Bandworks Publications

Audio Available

Component

Delivery

Eprint Folders

Format

Grade

Instrument

Item Sequence

Large Print Edition

Marketed Status

Minimum Sell Quantity

MINTS Data Available

Product Line

Prop65

Score Available

Video Available

It takes great courage to succeed in any area of music - we risk being right as much as we risk being wrong. Sometimes our efforts are met with acclaim and approval, and yet other times we face critical review and skepticism (warranted and unwarranted). Dancing Under the Stars is about the the joy and freedom in being yourself and pursuing your own dreams, regardless of the approval of others. It's quirky, fun, optimistic, and always joyful.

Dancing Under the Stars

Concert Band Score & Parts

Country Sketches is a two-movement work that encapsulates my journey growing up on a farm in Western Pennsylvania. It is personal programmatic music that has moments of innocence, hope, and joy as the story unfolds. I owe my family thanks for how and where I was raised, for it has served me well being a husband and father to my own family today. Movement I: Sunrise on the Hill captures the innocence and warmth of a beautiful sunrise on a hill just up the road from our farm house. One of my best memories growing up was playing cards into the early morning hours with my brother, cousin, and grandmother. Following those card games, we would leave my grandmother's place for a sleep over under the stars on the hill. As it was one of the highest points in our area and offered a wonderful view in any direction, the sunrise on those mornings would be spectacular. It was a treat to wake up before the sun hit and watch nature in all its beauty begin the day. Movement II: All in a Day's Work implies just what my father always told me: "There's always work to be done on the farm". Though many days would be long baling hay and straw, running wagons for my father, making repairs, and feeding our cows, the feeling at the end of the day was always one of satisfaction. The times I spent with my brother on these days created a number of great memories as we talked about movies, music, sports, our hopes, ideas, and dreams. Some days felt like work (I had the sore arms to prove it!), but most days felt like an enjoyable time helping my father with his "hobby". Summer was and still is a busy time on the farm, and it was during these days I learned that sometimes satisfaction is in the completion of a job and doing it well.

Country Sketches

Una Noche en Varadero is a Salsa-inspired piece for Wind Ensemble incorporating elements of Latin music such as the 3-2 and 2-3 clave, bass drum tumbao, piano montunos, jazz harmonies, and stylistic scoops and falls. The piece also has a percussion feature using Latin percussion such as the guiro, timbales, and congas. Salsa music initially started to rise in New York City during the 1960’s as many Cubans and Puerto Ricans (think West Side Story) who moved there began to fuse musical styles like the Cuban son montuno, cha cha, and mambo with elements of jazz as well as rock, RB, and funk. Salsa actually means "sauce" in Spanish and normally refers to the spiciness of Latin and Caribbean cuisine, but in the context of the musical style, it carries a slightly different interpretation of frenzied, "hot," or wild. Una Noche en Varadero begins somewhat "tamely" during the introduction until bar 31 when the conductor yells out, "Uno! Dos! Tres! Cuatro!" starting a faster tempo that gradually speeds up throughout the piece until the wild finale with the whole ensemble falling off their last pitch.

Una Noche en Varadero

A short, vibrant fanfare (only 2:00 in duration) which begins softly with percussion and builds to grand lyric statements.

Celebration Fanfare

John Dowland (1563-1626) was an English Renaissance composer, singer, and lute virtuoso who was well known for his melancholy songs. The melody, "Flow My Tears", is considered one of his most famous songs and originally appeared in three versions: one for solo voice with lute accompaniment; another for four singers with lute accompaniment; and third, as a consort of five viols with lute accompaniment. The consort title of Lachrimae Antiquae is the first of "Seven Tears" in his published edition of 1604.

