Jubilee

George Whitefield Chadwick (1854-1931) was an American composer. His style is regarded as 'American' but this was overshadowed towards the end of his life when music by Gershwin and Copland became yet even more 'American'. 'Jubilee' is the first movement of 'Symphonic Sketches', a programmatic four movement work that was composed over a 10 year period. 'Jubilee' is written in a quasi-rondo form with three elements: a high-spirited fanfare-like motif in rapid 6/4 time containing exciting cross rhythms, a melodic, slightly less energetic motif in 4/4 time and a lovely bucolic melody which is preceded each time by a French horn mini-fanfare. Each motif is developed in subsequent returns.