Results
-
£35.00strange geometry
Descriptionstrange geometrywas commissioned by Morgan Griffiths and the Hammonds Saltaire Band for their performance at the Brass in Concert Championships of 2015.As a bit of a space/sci-fi geek, as well as a musician, two events during the summer of 2015 had a particular effect on me. The first was the tragic early death in a plane crash of the famous film composer James Horner. Horner's music, particularly in films like 'Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan', 'Avatar', 'Apollo 13' and even his debut in Roger Corman's 1980 budget film 'Battle Beyond the Stars', defined for a generation the sound of sci-fi at the cinema. Along with John Williams he created the vocabulary for those who wish to express other-worldly wonder in music and his inventive talent will be much missed in an industry where originality has become something of a dirty word in recent years.The second event was the epic flyby of Pluto by the NASA New Horizons spacecraft. There are many reasons to find this mission inspiring - for example, the scientists and engineers behind it created a craft that has travelled at 37,000 mph for nine years and three billion miles to arrive within seventy-two seconds of the predicted time for the flyby. That they achieved this with such accuracy is an outstanding tribute to humanity's ingenuity and insatiable curiosity. However, the most exciting aspect of the mission was the clear, high resolution pictures of this unthinkably remote and inhospitable world beamed back to mission control. The best previous image of Pluto was an indistinct fuzzy blob - suddenly we could see mountains made of ice, glaciers of methane and carbon monoxide and nitrogen fog - features previously unimagined on a world thought to be a slightly dull ball of cold rock. The BBC's venerable astronomy programme 'The Sky at Night' waxed lyrical about these newly discovered features, referring to "the surprising discoveries of mountains and strange geometry on the surface of this cold distant world".I like to think that Horner would have been as inspired as I have been by this real-life science story, and this piece uses some of the vocabulary of the sci-fi movie soundtrack in a tribute to the memory of a great musician and to the inspirational geeks at NASA who have boldly taken us where no-one has gone before.Note: This work comes with a B4 portrait score. Listen to a preview and follow the music below!
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£44.00
Begin the Beguine - Cole Porter - Jan Utbult
Begin the Beguine is one of the most popular songs by Cole Porter. It was written in 1935 aboard the ocean liner "Franconia" en route from Indonesia to Fiji. It was later the same year introducted by June Knight as a part of the musical "Jubilee", premiered at The Imperial Theatre in New York City.After it's premiere, it has been performed and recorded a numerous times. This arrangement is a freely adaption of the Artie Shaw version.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£30.00Black Bottom Stomp - Jelly Roll Morton
Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe, professionally known as Jelly Roll Morton, was an American ragtime and early jazz pianist, bandleader and composer who started his career in New Orleans, Louisiana. Widely recognised as a pivotal figure in early jazz, Morton is perhaps most notable as jazz's first arranger, proving that a genre rooted in improvisation could retain its essential spirit and characteristics when notated. His composition "Jelly Roll Blues" was the first published jazz composition in 1915. Morton is also notable for writing such standards as "King Porter Stomp", "Wolverine Blues", "Black Bottom Stomp", and "I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say". Notorious for his arrogance and self-promotion, Morton claimed to have invented jazz outright in 1902, much to the derision of fellow musicians and the critics. At the age of fourteen, Morton began working as a piano player in a brothel (or, as it was referred to back then, a sporting house). In that atmosphere, he often sang smutty lyrics and took the nickname "Jelly Roll". While working there, he was living with his religious, church-going great-grandmother; who he convinced that he worked as a night watchman in a barrel factory. After Morton's grandmother found out that he was playing jazz in a local brothel, she kicked him out of her house and told him that "devil music" would surely bring about his downfall. Born in downtown New Orleans, Louisiana, his exact birth date differs depending to whichever source you want to believe; his half-sisters claimed he was born in September 1885, but his World War 1 draft card showed September 1884 and his California death certificate listed his birth as September 1889. He died in 1941 in Los Angeles.
