Composition of the Week

#176– December 05, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSKijqLGJZU Kulokker by American composer, performer and scholar of experimental music George Lewis, is our Composition of the Week. Kulokker was composed in 2020 and premiered on March 4 of the same year at the University of Bergen’s Museum of Natural History, Norway, by the Norwegian Naval Forces Band with Ingar Bergby conducting. During that concert another Lewis’ work was premiered as well, “Big Shoulders, Sharp Elbows”. Kulokker explores the expressive possibilities of the wind band through sound production techniques typical of the 20th and 21st centuries, such as glissandos, different textures produced by vibratos, air-sound, inverted [...]

#175– November 28, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ea9aCn3wgY8 Concerto for Trumpet and Wind Orchestra by British composer Sir Richard Rodney Bennett is our Composition of the Week. The work was commissioned by former WASBE President Timothy Reynish for Martin Winter and the RNCM Wind Orchestra. It was premiered on September 17, 1993, at the BASBWE Conference. It is scored for solo trumpet and the following setting: 2+pic.2+ca.2+Ebcl+bcl.2asx+tsx+barsx.2+cbn/432+btbn.2/timp.3perc/hp.pf/db(amp) It has a duration of 20 minutes, and it is structured in three movements. Declamato – Allegro – Presto Elegy for Miles Davis Vivo “The Trumpet Concerto was written in New York between April and June 1993 [...]

#174– November 21, 2022 Credit: David White https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgU_7hnP8pg Millennium Canons by American composer Kevin Puts is our Composition of the Week. « Millenium Canons » was commissioned by the Institute for American Music of the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester for Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops Orchestra, which premiered the work in June 2001 at Symphony Hall in Boston. Mark Spede arranged this version for wind ensemble for the University of Texas at Austin Wind Ensemble, Jerry Junkin, director. Kevin Puts composed Millennium Canons to celebrate the turn of the millennium. The wind ensemble version is scored for [...]

#173– November 14, 2022 https://youtu.be/IL_Kpges7jk Shapes of Crimson, by South Korean composer Minchang Kang is our Composition of the Week. Shapes of Crimson has a duration of 8 minutes, and it is scored for (almost) two identical wind ensembles, using 1111.Sax/2121.harp.accordion. These two groups are disposed on the stage in a V shape. Back, in the center of the stage there is a piano, a celesta as well as two percussions posts on each side. The soloist is placed right in the center of the stage, in front of the conductor. Shapes of Crimson use the spatialization and sound imitation of [...]

#172– November 07, 2022 I.Allegro Grazioso https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MeV0W14Gqc II.Lento https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1TKddo5dj0 III. Fanfarria y coral https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JKo6E7__8E Entornos, by Spanish composer Amando Blanquer Ponsoda is our Composition of the Week. Written in Valencia in 1997 and premiered in February of 2001, at the Teatro Principal de Alicante by the Banda Municipal de Alicante, with José Rafael Pascual Vilaplana conducting. Entornos has a duration of 18 minutes, and it is scored for large symphonic band, including bass saxophone, two flugelhorn parts, cello, string bass as well as five percussion parts. It is structured in three movements: I.Allegro Grazioso – II. Lento – III. Fanfarria - [...]

#171– October 31, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiZ4XTkCDhM Conflicts and Confluences by Dutch composer Henk Badings is our Composition of the Week. Written between 1983 and 1986, Conflicts and Confluences is Badings’ Symphony No. 15. It has a duration of 18 minutes and it is structured in three movements. I.Cominciere, II. Adagio Molto, and III. Scherzo finale. “Cominciere begins with somber and deep sonorities, in a dense and mysterious atmosphere. The texture becomes more complex and leads us to the first allegro. A first thematic idea is presented by the brass, in the form of a fanfare.  This material will dialogue in a recurrent [...]

#170– October 24, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMT1oWc40Mc Suite No. 2 for Band, by Colombian composer Victoriano Valencia Rincón is our Composition of the Week. Suite No. 2 was commissioned in 2007 by the Symphonic Band of Sabaneta - Antioquia, for its participation in the International Band Competition City of Valencia - Spain. It was part of the Latin American-Music-Project collection of the former Ludwig Masters publishing house in the USA. “The cultural richness shown in the diversity of singing in the different regions of Colombia, becomes an impulse and expressive intention in Suite No. 2 for Band. Just as the Andes submerge in [...]

#169– October 17, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgA6q7oIkzg Tierra Mítica, by Spanish composer, conductor, musicologist, and writer Bernardo Adam Ferrero is our Composition of the Week. WASBE wishes to pay tribute to his memory on the occasion of his passing last week. Terra Mítica, a symphonic poem written in 1999, was premiered in Valencia, on July 8, 2000, being the compulsory piece in the highest category of the famous “Certamen” of that year. It was also a compulsory piece during the “32 Certamen Internacional de Bandas de Música Vila d’Altea” in 2003, in Alicante, Spain. It is structured in four movements: I. Arco Mediterráneo [...]

#168– October 10, 2022 https://youtu.be/BTikv5we7C4 Moravian Rhapsody, by Czech composer, conductor and teacher Evžen Zámečník is our Composition of the Week. Moravian Rhapsody was performed on July 23, 2022, at the Žofín Palace, Prague, Czech Republic, during the 19th International WASBE Conference, by the WASBE Youth Wind Orchestra, conducted by Marek Prášil. It is a short, brilliant work inspired by folk melodies from Moravia. After a brief brass fanfare, the rhapsody unfolds in a series of variations on the song Beskyde Beskyde, which dominates the whole work. Moravian Rhapsody was written in 1984, after a commission from the Uster Festival in [...]

#167– October 03, 2022 https://youtu.be/-8h0QlTeUu8 Marxa Burlesca, by Spanish composer and teacher Manuel Palau Boix is our Composition of the Week. Marxa Burlesca was performed on July 23, 2022, at the Žofín Palace, Prague, Czech Republic, during the 19th International WASBE Conference, by the Filarmónica Beethoven (Spain), conducted by Juan José Fernández Olivares. Manuel Palau Boix wrote a first version for saxophone ensemble in 1936, possibly out of sketches for piano. This first version was premiered on December 23, 1936, at the Principal Theatre of Valencia, by the Orquesta Filharmonía de Saxos, presumably under the composer himself. Immediately after the premiere, [...]