Lachrimae

Let the Future Begin was commissioned by the Eastern Arizona College Band, Geoff De Spain, Director, in celebration of EAC's 125th Anniversary Year. The story of EAC is a remarkable one of endurance and perseverance. Chartered in 1888, over two decades before Arizona became a state, this institution has experienced nine changes to its name and serious threats of closure on more than one occasion. Whatever the challenge, EAC has managed to not only survive, but also to thrive while fulfilling its mission of providing an outstanding educational experience to generations of residents in the Gila Valley. The school's motto, "Let the future begin", reflects the spirit of the college, and of this piece which honors it's longevity.

Let the Future Begin

This work was in remembrance of my time in the Caldwell-West Caldwell School District in Caldwell, NJ, in the spring of 2023 as a temporary replacement high school band director. I taught high school band and gave instrumental lessons at the elementary and middle schools, so I essentially taught at  all three school levels for about four months. And my time there has been life-changing because the experience there taught me valuable skills that I can bring to my future school. But most importantly, my students and staff, whom I got to work with for only a short period, reminded me how much I love  teaching band and why I cherish instrumental music as an important means of expression.

Autumn Winds

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach (1867-1944) was a virtuoso pianist, and the first female composer in the United States to garner success in her native country and abroad. She began her composition career at the tender age of four, and made her public debut as soloist when she was seven. She was a very prolific composer, producing over 150 works of various genres, including chamber works, concertos, songs, and large-scale orchestral and choral works. She also wrote volumes of music for solo piano, which are still in print today. Bal Masque ("The Masked Ball"), a charming little work for solo piano which dates from 1894, is emblematic of Beach's early style. It contains all of the elegance, humor, and good cheer found in much of her music, and this orchestration for wind band by Patrick Burns reflects the colorful spirit of Beach's original composition.

Bal Masque

The work is a study of sorts in contrast and harmony, although those two elements are not the only focus. Up spins together beautiful melodies, fresh harmonies, a relentless ostinato, whimsical solos, and moments of pure exaltation and affirmation. The thrill of seeing your dreams come true and your hard work and dedication to craft paying off is a great personal joy. And this piece, while inspired by hot air balloons, depicts the exhilaration one feels when achieving one’s goals becomes a reality.

Now Is The Time (A Song of Hope) was written in the Fall of 2013 in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of civil rights leader Martin Luther King's famous 'I Have A Dream' speech, given on August 28, 1963 in Washington, D.C. The piece was written as a tribute to Dr. King's life and work, as well as the many other civil rights activists who fought so courageously for equality and an end to racial injustice in the 1950's and 1960's. More broadly, it is a musical portrayal of the pursuit of freedom and equality that many in our country still dream of. In his speech, Dr. King asks for the United States to hold true to its founding doctrines of equality for all men and women, and freedom from oppression. The piece begins with a clarinet solo, so simple and pure. It represents the basic ideals of our founding fathers and the American Dream. So as our country began with these ideals the piece starts with this motive and it appears throughout the work.

Now is the Time

BLINK was written for Andrew Spang and the Folly Quarter Middle School Symphonic Wind Ensemble as the first installment of their 'Play It Forward' commissioned works program. The piece is intended to symbolize the various stages of life and how quickly they pass by. Each section introduces a small idea or theme, which becomes a more prominent motive in the next section...much like the transitional incidents of our lives. The basic timeline follows birth, youth, learning and discovery, love and adulthood, having one's own children, and eventually the reflection of a full and happy life. It's a true celebration of life, which is inspired by Mr. Spang's spirit as a teacher, musician, colleague and friend.

