SKU: CL.012-4406-01

This exciting piece depicts the many facets of the once-endangered jaguar. The longing opening statements and animated main theme transition into a soloistic, lonesome melodic section that offers a haunting conversation amongst several key instruments. An energetic pursuit and capture of prey is depicted by several percussion instruments, and is followed by a return to the original theme with a powerful finish. Performers will enjoy working on this mixed-meter adventure, which can easily be incorporated into your project-based learning opportunities.

SKU: BA.BA11086

ISBN 9790006564446. 32.5 x 25.5 cm inches.

A suite whose movements always deliver something other than what they seem to promise. But throughout, the two instruments and respectively their players act like two people in very specific situations:

I.: The opening movement is reserved for the piano; the initially earnest, solitary cantilena intensifies creating expectation. Suddenly
II.: the violin sounds. Its moving figures replace the now silent piano, also soloistically.
III. „Passacaglia“: The title is taken literally – the two instruments/persons encounter each other in the street. Two musical characters who meet at a specific point, recognize each other, but move on again, each one by itself.
IV. „Rondo“: The two of them dance together. Before me, I saw people dancing the Sardana – a round dance – in front of the cathedral of Barcelona. Four themes in different time signatures circle ceaselessly between the two instruments.
V. „Fuga“: At last, regardless, panic flight – again the title is taken literally ... Human, only too human …

SKU: PR.114422950

ISBN 9781491134870. UPC: 680160685370.

HALL OF GHOSTS was composed in 2020 during the Covidlockdown period. Evocative of imagined spirits in an empty concert hall, the music pits dramatic silences, amid searching and plaintive phrases of the clarinet, against a lively middle section — a dialogue between the ticking of time and an instrument striving to make itself heard. The work was inspired by piccoloist Gudrun Hinze’s video for Harberg’s Prayer Project, filmed in the hauntingly empty Gewandhaus Chamber Music Hall.
Hall of Ghosts was composed in April 2020 as a “thank you” gift dedicated to the wonderful community of flutists who participated in my Prayer Project – a virtual flute orchestra project that I produced during the Covid-19 lockdown period. In July 2021, I arranged Hall of Ghosts for clarinetist Christopher Pell, who premiered the new version at the Interlochen Center for the Arts.Hall of Ghosts was inspired by piccoloist Gudrun Hinze, who recorded her part for the Prayer Project in the empty Gewandhaus Chamber Music Hall. This hall would normally be full of musicians rehearsing and performing, but now, due to Covid-19, the hall lay empty and filled only with echoes and memories. The image of Gudrun’s solitary piccolo inspired in me a musical invocation, imploring the spirits to let the music return.In the first section, the silence of rests and pauses creates an expressive background for the searching and plaintive phrases of the solo piccolo. The lively middle section is a contrapuntal dialogue between the ticking of time and an instrument striving to make itself heard. These materials trade off throughout the piece. You can decide through your interpretation on who wins. The music? Or the ghosts?

SKU: HL.44007325

UPC: 884088245221. 9.0x12.0x0.173 inches. English-German-French-Dutch.

Colorado Springs was commissioned by the United States Air Force Academy Band, Lieutenant Steve Grimo, Commmander/Conductor. Colorado Springs, home of the USAF Academy, is set in spectacular landscape towards the southern end of the Rocky Mountains and is a popular tourist resort for skiing and hiking. The Academy plays an important part in the life of the area and serves as a base for the USAFA Band, one of the professional bands forming part of the musical life of the U.S. Air Force. The suite is in three movements: 1. The Springs (fanfare) - The Springs is the local residents' name for the town, and this first movement starts with a stirring fanfare for brass and percussion, opening with bold unison horns. The rest of the brass join in and woodwind add decorative figures. After a short change of style, the opening material reappears to close the movement. 2. Seven Falls - Seven Falls is a spectacular waterfall near to the town which cascades 181 feet in seven distinct steps down a solid cliff of pikes peak granite. In this movement, high woodwinds describe the sparkling water as it descends to a popular lookout post near the bottom of the falls. 3. Pikes Peak - To the north-west of the town and reaching an altitude 14,110 feet, Pikes Peak is the farthest east of the big peaks in the Rocky Mountain chain, which contributed to its early fame among explorers and pioneers, and made it the symbol of the 1859 Gold Rush to Colorado with the slogan, Pikes Peak or Bust. It is the second-most visited mountain in the world behind Japan's Mount Fuji. This atmospheric movement describes the majesty of the mountain and is based around the fanfare from the first movement. Opening on a solitary bassoon, it is not long before the main theme appears under bubbling woodwinds. The music reaches a passionate climax at which point the opening fanfare reappears to bring the whole work to a close.

SKU: KJ.WB214

Spirited of the Land, the first of this four movement programmatic work, is inspired by the 1914 painting by Charles Russell, When the Land Belonged to God, and the composer's travel in the west. A Frontier Lawman, vividly depicts the swagger and demeanor of legendary lawman, Nathaniel Kimball Boswell. Cowboy Meditation, the third movement of West!, captures the spirit of the solitary life of the cowboy on the plains - his thoughts and the calls of the wild surrounding him. Railtown Jubilee, brings West! to a close representing the dramatic impact the railroad had on the West. Use this as an opportunity for making interdisciplinary connections.

About Standard of Excellence in Concert

The Standard of Excellence In Concert series presents exceptional arrangements, transcriptions, and original concert and festival pieces for beginning and intermediate band. Each selection is correlated to a specific page in the Standard of Excellence Band Method, reinforcing and expanding skills and concepts introduced in the method up to that point. Exciting parts with extensive cross-cueing are presented for every player. Accessible ranges, appropriate rhythmic challenges, and creative percussion section writing enhance the pedagogical value of the series.

Sold individually, each In Concert selection includes a full Conductor Score and enough student parts for large symphonic bands. Each student part also includes correlated Warm-Up Studies. The Conductor Score comes complete with rehearsal suggestions, a composer biography, program notes, a rehearsal piano part, several ready-to-duplicate worksheets and a duplicable written quiz.