Results
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£110.00
The Final Frontier - Geert Jan Kroon
In The Final Frontier, the composer explores different associations with the universe. Inspired by Stephen Hawking's (1942-2018) book Brief Answers to the Big Questions, the piece describes the wonders and dangers of the universe, the big questions about the smallest elements, and the possibility of space travel. The work consists of four movements. The first movement, 'Energy and Space', is the exposition of both main materials. With energy and space, a universe can be created. The second movement, 'The Great Unknown', is a fast section in which the materials are further explored and depicts the dangers of the universe, like supernovae and black holes. The third movement, 'The Big Questions', is a slow movement with different soloists and music of a reflective nature. Imagine how in the tiniest elements, whole dimensions could be rolled up. Also, a Dutch pioneer in cosmology is hidden in the notes. The fourth movement, 'The Final Frontier', is a big build-up to a majestic finale, portraying the excitement of space travel. The Final Frontier was the set test piece of the 3rd section at the Dutch National Brass Band Championships.
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£65.00Lyonesse. - Simon Dobson
Lyonesse was commissioned by the Brass Band Heritage Trust as the test piece for the Finals of the National Youth Brass Band Championships held in Manchester in April 2005. This atmospheric music, ideal as atest piece for First and Second section bands, takes its inspiration from the lost kingdom of Lyonesse, the mythical spur of land linking Cornwall and the Scilly Isles, and its associated legend of Tristan and Isolde. BrassBand Grade 5: 1st Section Duration: 13 minutes
Estimated dispatch 5-14 working days
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£74.95Eden (Score and Parts)
This work was commissioned by the Brass Band Heritage Trust as the test piece for the final of the 2005 Besson National Brass Band Championship, held at the Royal Albert Hall, London.The score is prefaced by the final lines from Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost (completed in 1663), in which Adam and Eve, expelled from Paradise, make their uncertain way into the outside world:"...The world was all before them, where to chooseTheir place of rest, and providence their guide:They hand in hand with wandering steps and slow,Through Eden took their solitary way."My work is in three linked sections. In the first, the characters of Adam, Eve and the serpent guarding the Tree of Knowledge are respectively represented by solo euphonium, cornet and trombone. The music opens in an idyllic and tranquil mood and leads into a duet between euphonium and cornet. Throughout this passage the prevailing mood darkens, though the soloists seem to remain oblivious to the increasingly fraught atmosphere. A whip-crack announces the malevolent appearance of the solo trombone who proceeds to engage the solo cornet in a sinister dialogue.The second section interprets the Eden story as a modern metaphor for the havoc mankind has inflicted upon the world, exploiting and abusing its resources in the pursuit of wealth. Though certainly intended here as a comment on the present-day, it is by no means a new idea: Milton himself had an almost prescient awareness of it in Book I of his poem, where men, led on by Mammon:"...Ransacked the centre and with impious handsRifled the bowels of their mother earthFor treasures better hid. Soon had his crewOpened into the hill a spacious woundAnd digged out ribs of gold."So this section is fast and violent, at times almost manic in its destructive energy. At length a furious climax subsides and a tolling bell ushers in the third and final section.This final part is slow, beginning with an intense lament featuring solos for tenor-horn, flgel-horn and repiano cornet and joined later by solo baritone, soprano cornet, Eb-bass and Bb-bass.At one stage in the planning of the work it seemed likely that the music would end here - in despair. Then, mid-way through writing it, I visited the extraordinary Eden Project in Cornwall. Here, in a disused quarry - a huge man-made wound in the earth - immense biomes, containing an abundance of plant species from every region of the globe, together with an inspirational education programme, perhaps offer a small ray of hope for the future. This is the image behind the work's conclusion and the optimism it aims to express is real enough, though it is hard-won and challenged to the last.John Pickard 2005
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£29.50Eden (Score Only)
This work was commissioned by the Brass Band Heritage Trust as the test piece for the final of the 2005 Besson National Brass Band Championship, held at the Royal Albert Hall, London.The score is prefaced by the final lines from Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost (completed in 1663), in which Adam and Eve, expelled from Paradise, make their uncertain way into the outside world:"...The world was all before them, where to chooseTheir place of rest, and providence their guide:They hand in hand with wandering steps and slow,Through Eden took their solitary way."My work is in three linked sections. In the first, the characters of Adam, Eve and the serpent guarding the Tree of Knowledge are respectively represented by solo euphonium, cornet and trombone. The music opens in an idyllic and tranquil mood and leads into a duet between euphonium and cornet. Throughout this passage the prevailing mood darkens, though the soloists seem to remain oblivious to the increasingly fraught atmosphere. A whip-crack announces the malevolent appearance of the solo trombone who proceeds to engage the solo cornet in a sinister dialogue.The second section interprets the Eden story as a modern metaphor for the havoc mankind has inflicted upon the world, exploiting and abusing its resources in the pursuit of wealth. Though certainly intended here as a comment on the present-day, it is by no means a new idea: Milton himself had an almost prescient awareness of it in Book I of his poem, where men, led on by Mammon:"...Ransacked the centre and with impious handsRifled the bowels of their mother earthFor treasures better hid. Soon had his crewOpened into the hill a spacious woundAnd digged out ribs of gold."So this section is fast and violent, at times almost manic in its destructive energy. At length a furious climax subsides and a tolling bell ushers in the third and final section.This final part is slow, beginning with an intense lament featuring solos for tenor-horn, flgel-horn and repiano cornet and joined later by solo baritone, soprano cornet, Eb-bass and Bb-bass.At one stage in the planning of the work it seemed likely that the music would end here - in despair. Then, mid-way through writing it, I visited the extraordinary Eden Project in Cornwall. Here, in a disused quarry - a huge man-made wound in the earth - immense biomes, containing an abundance of plant species from every region of the globe, together with an inspirational education programme, perhaps offer a small ray of hope for the future. This is the image behind the work's conclusion and the optimism it aims to express is real enough, though it is hard-won and challenged to the last.John Pickard 2005