Blink

I began my teaching career at Harrisburg High School in Harrisburg, Arkansas. When I first began teaching there, the entire band program consisted of 35 students. For the first several years, the high school band was very small and finding good music for our instrumentation was challenging. One of my favorite pieces we played from this period in our program's development was Canticle by Douglas Wagner. In Canticle, Wagner managed to craft an absolutely beautiful piece of music that had many musical challenges, but was written so that each instrument's part was unified; there was only one trumpet part, one clarinet part, etc. As both a director and a composer, I admired this feat of compositional skill. In Quiet Hours... is written in the same style. Each instrument's part is written as one part (with one or two divisi in octaves, to provide some range for more advanced ensembles). In writing it, I hope to provide another piece of worthwhile literature for schools with reduced instrumentation, many young players, or both. The title describes the hours in which music educators make the decisions that will bring success, joy, and passion to their students. Randall Standridge

In Quiet Hours

For those who have not traveled to North Carolina, two of the state's most breathtaking natural features are the Outer Banks and the Blue Ridge Mountains. The piece attempts to express the beauty of these places through styles of music that are rooted in the rich culture and history of North Carolina - Appalachian folk songs, African American work songs, and hymn singing. The journey begins on the Outer Banks, which are beaches that stretch for miles along the Atlantic coastline. A succession of waves crashes ashore, gaining momentum as each new instrument enters the texture. The succession climaxes in one large wave that propels the music "inland," where we hear the main melodic theme delivered in the solo trumpet. This soulful tune emulates the sounds of an Appalachian fiddler. After the band delivers this theme, the journey turns to a darker chapter of this region's history. Between the Outer Banks and the Blue Ridge Mountains lies fertile farmland that was once cultivated by African slave labor. The music depicts this labor through a work song, which contains syncopated rhythms, blues scales, and call and response - all elements of music brought to America from Africa. Real chains are used in the percussion to emphasize the great struggle that the work song represents. As we continue westward, we begin our ascent of the magnificent Blue Ridge with a restatement of the first theme. As the band reaches its summit, the Appalachian tune is heard for the final time along with two familiar hymns, How Firm a Foundation and The Battle Hymn of the Republic, soaring gloriously over the great peaks and valleys of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

From the Banks to the Blue Ridge

Longing began as a choral piece based on the poem of the same name by British poet Matthew Arnold. In 2012, I took the choral work and expanded the material to create this work for band. Longing is a beautiful lyrical work depicting the feelings most all have dealt with in their search for love and companionship. When reading the poetry, the reader can imagine a person so desperately in love that it's all they can think about, but there is a feeling that this love is not meant to be and that it exists only in their mind. The piece creates a very lush and dreamy soundscape but in the end leaves the listener wanting more. Longing was premiered by the University of Portland Wind Symphony, Patrick Murphy conductor in October 2012.

Longing

Commissioned in 1947 by Leonard Falcone and the Michigan State University Band, Spiritual is the composer's first composition for the concert band medium, and is one of the earliest attempts by any composer at incorporating elements of bebop jazz into a band composition.

Spiritual

This rousing and rhythmic concert opener was written to commemorate Dr Jack Stamp's retirement from Indiana University. Anthony O'Toole pulls out all the stops with "Stamp-isms" - elements which make his music so recognizable and unique...such as polychords, imitative counterpoint, and his use of rhythm and meter.

Prelude to Something Big

Danzon was commissioned by Concordia University Music Department (Moorhead, MN) for their 2015 Honor Band. A light, dance-like work, the music recalls the musical style and language of Aaron Copland (Danzon Cubano) and Leonard Bernstein (Danzon).

Danzon

The title of this work is not a reference to a fertile desert area, but rather a metaphoric one: a place of reflection, rest, and refuge from the burdens of the world. We all have at least one oasis, whether it be another person, a faith, a pet, a vocation or a hobby - something or someone to whom we can turn for rejuvenation when we need it most.

Oasis

A stunning modern setting of the venerated American Civil War tune by Anthony O'Toole.

The Battle Cry of Freedom

The piece portrays the composer's best memories of his beloved hometown from his childhood. At once nostalgic and grand, Hometown Miniatures serves as a fond memento of growing up in a small town and being connected to a close-knit community.

Hometown Miniatures

Global Sections - CORE [DO NOT TOUCH]*

Favicon

Need Help? Contact Us or call 1-800-345-6296    Live Chat

Header

Don't have a business account? Create one

Products