-
£30.00Here's That Rainy Day
Trombone Solo.In 1953, a new musical by Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen was staged, "Carnival in Flanders". Unfortunately, it was not successful. However, one of the songs, "Here's that Rainy Day" became a standard on the cabaret scene.I have arranged this memorable song for solo trombone and brass band. It begins in a Latin style, then moves to the famous Jazz Big Band style. Good key players make the band parts playable by most bands - as long as they like to 'swing'! The trombone part is not easy, on the other hand, neither is it aimed at the 'select few' virtuoso players. Impressive stuff though, with 'written' sections that sound like improvisation.
In Stock: Estimated dispatch 3-5 working days
-
£77.00General Series Brass Band Journal, Numbers 2238 - 2241, December 2023
2238: Fanfare and allegro on the Doxology (Steve Kellner)The Doxology, set to the tune Old Hundredth (T.B. 31), is used widely around the world by Christian denominations, including Salvationists. This concert opener is based on the short but powerful hymn of praise to the Triune God.2239: To the endless day (Kenneth Downie)This is a meditation on the hymn tune Ruth (T.B. 191), written by Samuel Smith. It is a particular favourite of Don Jenkins, whose late wife was also called Ruth. This music is dedicated to Don, a distinguished trombone soloist and former Band master of Bristol Easton Corps Band.The music is always associated with the hymn by William Walsham How, whose words begin 'Summer suns are flowing over land and sea' (S.A.S.B. 59) with the title coming from the end of the final verse.2240: Euphonium Solo - He giveth more grace (Ray Steadman-Allen)This 1996 arrangement of Blacklands (T.B. 527), the composers own hymn tune written in 1963, is being published posthumously. The hymn tune sets the words 'He giveth more grace as our burdens grow greater' (S.A.S.B. 30) with an emphasis on the generosity of God.2241: The Calvary effect (Ian Clarke)Around AC 30, on a hill often refered to as Mount Calvary, an event took place that was to change the world forever. The Calvary effect is a reflection, in musical form, on that event and what it still means to people today. If features two tunes: first, in a quiet reflective mood, we hear the highly emotive Healing Stream, associated with the words 'Jesus, keep me near the cross; There is a precious fountain' (S.A.S.B. 178). This then makes way for the chorus; 'Lord, make Cavalry real to me' (S.A.S.B. 182), which is at times indistinct and almost lost in its surroundings, reflecting the sentiments of the chorus. A return to the main tune follows, this time in a positive, passionate setting. The music finishes with a triumphant 'Hallelujah!'.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£125.00The World Rejoicing (Brass Band - Score and Parts)
The World Rejoicing was commissioned by the National Brass Band Associations of Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, and the British Open, as the test piece for their competitions in 2020/21. Although the work was completed in 2019, the pandemic of 2020 meant that these competitions were postponed until 2021/22. The premiere took place in September 2021 at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, UK.In searching for a common link between the brass band traditions of the various European countries that commissioned this work, I considered the fact that hymns have always played an important role in the relationship that brass bands have with their particular communities; and thus I turned to a well- known Lutheran chorale, Nun danket alle Gott (Now thank we all our God), written around 1636 by Martin Rinkart, with the melody attributed to Johann Cruger. A number of composers have incorporated this chorale into their music, most famously J.S. Bach in his Cantatas no. 79 and 192, and Mendelssohn in the Lobsegang movement of his 2nd Symphony (the harmonisation of which is usually used when this hymn is sung).It seemed fitting therefore for me to return to a compositional form I have used many times before (Variations) and to write a work based on this hymn. I have used it in a similar way to that which I employed in my Variations on Laudate Dominum of 1976 - that is, rather than writing a set of variations using elaborations of the complete tune, I have taken various phrases from the chorale and used them within the context of other musical material, applying an overall symphonic process of continuous variation and development. The structure, or sub-divisions of the work, which is through composed and plays without a break, is as follows:Prelude, Capriccio, La Danza 1, Processional, La Danza 2, Arias and Duets, Fuga Burlesca, Chorale, and Postlude.The work, which is around 16 minutes in length, is also partly autobiographical - in the manner say of Strauss's Ein Heldenleben - in that I have incorporated into the score brief quotations from many of my other major works for brass band. In that respect, The World Rejoicing sums up a particular facet of my life as a composer, and reflects the admiration I have always had for what is surely one of the great amateur music-making traditions in the world.Duration: 16.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£40.00
