto, State of São Paulo Symphonic Band, conductor Laszlo Marosi, June 13^th  
Contact Laszlo Marosi

HUNGARY     
Istvan Lendvay has been commissioned to write a large scale wind piece entitled Wind Symphony for Symphonic Winds.
Laszlo Marosi

JAPAN
Jonathan Newman – Climbing Parnsassus, Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra conductor Masuyuki Inagaki, 11^th April
music@jonathannewman.com

SINGAPORE
Zecharaiah Goh Toh Chai – Singapore Folk Tunes, commissioned and premiered by the American School, conductor Brian Wright
zechgoh@yahoo.com

SINGAPORE
Zecharaiah Goh Toh Chai – Symphonie Bombastique, premiered by Philharmonic Winds at Esplanade, conductor the composer, June 16^th.
zechgoh@yahoo.com

UK , LONDON
Kenneth Hesketh - The Gilded Theatre commissioned by National Youth Wind Orchestra, premiere, St John’s Smith Square , conductor James Gourlay, 10^th August 3.30.pm krhes@yahoo.com

UK, CHELTENHAM INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL
Joe Duddell – The Redwood Tree, Band of HM Royal Marines, Lympstone, conductor Major J A Kelly, 15 July 2008
info@schott-music.com

USA Various locations
Jonathan Newman – My Hands are a City, consortium commission expansion of The Rivers of Bowery premiered at CBDNA 2005 music@jonathannewman.com

USA ATLANTA
Jonathan Newman – Concertino for Flute, chamber winds and piano, Georgia State University Wind Ensemble.
music@jonathannewman.com

USA NEW YORK Carnegie Hall
Gregory Youtz – Concerto for Percussion and Wind Ensemble “The Five Changes”, Oregon State University Wind Ensemble, conductor Christopher Chapman, June 1^st. youtzgl@plu.edu

USA ITHACA New York State
Dana Wilson – Odysseus and the Sirens, Boynton Middle School Band, conductor Michael Allen
Wilson@ithaca.edu

WALES, CARDIFF
Christopher Painter – The Broken Sea, Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama Wind Ensemble conductor Tim Reynish 27 November
timreynish@tiscali.co.uk

ORGANUM-TAMBURA for Large Wind Ensemble (2007) 23'
[3picc,3fl,2ob,eng,clts:Eb,3Bb,bass,cbcl;2bsn,cbsn;4sax:SATB/
6hn,4tpt(+2picc),3trb,btrb;tba/timp;4perc(+CD playback)]

Organum-Tambura was written for the University of Michigan Symphonic Band . This piece is all about blurring the distictions between color, harmony and melody. Both organum (the practice of singing a parallel melody an interval above or below another given melody) and the tambura (Indian drone instrument) are evoked in this piece because these musical topics resonate with the idea that harmony, color and melody are on a continuum. Organum has harmony, yet it is functions like color because it moves in parallel motion, so it sounds like one line. It is a color/harmony-melody! The tambura also functions as a color, and plays a drone which is like a harmony, with an array of harmonics; yet, the way in which the harmonics sing, can be perceived as melodic as well 

Organum-Tambura ( link to complete premiere performance)
I. Organum
II. Tambura
III. "Mixture"

4. BRITISH AND EUROPEAN REPERTOIRE

I often get asked to name my favourite top works, and I usually escape by saying that the list is the present programme on which I am working. However, I recently browsed about twelve conducting seminars in the USA and Europe and found that not one had programmed any British music written in the past quarter of a century. I therefore made up twelve discs of repertoire for them to put in their resource section, and here they are, omitting dozens of other top ten works!

EDWARD GREGSON & DEREK BOURGEOIS

1      Gregson    Metamorphoses         Novello             10.54
2      Gregson    Celebration                Maecenas           6.40
3      Gregson    Benedictus                Novello               3.27
4      Gregson    Festivo                     Novello               5.13
5-7   Bourgeois  Symphony of Winds    HaFaBra            16.12
8      Bourgeois  Concerto for 3           Warwick            18.49
                       Trombones
9      Bourgeois  Metro Gnome            HaFaBra             3.12
10    Bourgeois  Greendragon             HaFaBra             7.15

BEDFORD – GREGSON – SPARKE –ELLERBY

1      Bedford   Sun Paints Rainbows   MusicSales        14.02
2      Bedford   Ronde for Isolde        MusicSales        9.02
2-4   Gregson    Sword and the Crown  Studio              15.23
5-8   Sparke      Four Norfolk Dances   Anglo               12.51
9-12 Ellerby      Paris Sketches          Maecenas          15.02  

