Program
Symphonic Proclamation (1978) by David R. Gillingham (b.1947)
Sinfonia V: Symphonia Sacra et Profana (1990) by Timothy Broege (b.1947)
The Alcotts (1920, trans.1972) by Charles Ives (1874-1954), transcribed by Richard E. Thurston
Red Rock Mountain (2016) by Rossano Galante (b.1967)
Symphonic Proclamation
Symphonic Proclamation is one of Gillingham's earliest works for band, "Symphonic Proclamation" is a high-energy overture with an abundance of flourishes in the woodwinds and fanfares in the brass coupled with a catchy melody that will make this memorable for all.
- Note by publisher
Sinfonia V: Symphonia Sacra et Profana
Sinfonia V: Symphonia Sacra et Profana was composed in the summer of 1973 at Brielle, New Jersey, on commission from the University City High School Wind Ensemble of University City, Missouri; it was premiered by that group in 1974. Subsequently the work was taken up by such distinguished conductors as Eugene Corporon, Thomas Dvorak, Craig Kirchoff and H Robert Reynolds, receiving numerous performances in the United States, Canada, and England. Since its publication by Manhattan Beach Music in September of 1989 it has also traveled to Japan and Australia, and has become standard repertoire for high school as well as college bands and wind ensembles.
Sinfonia V is both a musical diary and a musical collage. I incorporated several musics that were much on my mind the time the work was written, including ragtime, which I had been studying intently for several years, as well as the plainchant hymn Divinum Mysterium, which the choir of First Presbyterian Church, Belmar, New Jersey (where I was, and still am, organist and director of music) had used as a processional at Christmas time. If one imagines dialing across the FM radio band in a large city such as New York, the resulting collage (or to be more accurate, montage, as in film editing) might include a bit of early music (the Pavanne, and the chorales by Samuel Scheidt), some ragtime or jazz, some contemporary music, some voices, some instruments, et cetera.
At the same time, Sinfonia V contrasts secular music -- such as the Pavanne and the ragtime fragments -- with sacred music such as the Scheidt chorales and the plainchant hymn. There is no attempt to reconcile these two musical traditions, and the work ends in ambiguity.
Some listeners have found humor in it. I am not so sure. Here are some of the music I was working with in the summer of 1973, assembled in what I hope is a convincing musical structure -- no padding, no transitions, no note-spinning. The piece aims to be concise and kaleidoscopic, profound as well as entertaining, sacred and profane.
- Program Note by Timothy Broege
The Alcotts
The Alcotts is the subject of one of Ives’s Essays Before a Sonata, which he published concurrently with the Concord Sonata in 1920. In the essay, Ives takes us inside the elm-shaped Orchard House where “sits the old spinet piano Sophia Thoreau gave to the Alcott children, on which Beth played the old Scotch airs, and played at Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.” Warming as always to such a scene of home music-making, he continues: “ All around you, under the Concord sky there still floats ... that human faith melody reflecting an innate hope, a common interest in common men, a tune that the Concord bards are ever playing when they pound away at the immensities with a Beethoven-like sublimity, and with vengeance and perseverance.”
- Program notes by Jonathan Elkus
Red Rock Mountain
Red Rock Mountain is an episodic work that paints a musical portrait of a beautiful mountain landscape. Brass fanfares and soaring wind lines begin the piece, transitioning into an emotional section depicting the mountains at dusk. As the sun rises and sheds light on its peaks, the music becomes lyrical and rhythmically incisive, culminating in a heroic brass finale that depicts the full grandeur of the mountains.
- Note by publisher