Results
-
£45.00Diversions after Benjamin Britten (Brass Band - Score only)
Suite by Lucy Pankhurst, Simon Dobson, Paul McGhee and Gavin HigginsHaving devised a collective centenary tribute for Michael Tippett at the 2006 RNCM Festival of Brass (Variations on a Theme of Michael Tippett by five eminent composers of brass band music, PHM002), I commissioned this companion piece as a Benjamin Britten tribute for the 2013 festival. In the late 1970s, while researching a book about the English composer, and Britten's first teacher, Frank Bridge (1879 - 1941), I came across a copy of the printed score of Benjamin Britten's Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge (Op.10) for string orchestra, in which Britten had written descriptive titles for each of the variations suggesting appropriate character traits of his much loved mentor and guide. The character variations are cast in march, song and dance forms.Taking inspiration from Britten's youthful tribute, I invited four award-winning composers, who have all made significant contributions to the brass band medium, to create their own personal reflections on four aspects of Britten's character and music, designed to form a suite of Diversions after Benjamin Britten, but which can also be played separately.Lucy Pankhurst's hauntingly lyrical Prelude: His Depth refers to the emotional and symbolic subtexts that underpin Britten's operas, taking its musical cue from Britten's many arrangements of folk songs. The flugel horn takes a prominent role throughout.Simon Dobson's breathless Scherzo: His Vitality reminds us with its rapid passage work and leaping bass 'groove' that Britten loved tennis and fast cars in his younger days.Paul McGhee's evocative interpretation of the March: His Sympathy represents Benjamin Britten's pacifism, as the composer writes: 'We view the music through the eyes of a pacifist. Whilst war and violence surround us, we do not engage in it and though it continues to happen around us. With the use of muted effects in most of the band throughout the piece, the flugel horn is the lone voice of reason, standing firm against the mechanical and destructive society in which it is forced to live. As the machine of war continues around the lone voice, the voice is gradually dismissed and mocked as the war machine rumbles on into the distance.'In an extended finale, entitled Toccata: His Skill, Gavin Higgins celebrates Benjamin Britten's consummate creativity. For the RNCM Festival of Brass premiere, the four contrasting movements were framed and connected by Britten's Fanfare for St. Edmundsbury for three trumpets, with the trumpet soloists spaced round the hall. I am grateful to the Britten Estate and publishers Boosey & Hawkes for giving permission for the elements of Britten's fanfare to be incorporated in the collective work.- Paul HindmarshDuration: 19.30
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£104.99Parnassus (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Van der Roost, Jan
Since most of the bands competing in the 4th Section of the Dutch National Championships have many young players, this piece is stylistically youthful, especially in the opening and closing sections. An arpeggio pattern appears numerous times in all registers and is the basic musical element of the main melody, alternating with a second theme that has a slightly different melodic character. The middle section is conceived like a chorale, introduced and developed stepwise: firstly with short patterns and gradually in increasingly long snippets, until it's played in its glorious entirety at measure 216. No real solo passages are included but rather small chamber combinations, thus offering the opportunity to various players to display their technical and performance skills. The finale recaptures musical material from the first section of the piece and provides a majestic conclusion.Duration: 11:45
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£54.99Hymnus Antverpiae (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Van der Roost, Jan
This hymn was commissioned by "Antwerpen 93". And this city, on the banks of the river Schelde has been nominated "Cultural Capital of Europe" for 1993. The work-group "animatie" took the initiative and commissioned a hymn, which -as the finale to a grand open-air event on 27th March- was premired by hundreds of musicians from all over Europe. Philippe Langlet (France) was the conductor at this majestic occasion. Musically speaking the piece can no doubt be labelled easy. Indeed it is meant to represent a hymn, playable by all in different instrumental combinations. Consequently a variable instrumentation was chosen and a type of music, which by native is easily accessible and uncomplicated. The conductor is free -in the instrumentation- to score this piece according to his own taste. It is perhaps advisable to use the sharp brass in the forte parts, in order to make the range in the sound of the orchestra as colourful as possible. The percussion parts are not absolutely essential, so that the hymn can also be performed without percussion.Duration: 4:00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£84.99Convergents (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Cesarini, Franco
With Convergents Franco Cesarini has succeeded in composing a piece suitable for both concerts or contests which whilst not being too difficult still has the feel of a major work. This extremely rhythmical piece is built upon three themes which, after being introduced in turn, finally converge into the triumphal finale of the work. This scintillating work will be a definite enrichment to the repertoire of your concert band.Duration: 5:45
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£68.99Majesty (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Deleruyelle, Thierry