GUY WOOLFENDEN

Gallimaufry                                                             13.50
Illyrian Dances                                                         10.07
Mocckbeggar Variations                                              6.55
French Impressions                                                  10.29
Celebration                                                             13.30
Divertimento for Band                                               9.59

All published by Ariel Music   www.arielmusic.co.uk

                                                   ADAM GORB

1                     Awayday                                           7.03
2                     Metropolis                                        14.25
3-5                  Downtown Diversions                         17.04
                       For trombone & ensemble
6                     Dances from Crete                            19.16
7 – 11              Yiddish Dances                                  16.22

All published by Maecenas                                                .

KENNETH  HESKETH & STEPHEN McNEFF

1      Vranjanka         Hesketh            Faber                 8.16
2      Masque             Hesketh            Faber                 5.54
3-5   Danceries          Hesketh            Faber                 9.29
6      Diaghilev dances Hesketh            Faber               15.10
7      Ghosts              McNeff             Maecenas          19.37  
8-11  Image in Stone  McNeff             Maecenas          16.51

COMMUNITY AND SCHOOL REPERTOIRE

Sunrise & Safari                     Adam Gorb            Maecenas   9.25
Catcher of Shadows                Philip Wilby            Music Sales 15.14
Tails aus dem Vood Viennoise    Bill Connor             Maecenas   21.27
Song of Lir                             Fergal Carroll         Maecenas   6.10
Blackwater                             Fergal Carroll         Maecenas   7.20
Saxophone Concerto               Michael Ball           Maecenas   15.47 

MAJOR SYMPHONIC WORKS 1

American Games        Nicholas Maw     Faber               20.51
Concerto for Trumpet Richard Rodney MusicSales
                              Bennett             1^st movement      8.58
                                                     2^nd and 3rd        11.04
Entrance; Carousing;  Robin Holloway   Boosey & Hawkes 28.15
Embarcation

MAJOR SYMPHONIC WORKS 2

1 Sowetan Spring       MacMillan          Boosey             10.41  
2 Palace Rhapsody     Sallinen             Music Sales        16.43
3-6 Journey through a
Japanese Landscape   Musgrave          Music Sales        23.08
7 Triumph                 Tippett              Schott              15.33

RECENT COMMISSIONS

Passacaglia                       Jackson           Maecenas    5.38
Elegy for Ur                      Roxburgh          Maecenas  13.57
L’Homme Armé                 Marshall           Maercneas 17.11
Resonance                        Marshall            Maecenas  12.58
5-7 Trumpet Concerto        Pütz                 Bronsheim 18.44

MISCELLANEOUS WORKS 1

1 Pageant of London          Bridge              Con Brio    17.09
2 English Dance Suite         Gardner            OUP          25.49
3 Plain Man’s Hammer        Dalby               MusicSales 14.42
4-8 Five Folk Songs            Gilmore            Maecenas  18.46

                              DANCES

1 Welsh Airs & Dances        Hoddinott          Denis Wick   8.58
2 Scottish Dances              Musgrave          Music Sales 10.16
3 Suite of English Folk Dances                    Tomlinson Music Sales       13.25
4-7 John Gay Suite             Orr                  Music Sales 15.08
8 Danse Funambulesque     Strens              HaFaBra    10.09
9-11 Winter Dances            Carroll              Maecenas    9.57
12 Dashing away with the
Smoothing Iron                 Basford            Maecenas    6.47

SOME MAJOR EUROPEAN REPERTOIRE

Per le Flor del lliri Blau                Rodrigo                      Piles   17.13
Danse Funambulesque                Strens                  HaFaBra   10.08
Concertango mvt 1                    Serrano                     Piles   11.10 
Meltdown                                 Putz                  Bronsheim   14.07
Concerto for Wind Orchestra       Lindberg                 Tarrodi   14.34

5. FAREWELL TO DON DEROCHE AND DEPAUL UNIVERSITY

For years, Don DeRoche has been recording an incredible range of repertoire for Albany ; while WASBE is lucky that he has become executive Director, we have lost a tremendous asset in this series. Check it out on Albany records. The latest disc includes

Fanfare for a Joyous Occasion                                               William Alwyn
Concerto for Flute and Eight Wind Instruments                          William Alwyn
Suite from Tiresias                                                         Constant Lambert
Eine Kleine Posaunemusik                                                  Gunther Schuller

