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£29.95
The Land of the Long White Cloud (Score Only)
Dating from 1979, The Land of the Long White Cloud (Aotearoa) was Philip Sparke's first test-piece. It was commissioned by the New Zealand Brass Band Association for their 1980 National Championships (their centenary year) and set for the European Brass Band Championships, the same year, at the Royal Albert Hall in London. Aotearoa was the name given to New Zealand by its Polynesian settlers whose first sight of the islands was a long, flat cloud lying low over the land. The work has no specific programme although many have seen pictures of the surging ocean in the opening bars. A faster dance-like section leads to a slow, haunting solo for soprano cornet; this is taken up by the whole band before earlier material returns. The dance-like tune is, this time, given a fugal treatment and the opening bars return to close the work.Philip Sparke was born in London and studied composition, trumpet and piano at the Royal College of Music, where he gained an ARCM. It was at the College that his interest in bands arose. He played in the College wind orchestra and also formed a brass band among the students, writing several works for both ensembles.At that time, his first published works appeared - Concert Prelude (brass band) and Gaudium (wind band). A growing interest in his music led to several commissions, his first major one being this featured piece for the Centennial Brass Band Championships in New Zealand - The Land of the Long White Cloud. He has written for brass band championships in New Zealand, Switzerland, Holland, Australia and the UK, including three times for the National Finals at the Royal Albert Hall.In September 2000, he was awarded the Iles Medal of the Worshipful Company of Musicians for his services to brass bands and in 2005 Music of the Spheres won the National Band Association/William D. Revelli Memorial Band Composition Contest. In 2011, he received the BUMA International Brass Award for his contribution to brass music.His conducting and adjudicating activities have taken him to most European countries, Scandinavia, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Canada and the USA. In May 2000, he took the major step of becoming a full-time composer by founding his own publishing company, Anglo Music Press. The company is devoted to publishing his brass band, concert band, fanfare band and instrumental publications as well as recordings dedicated to his latest works.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£44.95Road to Run
The piece starts with a simple rhythmic pulse which is the basis of the entire work. This cell provides a platform for the piece to grow and develop starting with the first theme played by the euphoniums, all the way through to the conclusion performed in full gusto by the whole ensemble. The various motifs introduced throughout the opening of the piece are passed between the ensemble before the introduction of the three soloists.The central section of the piece features the Solo Trombone, Cornet and Euphonium as they take turns to play a jazz fusion solo whilst having some musical interplay with each other at the front of the stage. After this solo passage, the music then features the various sections within the ensemble, which pays homage to Weather Reports' famous "Birdland". In a jazz fused cannon, each new independent musical phrase is performed by the various sections standing. Starting with the Horns then Solo Cornets, Back Row and Flugal and finally the Baritones and Trombones.Once the different sections of the ensemble are featured, the piece then moves into the final stages. This section sees a reprieve of the opening material heard at the beginning, but further developed with the various melodic motifs passed around the ensemble. The ending builds on this material towards a rousing conclusion."Road to Run" is an up tempo, high energy concert work that has that 'feel-good factor' from start to finish. The idea behind the title is based on the feel and structure of the piece which takes the listener on a musical journey. And at 150 beats per minute - you could put it in your headphones and find your own 'Road to Run'.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£89.95Songs of Ascent - Jonathan Bates
DURATION: 14 minutes. DIFFICULTY: Championship. 'Songs of Ascent' was composed for the Royal Northern College of Music Brass Band, as part of their programme for the 2019 RNCM Festival of Brass. In my view, the festival itself is the leading showcase for original contemporary music for the medium (in a concert setting) in the world and therefore an ideal place to explore new ideas and sounds, which was a notion fundamental to the construction of this work. The piece is subtitled 'Out of the Depths, I cry to you, O Lord'; the opening line of Psalm 130 (which forms part of a set of 15 psalsm, 120-134 known as the Songs of Ascent") which forms the main inspiration for much of the musical material. Following an extended opening for four individual tuba lines, there are a number of solos for members of the band off stage, with bleak and deep accompaniment lines, reflecting the words of Psalm 130. Amongst these 'songs of ascents', the most common and strong themes are repentance and redemption; with the central core of this work emerging 'from the depths' to reveal one of very few calming and reflective passages of the work utilising the tune of 'Guide Me O Thy Great Redeemer' in a new setting, featuring the Solo Horn and Bass Trombone, before returning to the ethereal and dark timbres that form much of the music up to this point. In terms of compositional technique, this work is solely based on a set of 4 9-note scales in their various unique transpositions (below). Each of these scales provide a set of 2 whole tone scales, 6 minor triads, 6 major triads and is built on 9 augmented triads. Whilst most of the music in this work is based melodically on the set of notes (heard right at the outset in the motif in the tuba line), the central section delves into the harmonic capabilities of these 'modes', using a number of the 7 'keys' which can be derived from the minor & major chords derived in each scale. All 4 scales are used independantly to each other, with whole sections of the work focussing on each mode. 'Songs of Ascent' was selected as the set work for the Championship Section at the Butlin's Mineworker's Championships in 2020.
