A Wind Ensemble Wishlist

Pale Blue On Deep - Aaron Perrine

Tears Of St. Lawrence

Score and more: http://www.stevenbryant.com/music/catalog/nothing-gold-can-stay

Nothing Gold Can Stay was commissioned as a surprise gift for Kevin Sedatole in honor of his first ten years at Michigan State University. His conducting students spanning that decade, led by Jamal Duncan and Armand Hall, banded together and approached me at the 2015 College Band Directors National Convention in Nashville about writing the work, and I knew immediately that I couldn’t refuse this special project, made all the more appropriate because my wife, Verena, was one of Kevin’s very first students at MSU.

The music is my deliberate attempt to write a chorale – something simple, beautiful, and familiar. The deceptive surface simplicity of Robert Frost’s poem seems to coincide with this music, particularly the paradoxical descending of dawn to day, all embodying the concept of felix culpa, or “lucky fall” – the idea that loss can bring greater good, and is in fact necessary.

Nothing Gold Can Stay (MSU World Premiere)

A Glimpse of the Eternal

“A kill screen is a stage or level in a an arcade game that stops the player's progress due to a programming error or design oversight. Rather than "ending" in a traditional sense, the game will crash, freeze, or behave so erratically that further play is extremely hard or even impossible.” –Wikipedia

This piece is largely about addiction to video games, but also is meant to evoke an exciting and terrifying urban legend.  Back in 1981, a select few arcades near Portland, Oregon received a new 8-bit game (similar to the fan favorite Tempest) called Polybius.  The game was said to be extremely popular, almost to the point of obsession.  Just a short time after it’s release the game disappeared without a trace of its existence.  Polybius enthusiasts were said to have experienced several psychological side effects, including horrific nightmares, amnesia, and even suicidal thoughts, according to the myth.  

This piece strives to infuse the listener in the experience of playing such a game, as described in each segment.  The first section, “Insert Coin”(m.2) is fierce and eager, as a potential Polybius gamer would be.  Next is “Nocnitsa’s Dance”(m.19), a demented, off beat scherzo that refers to the Polish mythological spirit relating to the scientific phenomenon known as Hypnagogia, or visions occurring during the transitional state between wakefulness and sleep.  The following section, “Psychogenic Fugue”(m.116) is slower and more opaque than the rest of the piece, and refers to the technical term for a form of amnesia involving memory and personality.  In keeping with the musical meaning of the term “fugue”, this segment features extensive use of imitative counterpoint.  From this we move into “Sense Deletion”(m.170), a reprise of the dance tune, this time with even more drive and force.  The title refers to the English translation for the game’s supposed creating company, Sinneslöschen.  The piece ends with a chaotic bang in the short coda, “Game Over”(m.223).  

Kill Screen for Wind Ensemble

For Large or Medium Wind Ensemble Fixed Media, Horn Solo and Melodica (or Accordion), and guided improvisation

Dedicated to all those who have lost a loved one without a chance to say goodbye.

Death’s thin melody too…is a set of variations that began with the sound of a squeaky
escalator in Arezzo, Italy. The sound itself seemed to be reminiscing about the days when a lone monk wandered the hillside dreaming of a way to help people remember melodies. There is a hidden simple chord progression in this squeak, and yet, there are tones that rise beyond that simple progression into a harmonious other world: they belong, even if they do not fit. Death’s thin melody too…returns to Arezzo, in the footsteps of Guido of Monaco, and invites musicians to let go of notation and return to using their ears as a primary instrument for music-making. This work asks something different of the musicians: that they make music in community using all of the skills they have developed on their instruments, but guided by their unique sensitivities of each person as a listener.

Death’s thin melody first appeared as “Up/Down” in a Kansas City multi-media dance production called WE! (Jane Gotch and Mark Southerland, Spring, 2012), and as part of my epic series called 2012 Stories in live performance and appearing in forthcoming CD No. 7, Chanes. This version invites other instrumentalists to perform along with the haunting, simple tune that I originally improvised along with Arezzo’s escalators. Death’s thin melody too… was commissioned by Joseph Parisi for the UMKC Wind Ensemble.

Kill Screen for Wind Ensemble

Matt Browne