West City Youth Concert Band
Early Light — Carolyn Bremer
An up and coming name in the world of contemporary composers, Carolyn Bremer has created this arresting transcription for band of her orchestral work of the same name. Bright, tonal, and uplifting, the composition is as joyous and as full of wonder as is the title.
— Program Note from publisher
Originally written for the Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Early Light premiered in July 1995. According to the score notes:
The material is largely derived from The Star Spangled Banner. One need not attribute an excess of patriotic fervor in the composer as a source for this optimistic homage to our national anthem; Carolyn Bremer, a passionate baseball fan since childhood, drew upon her feelings of happy anticipation at hearing the anthem played before ball games when writing her piece. The slapstick heard near the end echoes the crack of the bat on a long home run.
Against the Rain — Roshanne Etezady
Against the Rain is based on a choral work I wrote as a part of a set of songs based on poems by Edna St. Vincent Willay.
Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,
Or nagged by want past resolution’s power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.
— Programme Note by composer
This work received its premiere performance at the Interlochen Arts Camp, Michigan, by the World Youth Wind Symphony under the baton of Steven D. Davis on July 14, 2014.
Roma — Valerie Coleman
A nation without a country is the best way to describe the nomadic tribes known as gypsies, or properly call, the Romani. Their traditions, their language (Roma), legends, and music stretch all over the globe. from the Middle East, the Mediterranean region, and the Iberian peninsula, across the ocean to the Americas.
Roma is a tribute to that culture, in five descriptive themes, as told through the eyes and hearts of Romani women everywhere: Romani Women, Mystic, Youth, Trickster, and History. The melodies and rhythms are a fusion of styles and cultures: malagueña of Spain, Argentine tango, Arabic music, Turkish folk songs, 3/2 Latin claves, and jazz.
— Program Note from score
In 2010, a consortium sponsored by the College Band Directors National Association’s Committee on Gender and Ethnic Issues offered Coleman a commission with very specific guidelines: In addition to the stipulation that the composer be from an underrepresented community, the premiere performance would be awarded to a high school with a largely minority student body – Roma High School, in Roma, Texas. As part of the project, Coleman visited Roma High School twice in order to gain a full appreciation of the program she was composing for, and she was inspired by the talent and range of the ability in the band. The title of the work is not only a tribute to the name of the school and town, but is also reference to another culture entirely.
— Program Note by Butler University Symphonic Wind Ensemble concert program, 2 March 2022
West City Concert Band
Illumination — David Maslanka
“Illumination” — lighting up, bringing light. Maslanka wrote, “I am especially interested in composing music for young people that allows them a vibrant experience of their own creative energy. A powerful experience of this sort stays in the heart and mind as a channel for creative energy, no matter what the life path.”
David Maslanka (1943-2017) was an American composer whose probing and introspective music ranges from chamber music miniatures to large, epic symphonies. His compositions for wind band won him particular acclaim, including more than a dozen concertos, seven symphonies (plus two more for orchestra)
https://windliterature.org/2024/08/12/illumination-by-david-maslanka/
Fantastic Dreams — Frank Ticheli
Fantastic Dreams was composed during a six-week residency in the late summer and early fall of 2023 at the McDowell Colony in Petersborough, New Hampshire. The work’s four short movements – really dreamscapes – are wide ranging in mood and style, yet connected via shared musical motives, gestures and themes.
Dancing with the Muses bursts for ecstatically, settling into a series of short, light-hearted variations, each showcasing a different instrument or group – bassoon, oboe, horns, alto saxophones, trumpets. Short episodes and ghostly gestures interrupt the variations, like unrelated thoughts interrupting a dream.
Elysian Fields is a meditation directly influenced by my quiet morning walks at the MacDowell Colony amid peaceful forests and meadows. Unhurried lyrical lines float over a gentle walking motif that lilts back and forth like a lullaby.
Magic Carpet is a brisk two-minute scherzo that whirls and whisks in daring flight. At the midpoint, a respite – featuring solo oboe and flute with celesta – is but a moment to catch one’s breath before hurtling on again in magical flight.
The dream journey takes a dark turn:
L.A. Noir pays tribute to old Hollywood’s film noir tradition – a frantic chase scene, a dark figure lurking in the shadows, a moment of quiet, anxious anticipation. Midway through, the calm oboe melody from the scherzo’s middle section reappears, now in a more menacing atmosphere. The suspense builds relentlessly, the music culminating in a ferocious roar that suggests the melodramatic endings typical of many film noir pictures.
Program Note by composer:
https://www.windrep.org/Fantastic_Dreams
Bio:
Educated at the University of Michigan, composer Frank Ticheli (b. 1958) has become one of the biggest names in new wind band repertoire. Since 1991 he has been a Professor of Composition USC-Thornton and was a longstanding Composer in Residence of the Pacific Symphony. He is the recipient of many awards, including the 2006 NBA/William D. Revelli Memorial Band Composition Contest for his Symphony No. 2.