In Stock: Estimated dispatch 1-3 working days
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£107.95Symphony in Two Movements (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Gregson, Edward
This work was jointly commissioned by the National Youth Brass Band of Great Britain (NYBBGB) and the National Youth Brass Band of Wales (NYBBW), the latter with funding from T Cerdd (Music Centre Wales), to celebrate their 60th and 30th anniversaries respectively. The first performances were given at Cadogan Hall, London, in April 2012, by the NYBBGB, conducted by Bramwell Tovey; and at the Great Hall, Aberystwyth University, in July 2012, by the NYBBW, conducted by Nicholas Childs.When I was approached about a joint commission to write a new work to celebrate the anniversaries of these two outstanding youth bands I was delighted to accept, and decided to respond by writing a work apposite for the magnitude of these special occasions, namely a 'symphony for brass'.Through a long journey of writing music for brass band, which commenced with Connotations (1977), and continued with Dances and Arias (1984), Of Men and Mountains (1991), The Trumpets of the Angels (2000) and Rococo Variations (2008), I arrived at what I regard as the most important work of the cycle to date, combining as it does serious musical intent with considerable technical demands. It is perhaps my most abstract work for brass band, avoiding any programmatic content.The symphony lasts for some 19 minutes and is structured in two linked movements. The form is based on that used by Beethoven in his final piano sonata (Op.111), which is in two movements only: a compact sonata-form allegro, followed by a more expansive theme and four variations. Prokofiev also adopted this model in his 2nd Symphony of 1925.The opening Toccata of this Symphony is highly dramatic but compact, whilst still retaining the 'traditional' structural elements of exposition, development and recapitulation; indeed, it also has the 'traditional' element of a contrasting second subject - a gentle, lyrical modal melody first heard on solo cornets.In contrast, the longer and more substantial second movement Variations is built around a theme and four variations. The slowly unfolding chorale-like theme accumulates both added note harmony and increasing instrumentation, whilst the four variations which follow are by turn mercurial (fast, starting with all the instruments muted), march-like (menacing, with short rhythmic articulations underpinning an extended atonal melody), serene (a series of 'romances' for solo instruments alongside echoes of the chorale) with an emerging theme eventually bursting into a climax of passionate intent; whilst the final variation is a dynamic scherzo (concertante-like in its series of rapid-fire solos, duets, trios and quartets) with the music gradually incorporating elements of the main ideas from the first movement, thus acting as a recapitulation for the whole work. It reaches its peroration with a return to the very opening of the symphony, now in the 'home' tonality of F, and thus creating a truly symphonic dimension to the music.Most of the melodic material of the symphony is derived from the opening eleven-note 'row', which contains various intervallic sets, and although the work is not serially conceived it does use some typical quasi-serial procedures, such as canons, inversions, and retrogrades. The symphony uses somewhat limited percussion, in line with a 'classical' approach to the sound world of the brass band, alongside a use of multi-divisi instrumentation, whereby each player has an individual part rather than the traditional doubling within certain sections of the band.- Edward GregsonDuration: 19.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£57.95Symphony in Two Movements (Brass Band - Score only) - Gregson, Edward
This work was jointly commissioned by the National Youth Brass Band of Great Britain (NYBBGB) and the National Youth Brass Band of Wales (NYBBW), the latter with funding from T Cerdd (Music Centre Wales), to celebrate their 60th and 30th anniversaries respectively. The first performances were given at Cadogan Hall, London, in April 2012, by the NYBBGB, conducted by Bramwell Tovey; and at the Great Hall, Aberystwyth University, in July 2012, by the NYBBW, conducted by Nicholas Childs.When I was approached about a joint commission to write a new work to celebrate the anniversaries of these two outstanding youth bands I was delighted to accept, and decided to respond by writing a work apposite for the magnitude of these special occasions, namely a 'symphony for brass'.Through a long journey of writing music for brass band, which commenced with Connotations (1977), and continued with Dances and Arias (1984), Of Men and Mountains (1991), The Trumpets of the Angels (2000) and Rococo Variations (2008), I arrived at what I regard as the most important work of the cycle to date, combining as it does serious musical intent with considerable technical demands. It is perhaps my most abstract work for brass band, avoiding any programmatic content.The symphony lasts for some 19 minutes and is structured in two linked movements. The form is based on that used by Beethoven in his final piano sonata (Op.111), which is in two movements only: a compact sonata-form allegro, followed by a more expansive theme and four variations. Prokofiev also adopted this model in his 2nd Symphony of 1925.The opening Toccata of this Symphony is highly dramatic but compact, whilst still retaining the 'traditional' structural elements of exposition, development and recapitulation; indeed, it also has the 'traditional' element of a contrasting second subject - a gentle, lyrical modal melody first heard on solo cornets.In contrast, the longer and more substantial second movement Variations is built around a theme and four variations. The slowly unfolding chorale-like theme accumulates both added note harmony and increasing instrumentation, whilst the four variations which follow are by turn mercurial (fast, starting with all the instruments muted), march-like (menacing, with short rhythmic articulations underpinning an extended atonal melody), serene (a series of 'romances' for solo instruments alongside echoes of the chorale) with an emerging theme eventually bursting into a climax of passionate intent; whilst the final variation is a dynamic scherzo (concertante-like in its series of rapid-fire solos, duets, trios and quartets) with the music gradually incorporating elements of the main ideas from the first movement, thus acting as a recapitulation for the whole work. It reaches its peroration with a return to the very opening of the symphony, now in the 'home' tonality of F, and thus creating a truly symphonic dimension to the music.Most of the melodic material of the symphony is derived from the opening eleven-note 'row', which contains various intervallic sets, and although the work is not serially conceived it does use some typical quasi-serial procedures, such as canons, inversions, and retrogrades. The symphony uses somewhat limited percussion, in line with a 'classical' approach to the sound world of the brass band, alongside a use of multi-divisi instrumentation, whereby each player has an individual part rather than the traditional doubling within certain sections of the band.- Edward GregsonDuration: 19.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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