Majesty is a powerful and spectacular overture. The work opens with a brilliant fanfare before making way for a majestic hymn. The end of the piece repeats the opening fanfare as a monumental finale in the style of an American symphonic march. This composition is dedicated to Queen Elizabeth II.Duration: 6.15
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£94.9920,000 Leagues Under the Sea (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Harper, Philip
Frenchman Jules Verne was a pioneer in science fiction during the late 19th Century, penning some classic stories such as Journey to the Centre of the Earth and Around the World in 80 Days - both of which have already been the subject of brass band test-pieces. It was therefore natural for me to choose Verne's 1869 watery magnum opus as the subject for this piece to which there are five sections, as well as an introduction and a finale.THE NAUTILUS. After a mysterious introduction we are introduced to The Nautilus - a fantastical submarine.THE CORAL KINGDOM. We visit awe-inspiring underwater coral formations.SQUID ATTACK. The Nautilus is attacked by a school of giant squid, or 'devilfish'.CAPTAIN NEMO. Captain Nemo is a loner and an eccentric. Some say he is a madman. Soloists of the band help to uncover the character of this enigmatic but powerful figure.MAELSTROM. The Nautilus is dragged into the ocean's deadliest whirlpool but Captain Nemo lives to fight another day.Duration: 12.30
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£43.99
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (Brass Band - Score only) - Harper, Philip
Frenchman Jules Verne was a pioneer in science fiction during the late 19th Century, penning some classic stories such as Journey to the Centre of the Earth and Around the World in 80 Days - both of which have already been the subject of brass band test-pieces. It was therefore natural for me to choose Verne's 1869 watery magnum opus as the subject for this piece to which there are five sections, as well as an introduction and a finale.THE NAUTILUS. After a mysterious introduction we are introduced to The Nautilus - a fantastical submarine.THE CORAL KINGDOM. We visit awe-inspiring underwater coral formations.SQUID ATTACK. The Nautilus is attacked by a school of giant squid, or 'devilfish'.CAPTAIN NEMO. Captain Nemo is a loner and an eccentric. Some say he is a madman. Soloists of the band help to uncover the character of this enigmatic but powerful figure.MAELSTROM. The Nautilus is dragged into the ocean's deadliest whirlpool but Captain Nemo lives to fight another day.Duration: 12.30
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£75.00Facets of Glass (Brass Band - Score and Parts) - Langford, Gordon
Set as the Third Section test piece for the 2022 Regional Championships of the British Brass Band Championships of Great Britain. This a new edition prepared especially for the 2022 Regionals.The works consists of four contrasting movements movements:Prelude - Fusion (Andante Moderato)Scherzo - Celebration (Presto)Meditation - Lathom Park Chapel (Andante Religioso)Finale - Visions (Allegretto con Spirito)Duration: 10.15
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£22.00Journey of the Lone Wolf (Brass Band - Score only)
Championship Section Test Piece for the 2016 National Finals of the British Brass Band Championship.The Lone Wolf of the title is the great Hungarian composer and folklorist Bla Bartok. Bartok's journey took him from the hills of the Balkans to the heart of the new world. His singular vision may have meant a life out in the cold, a life without warmth and love, a life without true happiness, a death mourned by a few in a strange land.The first of the three linked movements is capturing the Peasants' Song and follows the young Bartok and fellow composer Zoltan Kolday as they embark on Summertime adventures through the Hungarian countryside to collect and catalogue the astonishing variety of Gypsy and folk music heard in the Balkan hills. The arrival of WW1 plunges Bartok's beloved Hungary into chaos.Bartok was at times a cold man, aloof and lonely. The occasional moments of tenderness he showed are portrayed in Night Music. His brief but intense affairs speak of a love he could only long for. Jazz is my night music and here there are hints of what Bartok may have heard in the USA later in his life.Having been forced by the world's evils to leave his homeland of Hungary for America Bartok, the anti-fascist, felt isolated and angry. In the finale, Flight and Fight, we hear his longing for a simpler time of Gypsy folk dances as well as his maturity and depth as a composer finally exploring deeper colours and darker themes.Duration: 15.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
-
£40.00Abide With Me (Euphonium Solo with Brass Band - Score and Parts) - McGhee, Paul
My arrangement of William H. Monk's tune of 1861, uses the euphonium soloist as the central figure for the melodic line in the three verses. Surrounding the solo line is an irregular pulsed figure in the percussion to give the music an unsettled feel whilst the muted ensemble lightly colour the melodic contour of the soloist. From the low beginnings of the piece, where no high instrumentation is used, we are led through the darkened texture to a bright finale, although the sense of the forbidding is always present.Abide With Me has always been a favourite hymn of mine and it was when watching the film 28 Days Later that I believed it would make a rather striking arrangement for brass band. This was confirmed further when the hymn was used at the 2012 opening ceremony of the London Olympics. The juxtaposition between the static, slow moving melody and the rhythmic effects of the dancers was something that I thought could be captured in an arrangement.- Paul McGheeDuration: 5.00
Estimated dispatch 7-14 working days
View Music