Palmetto Concert Band

Contemporain

Soso

Wind Ensemble

Wind Band Works

NPR Daugherty Interview with Jacqueline Nalbloom Iowa Public Radio

Live recording of "Wine-Dark Sea: Symphony for Band" by John Mackey.
Performed by the University of Texas Wind Ensemble, conducted by Jerry Junkin.
Program note and full score available here:
http://ostimusic.com/WineDarkSea.php

Wine-Dark Sea: 1. Hubris

Johan de Meij - Symphony No. 2  The Big Apple   Skyline, Allegro Assai

"The Ringmaster's March" by John Mackey
Movement 4 of the suite, "The Soul Has Many Motions."
view the full score here: http://ostimusic.com/Ringmasters-media.php
Performed by the University of Texas at Arlington Wind Symphony, conducted by Doug Stotter

John Mackey: The Ringmaster's March

EDGES is inspired by several events in my life over the period of 1995-97.  Two are near-death experiences, while the third is the sudden passing of one of my closest colleagues and best friends, Professor Robert Cooper.  

The first movement, "BACK FROM THE EDGE", is a chronicle of the battle that I waged with "flesh-eating strep", which nearly cost me my life in spring, 1995.  A fragment of a line from French playwright Jean Genet’s “Prisoner of Love” served as additional inspiration: 

 “perhaps all music, even the newest, is not so much something discovered as something that re-emerges from where it lay in memory, inaudible as a melody cut in a disc of flesh.  A composer lets me hear a song that has always been shut up silent within me.”

In a sense, my life has re-emerged from where it lay, for a while, silent, in memory.

Movement II, "POSTCARDS", is inspired by my mentor and friend, composer Donald Erb, who had his own near-death experience about a year later in the same Ithaca, New York hospital (a bizarre coincidence).  I know that he shared many of the mental aberrations I experienced during the recovery process, and POSTCARDS reflects the strange visions, the elusive but more and more frequent moments of clarity, and the eventual return to reality that such experiences create.  For me, in retrospect, these thoughts were like vivid postcards of other realities, sent to me by another part of my mind and filtered through the pain, the fear, and the medications that I had been given.  There was also a highly obsessive quality to my thoughts during the reco-very, which is reflected in the primary melodic material which simply refuses to disappear, though it changes colors, dynamics, and tempos at every turn.

Postcards -- real postcards, that is -- also played a role in my experiences.  While recovering, I received a post card (often of questionable taste) every two or three days from Don.  When it was his turn to be in recovery, it was my turn to send him postcards (equally questionable)...they seem now to me to be a lifeline to reality from people who are eager to welcome us back.

A quote was inspirational for this second movement as well, this time from Hermann Hesse’s Damien:

“In each individual the spirit is made flesh, in each one the whole of creation suffers, in each one a Savior is crucified.”

The final movement is a reflection on the amazing, wonderful, and sometimes difficult life of my colleague, Robert Cooper.  Robert had, without a doubt, the speediest metabolism of anyone I have ever known.  Lunch with Robert could be defined as both of us eating for the first five minutes and Robert watching me finish eating for the last 45.  Robert had two computers in his office and a phone; often all three were busy at once, while he carried on at least one additional conversation with whomever was present.  Yet Robert had great depth too.  He was a living example to students and colleagues, especially in facing life’s travails with courage and conviction.  He was also funny as hell.  I suppose that Robert’s pace was impossible to sustain, and in fact he died suddenly at age 45 on September 18, 1997. 

No quotations needed with this movement.  This one’s for you, man.


EDGES Movement III OhMan for wind ensemble

EDGES Movement II Postcards for wind ensemble

EDGES Movement I Back from the Edge for wind ensemble

La Grive Musicenne (Messiaen) Excerpt/ Camp Meeting

Music: “Picture Etudes” for Solo Piano: Three Pierrots
Composer: Adam Schoenberg
Artist: Nadia Shpachenko
Album: Woman at the New Piano: American Music of 2013
Label: FRESH! From Reference Recordings
Street Date: November 11, 2014

http://referencerecordings.com
Amazon: http://amzn.to/1BWsdYL

World Premiere recordings of new works for piano, chamber instruments and electronics from 4 notable modern composers: Tom Flaherty, James Matheson, Adam Schoenberg, and Peter Yates

Featuring Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman: piano, percussion;
with Genevieve Feiwen Lee: piano, toy piano, electronics

This innovative project of new compositions brings together piano repertoire representing the diversity of today’s American classical music. With sounds and textures both new and familiar, both tumultuous and contemplative, all the pieces touch on themes of transformation, of resonances across time, and of cycles of rebirth. The four composers present a snapshot of the many facets of piano music in 2013, the beginning of a new era of pianism.

