Composition of the Week

#131– January 24, 2022 I. Movement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WClAlrGTbw8 II. Movement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DFcvinJg0Y Musica Boema by Czech composer Zdeněk Lukáš is our Composition of the Week. Musica Boema was commissioned in 1977 by Joel Blahník for Stanley DeRusha, who premiered the work with the Michigan State University Wind Symphony on December 11, 1978, at the CBDNA Conference. An earlier work by Lukáš written in 1966, Sonata Concertata for Piano and Symphonic Band, Op.49, was also premiered in the same program. Musica Boema is scored for winds, brass, harp, xylophone, and glockenspiel and cast in two movements. It has a duration of 18 minutes. It [...]

#130– January 17, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff9nGZuaijQ “Skating on the Sheyenne” by American composer Ross Lee Finney is our Composition of the Week. The work was completed in April 1977 after a commission of the Brooklyn College Band. It was premiered by this ensemble under Dorothy Klotzman, on May 20, 1978. “Skating on the Sheyenne” reflects several 20th-century compositional techniques, including rhythmic retrograde, aleatory as well as extended tonality. At the same time, depicts images associated with the Sheyenne River in wintertime. The river runs through Valley City before flowing north to Hudson Bay. It usually freezes each year before the first snowfall, [...]

#129– January 10, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WG7f8A34b5M Le Cortège du Roi Renaud, for Double Wind Quintet, by Swiss composer and conductor Franco Cesarini is our Composition of the Week. Le Cortège du Roi Renaud was originally written for a full-wind orchestra in 1999 and would be later rearranged for double wind quintet by the composer. This is the version we are presenting to you. It is a short suite in five movements based on tales that originated in southern European folk songs, dating back as far as the 16th century. A large portion of these songs refer to the French poetry “complaintes”, which [...]

#128– January 03, 2022 photo by Charlie Grosso https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_mp9btuj3A In this, our first publication for the new year 2022, WASBE wishes to convey to you its most sincere wishes for peace and serenity. May today, more than ever, the possibility of making music together help us to treasure the importance of sharing meaningful moments with musicians, colleagues, and friends in live concerts. Lux Perpetua, by American composer and conductor Frank Ticheli, is our Composition of the Week. Winner of the 2021 NBA/William Revelli Composition Prize, Lux Perpetua received its world premiere by the Baylor University Wind Ensemble under Eric Wilson, at [...]

#127– December 27, 2021 https://soundcloud.com/user-642642570-907922214/rotterdam-1945 Rotterdam 1945 by Dutch composer, arranger and conductor Johan de Meij is our Composition of the Week. Rotterdam 1945 was written at the request of Maestro Arjan Tien, the chief conductor of the Marine Band of the Royal Netherlands Navy, to commemorate their 75th anniversary in 2020. 1945 also marked the end of World War II, the year that Johan de Meij's home country was liberated from Nazi Germany. Johan's father was born in Rotterdam in 1910, so he has a special bond with this dynamic city. De Meij uses the numbers 1-9-4-5 to create the [...]

#126– December 20, 2021 https://youtu.be/DLlAJQ7mP_k On the 100th anniversary of the birth of American composer, arranger and conductor Alfred Reed, we have chosen his Russian Christmas Music as our Composition of the Week. Russian Christmas Music was written in 1944 and was commissioned only 14 days before it was scheduled to be performed and broadcast live on NBC. The work was first performed in December of that year in Denver, Colorado. Two years later, the piece was elaborated and revised, and in that form was one of the three prize-winning works in the 1947 Columbia University Contest for new serious music [...]

#125– December 13, 2021 IN MEMORIAM DÉSIRÉ DONDEYNE (1921 - 2015) SYMPHONIA SACRA For Large Wind Band https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vVii0Z_L1A On the 100th anniversary of the birth of French composer and conductor Désiré Dondeyne, we have chosen his Symphonia Sacra as Composition of the Week. “An important work, inspired by Gregorian themes, especially those of the Holy Week, cast in four movements: “Entry and aspersion”, “Torments and prayers”, “Litanies”, and “The salutary truth”. A slow introduction incites the faithful to the prayer, followed immediately by the aspersion. The themes of the third movement are borrowed from the liturgies of Holy Saturday; they include [...]

#124– December 06, 2021 BRUCE YURKO (1951) IN MEMORIAM KAREL HUSA For Wind Ensemble https://soundcloud.com/user-642642570-907922214/sets/wasbe-composition-of-the-4 “In memoriam Karel Husa” by American composer and conductor Bruce Yurko is our Composition of the Week. In memoriam… was written in 2017, after Husa’s passing in December 2016. The premiere performance took place on May 6, 2018, by the Eastman Wind Ensemble under Mark Scatterday. The work is dedicated to the latter as well as to Donald Hunsberger. It has a duration of 15 minutes and calls for a standard wind ensemble instrumentation. “It was in August 1973, at the Ithaca College School of Music [...]

#123– November 29, 2021 Sir MALCOM ARNOLD TAM O’SHANTER Overture, Op. 51 (Trans: John Paynter) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgF6A0qyYlI Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the birth of British composer and trumpeter Sir Malcolm Arnold, Tam O’Shanter Overture Op. 51 is our Composition of the Week. Tam O’Shanter was first performed at a Henry Wood Promenade Concert on August 17, 1955, with Malcolm Arnold himself conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The music, programmatic in its structure, is based on the famous narrative poem by the Scottish poet Robert Burns (1759 - 1796). Tam O’Shanter, the title, and hero of the poem is a drunken farmer [...]

#122– November 22, 2021 IM MEMORIAM HENRI TOMASI (1901 - 1971) FANFARES LITURGIQUES For Brass Ensemble Listen and view the score https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OEs24RHmGA “Fanfares Liturgiques” by French composer and conductor Henri Tomasi is our Composition of the Week. Henri Tomasi passed away on January 13, 1971, and we want to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his death with this work. “Fanfares Liturgiques” has become since its premiere a cornerstone of the brass ensemble literature. Tomasi wrote Fanfare Liturgiques (originally Fanfares Concertantes) as part of his opera Don Juan de Mañara; they were premiered in 1947 in Monte Carlo, where Tomasi had recently [...]