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£107.95Symphony in Two Movements (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Gregson, Edward
Selected as the Championship Section test piece for the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain 2025This 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
Selected as the Championship Section test piece for the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain 2025This 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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£89.95Diversions, Op.97 (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Bourgeois, Derek
This work was commissioned in1985 by Skellerup, Christchurch, New ZealandMovements:Allegro VivaceAndante Con Moto Molto ExpressivoAllegro VivaceDerek Bourgeois wrote Diversions in the summer of 1985 to a commissioned from the Skellerup Brass Band.Bourgeois previous test piece, Blitz, was aggressive and forceful, therefore the composer decided to write a work of a completely different character, which although technically very demanding, is light-hearted in style, and easy on the ear, as the title suggests.The first and third movements share the same tempo, but are rather different in character. The first movement is a sonata allegro contrasting two main themes. The first is bold and jaunty and is heavily scored, the second announced by the solo horn is more lyrical in character. The development section and recapitulation are merged into a continuous interplay of the two themes.The second movement is an expressive andante in free rondo form. It is lightly scored for the most part with a lot of solo passages that make demands on the musicianship of the players and conductor alike. The very simplicity of its textures and the breadth of its melodic writing demand firm control of vibrato, phrasing and rubato.The brief finale is nothing short of a romp. Its ternary structure is highly rhythmic in character and only rarely do the performers enjoy the luxury of two consecutive bars in the same time signature!Duration: 11.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£44.95
Diversions, Op.97 (Brass Band - Score only) - Bourgeois, Derek
This work was commissioned in1985 by Skellerup, Christchurch, New ZealandMovements:Allegro VivaceAndante Con Moto Molto ExpressivoAllegro VivaceDerek Bourgeois wrote Diversions in the summer of 1985 to a commissioned from the Skellerup Brass Band.Bourgeois previous test piece, Blitz, was aggressive and forceful, therefore the composer decided to write a work of a completely different character, which although technically very demanding, is light-hearted in style, and easy on the ear, as the title suggests.The first and third movements share the same tempo, but are rather different in character. The first movement is a sonata allegro contrasting two main themes. The first is bold and jaunty and is heavily scored, the second announced by the solo horn is more lyrical in character. The development section and recapitulation are merged into a continuous interplay of the two themes.The second movement is an expressive andante in free rondo form. It is lightly scored for the most part with a lot of solo passages that make demands on the musicianship of the players and conductor alike. The very simplicity of its textures and the breadth of its melodic writing demand firm control of vibrato, phrasing and rubato.The brief finale is nothing short of a romp. Its ternary structure is highly rhythmic in character and only rarely do the performers enjoy the luxury of two consecutive bars in the same time signature!Duration: 11.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£89.95Diversions for Brass Band, Op.97 (Brass Band - Score and Parts)
This work was commissioned in1985 by Skellerup, Christchurch, New ZealandMovements:Allegro VivaceAndante Con Moto Molto ExpressivoAllegro VivaceDerek Bourgeois wrote Diversions in the summer of 1985 to a commissioned from the Skellerup Brass Band.Bourgeois previous test piece, Blitz, was aggressive and forceful, therefore the composer decided to write a work of a completely different character, which although technically very demanding, is light-hearted in style, and easy on the ear, as the title suggests.The first and third movements share the same tempo, but are rather different in character. The first movement is a sonata allegro contrasting two main themes. The first is bold and jaunty and is heavily scored, the second announced by the solo horn is more lyrical in character. The development section and recapitulation are merged into a continuous interplay of the two themes.The second movement is an expressive andante in free rondo form. It is lightly scored for the most part with a lot of solo passages that make demands on the musicianship of the players and conductor alike. The very simplicity of its textures and the breadth of its melodic writing demand firm control of vibrato, phrasing and rubato.The brief finale is nothing short of a romp. Its ternary structure is highly rhythmic in character and only rarely do the performers enjoy the luxury of two consecutive bars in the same time signature!Duration: 11.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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£59.95Swedish Festival Music (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Downie, Kenneth
This three-movement suite was commissioned by the Swedish Brass Band Association as the test piece for the Championship Section of their 2008 National Contest. The first movement is inspired by the magnificent Swedish hymn 'How Great Thou Art'. Indeed the influence of that hymn can be traced in all three movements. The declamatory style of the opening gives way to other, more reflective expressions of awe and wonder. A more animated section develops before a final, triumphant statement of the 'How Great' idea returns to finish the movement. The slow second movement features another much-loved Swedish hymn. The music provides plenty of scope for expressive playing, and a feeling of intimacy should be created by the use of several short solo passages. The third movement Allegro brings a totally different, dance-like mood with frequent references to a reel from the region of Uppland. This eventually brings a return to the opening subject and a final, triumphant reference to 'How Great Thou Art'.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
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