COMPACT DISC REVIEWS
INDEX
French Classics  -  RNCM Wind Orchestra/ Reynish
Celebration  -  West Lothian Celebrity Winds/ Boddice
Whirr, Whirr, Whirr  -  University of North Carolina Greensboro / Locke
Ghosts  -  Philharmonia à Vent/ Boyd
International Wind Repertoire Project - Various/ Reynish

It is impossible to do more than navigate the tip of the iceberg of compact discs which pour out monthly from our colleges, schools and community bands. I listen out for discs which introduce new ideas on repertoire with works which perhaps eschew the usual formula and cliché of the wind repertoire. Four discs are recommended for September repertoire review which include pieces I would consider performing and which might throw up a work which could be useful for browsers.


CHAN 9897 FRENCH WIND BAND CLASSICS
Royal Northern College of Music
Conductor: Tim Reynish
Trombone: Joseph Alessi

Florent Schmitt                Dionysiaques                                                    10.57
Camille Saint-Saens         Orient et Occident                                              8.07
Eugene Bozza                  Children’s Overture                                            5.16
Darius Milhaud                Suite Française                                                 14.51
Hector Berlioz                 Grande Symphonie funebre et Triomphale         32.41 

Music Net rating:
            Performance     * * * * *
            Recording         * * * * *

Standard repertoire apart from the Bozza, a really great example of the wind orchestra series commissioned by Robert Boudreau for the American Wind Symphony, and the Saint-Saens which I think is a great original 19th century piece, both well worth exploring. 





CELEBRATIONS - WEST LOTHIAN CELEBRITY WINDS 
Conductor Nigel Boddice

CD1
Galloway Bouquet - John Maxwell Geddes
Cartoon - Thomas Wilson
Sirocco - Edward McGuire
Symphonic Ode - Peter Inness
The Wee Cooper of Fife - Cedric Thorpe Davie

CD2
Celebrations - Bruce Fraser
A Plain Mans Hammer - Martin Dalby
Lost mountain - William Sweeney
Portrait of a City - Alan Fernie

I am very happy to include this disc in my first web selection, not only because it features two of my favourite Scottish works, by Martin Dalby and Cedric Thorpe Davie, but because there is a link to an hilarious account of the funding, rehearsing and recording by conductor Nigel Boddice, in which he describes all of the repertoire in enthusiastic and affectionate terms. I hope that this disc is still available for anyone curious enough to track it down.

UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA GREENSBORO WIND ENSEMBLE
Conductor John Locke

The University of North Carolina continues to bring out more in their series of excellent repertoire recordings. This disc contains some excellent performances of very useful repertoire

WHIRR!!!, WHIRR, WHIRR
Ralph Hultgren has written some very useful music, but none more immediately attractive than the piece which gives the disc its title. This is a fast-moving moto perpetuo, which within less than three minute time-span even has time for an academic Australian fugue which erupts into a swinging tune very reminiscent of the second theme in Hesketh's Masque and an ebullient finale. Don’t play this if your players are digitally challenged, or cannot tongue quickly, but certainly add it to the very useful number of brilliant opening works which have been written recently. Emblems receives a very healthy performance under David Kish, played with a nice balance of pompous weight and light dexterity; pompous is the opening Fanfare in Julie Giroux's To Walk With Wings, but this dissolves into an episodic "Overture" section, a sequence of attractive brief events. Giroux has a nice way with her musical language which springs from the West coast studios and study with John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith. I often watch American films and wish that more composers of wind band music on both sides of the Atlantic could write as refreshingly for the concert hall as they do for the film studio, and she does. I think that this work is worth tracking down and playing.

Gloriosa is becoming one of our most important imports from Japan, and is here given a fine performance; some the odd discrepancy in ensemble in the brass interjections and the changes of pulse do not mar the general spirit, and the energetic sections received very committed performances. The Enigma Variations were a shock to the system; the theme for me was very much too slow in this scoring, and for the first time intonation was an issue, the old problem of flutes sounding flat, clarinets sharp. What was more worrying was the plethora of wrong notes, whether in the Slocum arrangment or this performance I know not. R.P.A. had very little of the grace and delicacy of most orchestra performances, some great playing in G.R.S. which works wonderfully; but for me Nimrod and the Finale just do not work. 

