Arrangement: Moss John. Par PORTER COLE. Bénéficiant actuellement d'un renouveau avec succès à Broadway, cette comédie musicale classique Cole Porter comporte certaines de ses chansons les plus connus. Dans les mains de maître arrangeur John Moss, ce medley scintille avec showbiz illustrations graphiques, y compris les chansons/ Recueil / Orchestre D'Harmonie

America, the Beautiful. Par CURNOW JAMES. The perfect arrangement for your Beginning Band’s first patriotic performance! There are lots of opportunities for young players to solidify basic skills here. A few easy accidentals, articulations, dynamics, and phrasing can all be taught while rehearsing Sea to Shining Seay. There are many more uses for this arrangement than the typical concert setting, too. Does your student body meet at the flag pole on Monday mornings for a flag salute? Play it there. How about a short performance at a school board meeting? The possibilities are endless! Don’t miss it! / Niveau : 0.5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band

Par VAN DER ROOST JAN. This piece was commissioned by the ‘Concert Band Vlamertinge’ and is a plea for peace: the title translates as ‘Peace on Earth’. This is expressed by means of the vocal contribution expected from the performers. In various places of the piece you can recognize, the words ‘Et In Terra Pax’ - an appeal for peace - at first jumbled together but later more rhythmically structured, developing into synchronized massed voices. The work starts with a pentatonic theme based on the notes D, E, G, A and C (taken from ‘ConCErtbAnD VlAmErtinGE’ and the name of the conductor, NiCk VAnDEnDriessChe). A somewhat sad melody is developed during an orchestral climax which leads to the firstexplosion of sound (measure 62 onwards). Suddenly the opening measures are recaptured, albeit with a differently colored sound: the words ‘Et In Terra Pax’ bring the first movement to a close. A restless Allegro follows which abruptly stops and is replaced by a calming cho-rale-like passage. A narrator reads aloud the poem ‘Sonnet’ by the young poet Charles Hamilton Sorley, who was killed during World War I. This poem fittingly puts into words the cruelty and senselessness of war. After the expanded recapitulation of the allegro, the broad, almost infinite atmosphere of the beginning returns. Clarinet and English horn play the pentatonic opening theme once more, this time broadly, while the words ‘Et In Terra. . . Pax’ are repeated again and again by the rest of the orchestra. The composer has purposely avoided all forms of aggression and bombastic sounds regularly used in works about war. Fear of violence and destruction can be heard and felt during the allegro passages. The charged opening makes way in the end for hope: May peacefulness replace cruelty in everyday life, too. / Niveau : 4 / Répertoire / Concert Band ou Harmonie

Par CURNOW JAMES. Throughout the colonial period in America, country dancing was the principal recreation of all social classes. Americans had inherited this tendency from Elizabethan England, and many continental Europeans also took up English country dancing as their own. Four Colonial Country Dances feature country dance tunes that were indigenous to New England and particularly to the Boston area. / Niveau : 5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band ou Harmonie

Par DE HAAN JACOB. This composition is based on a passacaglia theme, in which artistic perfection, symphonic drama and oriental melody lines play a role. The passacaglia is originally a dance made up of a series of variations above a bass line constantly present as an ostinato. It is not in this sense that the 'Symphonic Variations' are in the passacaglia form but in the sense of the open form of the variations. Jacob de Haan, himself originally an organist, took his inspiration for this piece from the famous passacaglia for organ in C-minor by J. S. Bach. Following the introduction of the passacaglia theme (in the bass) the entry by the trumpets and trombones forms the majestic start to amusical adventure, in which this theme (often fragmentary) returns in variations. Then there follow two faster movements with dramatic contrasts and virtuose passages. Particularly striking here is the use of two characteristic intervals from the beginning of the theme namely the minor second and the augmented fourth. An apause in the composition comes in the slow bridge where a syncopated bourdon (perfect fifth) is constantly repeated. The tension grows in dynamics and harmony, and the oriental-flavour becomes obvious in the melody. We arrive at a faster movement via an accelerando, in which a perpetuum mobile based on the passacaglia theme is central. Finally the whole flows into a martial theme, in which the ostinato accompaniment n the descant derives from the passacaglia theme. / Niveau : 5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band

Par BULLA STEPHEN. Spirited rhythms underpin three great Old West songs in Stephen Bulla’s Along Came the Cowboys. You’ll find a bonanza of great teaching tools in this Western extravaganza: phrase extensions, style contrasts, dynamic and articulation considerations, rhythmic counterpoint, and much more. Your young musicians will really enjoy playing music that employs the types of mechanisms standardised by decades of cowboy movie underscoring. This is something your students can definitely get into! What a great supporting assignment to have your students try to find examples of comparable musical treatments on their movie videos and DVDs. / Niveau : 2.5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band ou Harmonie

Par CURNOW JAMES. Throughout the colonial period in America, country dancing was the principal recreation of all social classes. Americans had inherited this tendency from Elizabethan England, and many continental Europeans also took up English country dancing as their own. Four Colonial Country Dances feature country dance tunes that were indigenous to New England and particularly to the Boston area. / Niveau : 5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band

Par BULLA STEPHEN. Spirited rhythms underpin three great Old West songs in Stephen Bulla’s Along Came the Cowboys. You’ll find a bonanza of great teaching tools in this Western extravaganza: phrase extensions, style contrasts, dynamic and articulation considerations, rhythmic counterpoint, and much more. Your young musicians will really enjoy playing music that employs the types of mechanisms standardised by decades of cowboy movie underscoring. This is something your students can definitely get into! What a great supporting assignment to have your students try to find examples of comparable musical treatments on their movie videos and DVDs. / Niveau : 2.5 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band

Par HOSAY JAMES L.. If you seek truly dramatic music, look to opera. Opera has been enormously influential on Classical, Popular, and Film and Television music over the years. James L. Hosay’s new intermediate level piece, OPERATICA, incorporates the important elements of Opera and Classical music to bring exhilarating drama to the concert band stage. Style and technical considerations make this a rich learning experience for the band. Add in the dimension of music history by studying Opera and Classical music, and you have a wonderful teaching tool! The grand theme explores a multitude of colors as it twists and turns its way through opera-style development and variation. Whether for formal, festival, or spring concert use, you will find this to be a thrilling addition to your library. Opulent! / Niveau : 3 / Pièce de concert / Répertoire / Concert Band ou Harmonie