Percussion Ensemble

band

Featuring a balanced ensemble of keyboard and battery percussion, "Mercury Rising" is, in essence, a double fugue that gives all players the opportunity to shine. After a brief anticipatory introduction, the tempo picks up and the keyboard percussion introduces the primary fugue theme (or subject), with entries by the marimba, the xylophone, and then the vibraphone. The battery joins the excitement before taking over the fugue subject, featuring the snare drum and concert toms. By the time the timpani takes over the subject, all members of the ensemble have entered leading to a climactic explosion at m. 72. After a brief developmental 3/4 section, in which fragments of the fugue subject are strewn about the ensemble, intensity continues to build to the end of the piece, as the theme appears in its loudest and fastest presentation yet.

Mercury Rising - Daughtrey | Perc Ens (7 players) | Gr. 3

Percussion 1 (bells, xylophone, chimes)
Percussion 2 (vibraphone)
Percussion 3 (4-octave marimba)
Percussion 4 (4.3-octave marimba)
Percussion 5 (4 timpani, wind chimes)
Percussion 6 (snare drum, 4 toms, triangle)
Percussion 7 (kick bass drum, tam-tam)
Percussion 8 (splash cymbal, suspended cymbal, China cymbal, hi-hat, woodblock)

Fidget (percussion octet) - Nathan Daughtrey

"Meanwhile in a Parallel Universe" is a fantasy based on the notion that our brief time on this earth can have any number of outcomes depending on the decisions we make, the relationships we encounter, and how present we are along the way. As our stories evolve through circumstance, timing, and millions of decisions big and small, alternate stories are spun based on which forks in the road we take. The result is an adventure filled with both uncertainty and accomplishment – byproducts of a vulnerable journey.

The piece is designed to play out as if it were an episodic journey filled with wonder. It is constructed in three short, connected movements featuring a solo marimbist accompanied by eight percussionists. While each movement has its own identity, their melodies and harmonic DNA (built upon a seventh suspended fourth chord) keep them rooted to the same story – one that sometimes sounds resolute, and at other times, ungrounded.

Harmonically, the forks in the road of "Meanwhile in a Parallel Universe" are dictated by restating ideas in mediant relation (modulations of minor thirds). Just as we're always ourselves even when in unfamiliar territory, the goal was to create unpredictable turns harmonically while maintaining thematic familiarity within the restatements.

The first movement is held by a rhythmic pattern of fifteen beats (three bars of 2/4 plus a bar of 3/8). This doesn't reveal itself clearly until the syncopated bass ostinato enters, following the dawn of a curious introduction. With sure-footedness the main theme is introduced by the soloist weaving a complex pattern of four-mallet permutations. The ensemble restates this with fuller orchestration, leading to a development of virtuosic acrobatics by the soloist, and culminating in a whirlwind fight for survival.

We descend into the second movement through a rubato series of anxious flourishes. These built on chords containing diminished seconds and augmented fifths, making them feel less grounded. This moves into a distant and reflective period as the soloist arpeggiates the seventh suspended fourth ostinato in the left hand while the right hand plays melancholy, sustained one-handed rolls. This develops from lonely isolation into ferocious layers of conviction.

The intensity reaches a breaking point in which new clarity is achieved through a pulsating, accelerating unison. From this clarity, the journey of the third movement embarks. Unlike the first two movement's fifteen-beat motive, the meter switches to a more comfortable 12/8. The melody here is based on the same DNA from before, but proceeds with a newfound sense of identity. This adventure leads through blazing displays of technique from the soloist and culminates in a courageous and triumphant march forward.

"Meanwhile in a Parallel Universe" was commissioned by Bloomsburg University (Bloomsburg, PA) under the direction of Dr. Gifford Howarth, and the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music (Singapore), under the direction of Jonathan Fox. It will premiere in Singapore in March 2012 featuring Dr. Howarth as the soloist with the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory percussion ensemble.

Meanwhile in a Parallel Universe

Sheet music available from Tapspace at www.tapspace.com.