USEFUL NEW IDEAS
A well presented and played disc then, which you might be able to get via the University Band Office. Track down Giroux's To Walk With Wings if you are looking for an American piece which eschews most of the usual clichés.

POSTSCRIPT
Next time you wonder whether to bring out the Bernstein Candide yet again, think about composers from Australia, Switzerland or the UK for a change. I would highly recommend the following four works to open any concert if the band is good enough:

Whirr, Whirr, Whirr!!!                 Ralph Hultgren
Masque                                       Kennth Hesketh
Awayday                                     Adam Gorb
Toccata                                       Oliver Waespi

GHOSTS on Klavier K11150, available from Klavier Music Productions or any record shop.

In the same week that I learned of the withdrawal of my repertoire disc with the RCM Wind Orchestra of works by Sallinen, Roxburgh, Holloway, Bingham and Casken, I learned of the release of a disc with three of my commissions, so you win some and you lose some!

This is a terrific disc (I am biased of course), particularly for the very American up-front performances by Philharmonia à Vent conducted by John Boyd, and the incredibly informative and often very amusing sleeve-notes by Giles Easterbrook. One correction needs to be made at the outset; Giles claims to have been sitting next to me during the world première of Bennett’s Morning Music. Maybe he fell asleep during Hello Dolly and did not notice me slipping onto the podium to conduct the Northshore Concert Band.

In addition to a frustratingly short snippet of Gustav Holst, the disc contains three sets of variations which I commissioned over the past two decades. The Bennett I commissioned for the Boston WASBE in 1987, the Marshall for WASBE in Sweden in 2003, and the McNeff for a BASBWE Conference in 2002. It is good to hear Bennett’s Morning Music in another interpretation, clean and crisp, with some superb playing and careful controlled rubato and balance. I still believe that this is one of the finest works of the last twenty five years, closely constructed and argued, lyrical, wonderfully scored, lyrical and singable despite being basically a serial work.

Ghosts is a wonderfully inventive piece, a set of seven variations on a Haunting theme with an Epilogue. Written for school or amateur groups, the composer suggests disarmingly that you can leave any variations which are too difficult, and each stands alone – the result is a kind of wind band Enigma Variations. Here John Boyd’s approach pays huge dividends in the clarity and brilliance of articulation, emphasising the wit and spontaneity of this theatrical piece.

If Ghosts looks back in its characterisations to Elgar, L’Homme Armé is loosely built on the Symphonic Variations by Dvorak. Giles writes winningly of the political messages, the musical devices and the influences from jazz, Maori war chant and funeral march. Here I actually find the American approach unyielding and harsh. Those repeated jazz-inflected tags in the first variation I really do not need to hear hurled at me, though I suspect the composer prefers it to my laid back version. I loved the hazy ghosting in variation three, and there are fine solos throughout, especially here by alto saxophone and piccolo, later by euphonium and solo trumpets. The Haka lacks passion, it is too tidy and organised; John has probably never viewed the All Blacks’ war cry before they pummel the Brits into submission at rugger. In fact a lot of the playing is very tidy and accurate, so that sometimes we lose the phrasing and the line which are two of my obsessions. The Ländler movement is wonderfully played but to my taste lacks freedom and forward movement, with the 12/16 and the little Shostakovich march a little staid and pedantic, but it is fascinating again to hear a completely different interpretation.

My big caveat is over the canons near the beginning of the finale which I think only work in the tutti if everyone is showing a really vocal phrasing. That said, one can only sit back and admire the individual expertise of John’s handling of the sometimes dense orchestration and also his skill in managing those devilish time changes.

The new (to me) work on the disc is John Boyd’s expert transcription of Holst’s Capriccio, originally written for what Giles describes as a curious hybrid beast, half wind band-half orchestra, that was Shilkret’s radio orchestra……..not actually a wind piece…..more a basis for negotiation. Snippets of folk like material, of marches, reminiscences of Hammersmith and The Songs without Words make this a fascinating kaleidoscope of ideas, deftly woven into a too-short five minute piece.