The World Rejoicing (Brass Band - Score only)
The World Rejoicing was commissioned by the National Brass Band Associations of Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, and the British Open, as the test piece for their competitions in 2020/21. Although the work was completed in 2019, the pandemic of 2020 meant that these competitions were postponed until 2021/22. The premiere took place in September 2021 at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, UK.In searching for a common link between the brass band traditions of the various European countries that commissioned this work, I considered the fact that hymns have always played an important role in the relationship that brass bands have with their particular communities; and thus I turned to a well- known Lutheran chorale, Nun danket alle Gott (Now thank we all our God), written around 1636 by Martin Rinkart, with the melody attributed to Johann Cruger. A number of composers have incorporated this chorale into their music, most famously J.S. Bach in his Cantatas no. 79 and 192, and Mendelssohn in the Lobsegang movement of his 2nd Symphony (the harmonisation of which is usually used when this hymn is sung).It seemed fitting therefore for me to return to a compositional form I have used many times before (Variations) and to write a work based on this hymn. I have used it in a similar way to that which I employed in my Variations on Laudate Dominum of 1976 - that is, rather than writing a set of variations using elaborations of the complete tune, I have taken various phrases from the chorale and used them within the context of other musical material, applying an overall symphonic process of continuous variation and development. The structure, or sub-divisions of the work, which is through composed and plays without a break, is as follows:Prelude, Capriccio, La Danza 1, Processional, La Danza 2, Arias and Duets, Fuga Burlesca, Chorale, and Postlude.The work, which is around 16 minutes in length, is also partly autobiographical - in the manner say of Strauss's Ein Heldenleben - in that I have incorporated into the score brief quotations from many of my other major works for brass band. In that respect, The World Rejoicing sums up a particular facet of my life as a composer, and reflects the admiration I have always had for what is surely one of the great amateur music-making traditions in the world.Duration: 16.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£44.00The Liberty Bell (Brass Band - Score and Parts)
This march, written in 1893, was originally destined for inclusion in an operetta but after the composer had witnessed a spectacle called "America" in Chicago, which had as its backdrop a huge painting of the Liberty Bell, it was given the name by which it has become famous. Further recognition has come in more recent years by the adoption of the march as the signature tune for the popular TV programme, Monty Python.The arrangement includes several solos for a large unpitched bell which add aural (and visual) interest. It has been recorded by Brass Band of the Western Reserve, musical director Keith M Wilkinson, on the CD Slides Rule.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£45.00Thriller (Score and Parts)
It seems like yesterday . . . but it was almost 34 years ago in 1982 that Michael Jackson's Thriller album was first released. It was this album that catapulted him to super-stardom. This is a stunning arrangement by Philip Harper.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£94.95Whitsun Wakes (Score and Parts)
Whitsun Wakes was commissioned by the BBC and first performed by Black Dyke Band, conducted by James Watson, in Manchester's Bridgewater Hall on 26th May, 1997 as part of the BBC's 'Music Live' Festival. It was subsequently selected as a test piece for the British Open Championship which was scheduled to be held on 6th September 1997 at Birmingham's Symphony Hall. Unfortunately this was the day of the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales and so the British Open was postponed until 17th January, 1998. However the greatest irony is the fact that although this piece takes its inspiration from the Manchester area it was destined to be played at the first British Open Championship to take place outside Manchester.
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days