Spinning Yarns

Torn (from "Spinning Yarns" by Matthew Weyer)

Mercury Rising for Percussion Ensemble

Unleash the Fury for Marimba Quartet

Commissioned by the Monroe Township Middle School Percussion Ensemble, Yale Snyder, Director
and Zachary Morolda, District Supervisor of the Department for the Applied Arts and Career Technology;
Monroe Township School District; Monroe Township, NJ 

INSTRUMENTATION
Bells & Xylophone (shared)
Vibraphone & Marimba (shared with Marimba 2)
Chimes & Xylophone
Marimba 1 (4-octave) & Vibraphone (shared)
Marimba 2 (4.3-octave) & Vibraphone (shared)
Timpani (4 drums)
Percussion 1 (Snare Drum, Triangle, Crash Cymbal)
Percussion 2 (4 Concert Toms, Wind Chimes, Crash Cymbal)
Percussion 3 (Suspended Cymbal, Hi-Hat)
Percussion 4 (Concert Bass Drum, Tam-Tam)
Percussion 5 [optional] (Shaker, Tambourine)
Percussion 6 [optional] (Woodblock, Cowbell)

Luminescence (perc ens 10-12) - Nathan Daughtrey

Dystopia was written to imitate a tense, action-packed, horror movie soundtrack within the percussion ensemble setting. Using a fairly large instrumentation (including piano), some interesting textures are achieved by way of bowed instruments (waterphone, tam tam, vibraphone), and gutteral, groaning bass drum effects. Frequent use of tight intervals and dissonant melodies add to the tension driven by a syncopated ostinato in 5/4.

Essentially, this is program music designed to take listeners on a journey of their own images. There isn’t a literal story being told here, but its structure takes us from quiet mystery to suspenseful pursuit, then action-based escape. These dramatic elements will allow each performer and listener to choose his or her own adventure by letting the music create a scary story line of its own.

Dystopia was premiered before an enthusiastic audience at the 2008 Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago, Illinois.

Sheet music available at http://www.tapspace.com


Dystopia (Jim Casella)

Angelic Voices (percussion ensemble 5) - David R. Gillingham

…like a burden too heavy (Brian Blume)

Percussionist, composer, & educator Nathan Daughtrey (b. 1975) is a musical chameleon who uses his wide-ranging talents to adapt comfortably to a variety of environments. As a performing artist and clinician for Yamaha percussion, Vic Firth sticks & mallets, Zildjian cymbals, and Black Swamp accessories, he has performed and given masterclasses and clinics throughout the United States and across three continents. Nathan has recorded two solo marimba albums to date – "Spiral Passages" and "The Yuletide Marimba" – as well as several chamber music albums, including a recent collaboration with euphoniumist Brian Meixner titled "Praxis."

With over 60 publications for percussion ensemble, concert band, orchestra, chamber ensembles, and soloists as well as an ever-growing number of commissions, Nathan balances his performing with composing, and to great acclaim. He is the only composer in the history of the Percussive Arts Society International Composition Contest to procure both 2nd and 3rd place in the same year with his percussion ensemble works "Limerick Daydreams" and "Adaptation," respectively. Nathan's compositions appear regularly on performances at PASIC, the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic, the Bands of America National Percussion Festival, and in concert halls and other performance venues around the world. His works have also been recorded on several albums by respected performers, including the FSU Percussion Ensemble, the Showa Wind Symphony conducted by Ray Cramer, the RoseWind Duo, and Mississippi State University. Additionally, three of his compositions for wind ensemble have been featured in three volumes of "Teaching Music Through Performance in Band."

As an educator, Nathan served as a Visiting Lecturer of Percussion for three years at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where he taught applied percussion and conducted the Percussion Ensemble. He also served as a sabbatical replacement at the University of Oklahoma, where he taught undergraduate and graduate percussion students and conducted the world-renowned OU Percussion Orchestra. Dr. Daughtrey is currently a Visiting Lecturer of Percussion and Music Composition at High Point University (NC), where he teaches applied lessons, directs the percussion ensemble and works in collaboration with the School of Communication and Department of Dance.

Nathan remains active within the Percussive Arts Society serving as a member of the Composition Contest Committee, organizing the PASIC Fun Runs on behalf of the Health and Wellness Committee, and editing the keyboard percussion articles for Percussive Notes.