This then is a first rate recording of three major works, all in variation form, easy yet intriguing listening, with a bonus of unknown Holst.

INTERNATIONAL WIND ENSEMBLE REPERTOIRE RECORDING PROJECT
by Frank Battisti 

What are human emotions? Not only lyricism, sadness, tragedy, but laughter
Dmitri Shostakovich

Volume 1 4949-MCD
UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY WIND ENSEMBLE/ REYNISH

Available from Tim Reynish, 62 Moss Lane, Leyland, PR25 4SH, UK, price £10.00
15 Euros or $15.00, including postage and packing.

Volume 2 5342-MCD
UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY WIND ENSEMBLE/ REYNISH

I know of no one who has as much dedication and passion for the development and expansion of an international wind band/ensemble repertoire than Timothy Reynish. During the past 2 decades he has been responsible for commissioning numerous new works from composers throughout the world as well as discovering and bringing recognition to forgotten works through his performances, CD recordings, articles and clinics. Since the advent of WASBE opportunities for making contacts with composers from throughout the world has lead to the development of wind band/ensemble literature which is much more diversified and broader in styles and scope than ever before.

To this end Tim has recently produced and issued the first two of a planned series of CDs featuring works by international composers. The first two CDs include works by composers from Belgium, Finland, New Zealand, Spain, Sweden, UK and USA. I feel confident in saying that many wind band/ensemble conductors will not be familiar with the works on these recordings.

LIVE IN CONCERT WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY WIND ENSEMBLE

VOLUME 1 (4949-MCD) contains music composed between 1930 and 2003. Samurai by Nigel Clark is a sharp-edged virtuoso piece, very energetic and rhythmic. Diaghilev Dances by Kenneth Hesketh is wonderfully impressionistic, elegant and at times, dramatic work – a miniature ballet, Hesketh’s homage to Diaghilev and the music he inspired. Danse Funambulesque by Jules Strens’ inhabits the expressive world of Florent Schmitt’s Dionysiasques. It is scored for the European instrumentation of the Belgian Guides/French Garde Republicaine Bands. Christopher Marshall’s L’homme Armé is based on the 15th century melody of the same name. It is a striking work with varied moods and colors. The Concerto for Winds and Percussion by world trombone virtuoso Christian Lindberg is a fresh, exciting, bold and outgoing work.

LIVE IN CONCERT WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY WIND ENSEMBLE

VOLUME 2 (5342-MCD) includes three works composed between 2000 – 2003 and one composed in 1934. Adam Gorb’s Dances from Crete is an infectious and brilliant work that will delight audiences and challenge players. Magnus Lindberg’s Gran Duo, already performed numerous times, mostly by symphony orchestras – only 4 performances by wind ensembles - is still relatively unknown in wind band/ensemble circles. Scored for the instrumentation used by Stravinsky in his Symphonies of Wind Instruments (plus a bass clarinet) it is a major work by one of the world’s leading composers. The music ranges in scope from large textural sound masses to chamber music like and solo passages. Laurence Bitensky’s Awake, You Sleepers is based on melodies and motives of traditional Jewish chant in which the trumpet soloist plays music that is free feeling and improvisational in style. This is a unique and wonderful addition to the concerto literature for trumpet and wind band/ensemble. Rodrigo’s Per La Flor del Lliri Blau, composed in 1934, is a romantic tone poem in the 19th century tradition. The character of the music encompasses energetic fanfare passages, tender melancholy melodies and large dramatic episodes.

Since the pieces on these CDs were all recorded during live concert performances, they are not always technically perfect. However, Reynish and his players create performances that are musically interesting, expressive and lively. Reynish’s International Wind Band/Ensemble Repertoire Project offers all wind band/ensemble conductors an opportunity to hear works that they might not encounter in their local/national professional environments.

Recordings of wind band/ensemble music such as found on these CDs would have been impossible 25 years ago. Let us rejoice and listen !!

All CDs in this International Wind Band/Ensemble Repertoire Series are available from Tim Reynish, 62 Moss Lane, Leyland, PR25 4SH, UK, price £10.00, 15 Euros or $15.00 US, including postage and packing. Email: timreynish@tiscali.co.uk