6. A BREEZE TO ENJOY
By Chang Tou Liang  from the  Straits Times

AN EVENING WITH TIM REYNISH
The Philharmonic Winds
Esplanade Concert Hall/Sunday

CONCERTGOERS will soon realise that wind band music operates in a parallel universe far, far away from that of symphonic orchestral music. With the exception of transcriptions of orchestral masterpieces for wind (but seldom the other way around), never the twain shall meet. In spite of the humbler nature of wind bands, with their colliery and distillery origins, it was refreshing to note an audience for The Philharmonic Winds that far outnumbered that at the Singapore Festival Orchestra's fine performance the evening before. This despite all of the composers featured hardly ever appearing in the standard symphony orchestra's list of suspects One factor is the accessibility of many wind works. These are meant to be enjoyed, rather than admired by academics and then sequestered in a repository of forgotten works.  Veteran British wind conductor Timothy Reynish's programme provided an enjoyable mix of the unstuffy and unfamiliar.

Kenneth Hesketh's Serbian folk music-inspired Vranjanka delighted in its slow-fast dance rhapsody form, as did the Welshman Adam Gorb 's four-movement Dances From Crete, which captivated with infectious rhythms before closing with the celebratory smashing of china.

New Zealander Christopher Marshall 's U Trau, about some unattainable Utopia, gave a 58-member mixed choir a major role with rather banal lyrics sung in Niuspi, derived from Indo-European languages.

American David del Tredici's In Wartime sounded hardly warlike, but suggested an impending doom as the carefree pastoral opening worked its way from the hymn Abide With Me to the opening of Wagner's Tristan Und Isolde, before closing with a siren and dimming of house lights.

Through all this, The Philharmonic Winds was ever sensitive to conductor Reynish's directions, and its performers clearly enjoyed themselves in Luis Alarcon's Piazzolla-derived Concertango accompanying the rock-steady saxophonist Fabian Lim and a jazz trio.

The World Premiere of Zechariah Goh Toh Chai's Symphonie Bombastique, a musical caricature of Reynish on his turning 70, was an ironic portrait conducted by the composer.

The music, with its nonchalant swagger and wonderfully played riffs from various solo instruments, made a fitting tribute from one creator comfortable inhabiting both aforementioned parallel universes.

Such is the gift of versatility.

7. ROYAL NORTHERN COLLEGE OF MUSIC

1^st July RNCM Wind Ensemble

As with most wind concerts, this was not covered by the Press, so in line with previous Homepages, I am adding a few notes on my impression of the music. It was a tough programme to which the RNCM players responded magnificently.

Torso                      Michael Oliva

Starting with pianissimo bowed crotales, this fascinating soundworld rarely gets above triple pianissimo, and when it does, the effect is enormous. A mood tonepoem of about 6 minutes, for small ensemble – needs three piccolos and three soprano saxophones who enjoy crescndoing from nothing to ppp

Resonance                  Christopher Marshall

One of my favorite commissions, an Ivesian mélange of tiny motifs, held together by Wagnerian horns, emerging into a Methodist/Baptist hymn with variations which itself dissolves into birdsong.

Farewell                      Adam Gorb

I have no hesitation in saying that this is a masterpiece. It provides a dramatic, tragic journey for players and audience, and reaches a Mahlerian intensity.

Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum          Messiaen

An extraordinary work in which Eastern rhythms, South American birdsong and Western plainsong meet together in what is virtually an act of worship. There are misprints in the little crescendo in the second movement – there may be more.

8. TWO ADDITIONAL HORN CONCERTOS

Timothy Miles (milestim2@aol.com) writes:

I thought you may be interested in adding this to your list of horn concertos.  My graduate project at the University of New Hampshire was creating a wind ensemble version of Joseph Schwantner's Beyond Autumn: Poem for Horn and Orchestra.  My advisors for the project were Andrew Boysen, who did the transcription of Schwantner’s Percussion Concerto and Joseph Schwantner.  The University of New Hampshire Wind Symphony premiered the piece in November 2006 with myself conducting and Kendall Betts, formerly of the Minnesota Orchestra and current horn professor at UNH.  Schott has added the piece to their rental catalogue (however it has not appeared on their website yet). The piece is about 19 minutes long.

   Eduard Oertle Eduard.Oertle@t-online.de  writes:

Apart from the works for horn and band listed on your website, there is one piece that I could recommend: Boudewijn Cox "Adagio". It is available from Beriato and you will find a sound sample on their website (www.beriato.com).