Steinway Artist Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman has performed extensively in solo recitals and with orchestras in major venues across North America, Europe and Asia. Described by critics as a "truly inspiring and brilliant pianist... spellbinding in sensitivity and mastery of technique," Nadia enjoys bringing into the world things that are outside the box – powerful pieces that often possess unusual sonic qualities or instrumentation. Nadia’s concert highlights include solo recitals at Carnegie Hall, Concertgebouw, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, as well as numerous appearances as a soloist with orchestras in Europe and the Americas. An enthusiastic promoter of contemporary music, she has been chosen to give world and national premieres of more than 50 works by Elliott Carter, George Crumb, Tom Flaherty, Annie Gosfield, Leon Kirchner, Amy Kirsten, Hannah Lash, James Matheson, Harold Meltzer, Adam Schoenberg, Lewis Spratlan, Iannis Xenakis, Peter Yates, and others. Winner of more than a dozen piano competitions, Nadia currently serves on the faculties of Cal Poly Pomona and Claremont Graduate Universities.

This album is produced by six-time GRAMMY® nominees Marina and Victor Ledin, engineered and edited by the uncompromising and innovative engineer, Barry Werger-Gottesman. Recorded at Pomona College, Claremont, California, July 11-14, 2013

FRESH! is part of Reference Recordings’ mission to encourage new artists and give them a strong platform for promotion and sales nationally and internationally.

Adam Schoenberg: Picture Etudes for Solo Piano: Three Pierrots

We Move Lightly

به مژگان سیه کردی هزاران رخنه در دینم
بیا کز چشم بیمارت هزاران درد برچینم
الا ای همنشین دل که یارانت برفت از یاد
مرا روزی مباد آن دم که بی یاد تو بنشینم
حافظ

Olafur Arnalds, Shajarian, Nils Frahm, Andalibi

there are no words - by James M. Stephenson
This is the version for concert band (or wind ensemble)
http://stephensonmusic.com/product/there-are-no-words-band/
VIEW SCORE here:
http://stephensonmusic.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/there-are-no-words-concert-band-score-FINAL.pdf

Program notes can be found at the link above.
Please look at the score to see how the last section of the work (starting at 9:20) uses the names of the victims as inspiration for the melody.
Jim Stephenson; 
August 7, 2015 (original version premiere; Nathan Tucker and Chamber Music Charleston)
February 20, 2016 (concert band premiere; Scott Weiss and Palmetto Concert Band) 


there are no words - for concert band

Commissioned by the SEC Band Directors Association
I've always wanted to write an "easy piece" for winds that explored the kind of long lines and introspective expression I tend to work with in the majority of my music. When this commission came along, the partners and I were excited at the notion of creating something in that vein for the many great high school and middle school groups as well as for the second and third bands at the fabulous universities across the southeastern united states. 
It was with that in mind that wrote My Eyes are Full of Shadow.

"My eyes are full of shadow, and my part
Of life is yesterday."
—Edith Nesbit
I've always been a person prone to melancholy. My mother used to say that I had periods of sadness interrupted by periods where I was happy about being sad.
As an adult, I've learned to be contented in these low periods and in those moments I seek out the healing power of music and poetry. Edith Nesbit's "Age to Youth," from which this work's title is taken, describes looking back on a moment of pain in the past and an inability—an unwillingness?—to move beyond it.
Finding this poem brought me great joy in connecting to its sadness.
My Eyes Are Full of Shadow opens with an optimism of a new day but as the cadences are consistently left largely unfulfilled, we realize something is amiss.
Each attempted restart of the opening results in another aborted cadence and now they are frequently interrupted by a simple, sad chaconne. Reflecting the poem's insistence on living in the past, this interrupting chaconne grows more insistent and eventually gives way to a return to the opening but now colored by the assertions of the chaconne.
My Eyes are Full of Shadow was commissioned by the SEC Band Directors Association for its members.

This is a live performance from the Palmetto Concert Band with Cormac Cannon conducting.
Find out more at joelpuckett.com

My Eyes are Full of Shadow (Premiere)

My 3rd Mash up in Feb
Persian Olafur!
For the love of "Study for Player Piano (i)" and the serenity of music which Olafur has brought to my life.
and Shajarian the voice for years.


هشیار کسی باید کز عشق بپرهیزد
وین طبع که من دارم با عقل نیامیزد

گر سیل عقاب آید شوریده نیندیشد
ور تیر بلا بارد دیوانه نپرهیزد
آخر نه منم تنها در بادیه سودا
عشق لب شیرینت بس شور برانگیزد



https://twitter.com/OlafurArnalds/status/864213241421070341
, خود الافر این مش اپ رو   نوشته که دوست داره*

هوشیار کسی باید(sane is the one who)

تو کافردل ...
_________________
To Kafardel
A mix by @thesepanta

Vocal: Mohmmadreza Shajarian
Ambient Music: @olafur-arnalds - Lynn's Theme
Lyrics: Hafez Shirazi

Also on Youtube (with translation): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDBu4iZ-1YI
Download on Telegram: https://t.me/tsepanta/9

To KafarDel (Shajarian | Arnalds)

Opening de Philip Glass

گر تواش وعده ی دیدار ندادی امشب
پس چرا دیده ی من از همه بیدارتر است
_________________
Ze Mojgane Siahe To
A mix by @thesepanta

Vocal: Mohammadreza Shajarian
Ambient Music: @olafur-arnalds - Alice Enters
Lyrics: Foroughi Bastami

Also on Youtube (with translation): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UTyv5caWtE
Download on Telegram: https://t.me/tsepanta/22

Ze Mojgane Siahe To (Shajarian | Arnalds)

Ligeti étude book 1 "Fanfares" live

Joel Puckett is a composer leaving both audiences and the press buzzing. His music has been described as, “soaringly lyrical” (Minneapolis Star Tribune), “Puccini-esque” (Wall Street Journal), and “containing a density within a clarity, polyphony within the simple and – most importantly – beautiful and seemingly spiritual.” (Audiophile Audition). Parterre Box recently proclaimed, “Puckett should be a household name” and the Philadelphia Inquirer’s David Patrick Stearns mused, “if the name Joel Puckett isn’t etched into your brain, it should be.” In 2011 NPR Music listed him as one of the top 100 composers under 40 in the world.

Hailed as “visionary” (Washington Post) and “an astonishingly original voice” (Philadelphia Inquirer), his music is performed by the leading artists of our day and is consistently recognized by organizations such as the American Composers Forum, BMI, Chorus America, National Public Radio, and the American Bandmasters Association.

Puckett’s music attracts diverse performers and listeners through its emotional energy and commitment. Melding tradition with innovation, his distinctive style grows from his power to create transcendent experiences using charismatic musical language.

The Fix, a grand opera commissioned by Minnesota Opera, premiered in the March 2019 to packed houses, enthusiastic audiences, and largely effusve praise. With a libretto by Academy Award and Tony Award winner, Eric Simonson, the work depicts the rise and fall of the 1919 Chicago White Sox. It is a tragedy ripe with power, romance and redemption, set against the backdrop of America’s favorite pastime. Puckett’s earlier commissions have been premiered and performed worldwide, to exuberant critical acclaim.

His flute concerto, The Shadow of Sirius, premiered in 2010 and has received more than 200 performances and been recorded multiple times, including 2015’s Naxos Surround Sound disc, “Shadow of Sirius,” which received a 2016 Grammy Nomination. Currently the Chair of Music Theory, Ear Training, and Piano Skills at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Puckett presents workshops nationwide and frequently serves as an adjudicator at competitions for rising composers. His music is represented worldwide by Bill Holab Music.