A demo "exploring" track for a brightly-colored urban open-world.

Urban Cool

My full orchestra exploration of Melville's novel "Moby Dick," blending film music orchestration with techniques from the contemporary concert hall. From the premiere featuring the UMD Symphony Orchestra with conductor James Ross. Enjoy this sample, and visit www.wixonmusicworks.com for more!

In Leviathan's Wake

Night Music is a song-without-words for solo horn and piano. In composing this piece, I was inspired by poet Philip Larkin's provocative poem of the same name. His words conjure powerful images of dark trees, souls of the dead, and the rustling wind – a nightscape that, while never threatening, is clearly separate from the waking world. I've attempted to paint these stark images in music through transparent piano textures and haunting interjections by the horn. In approaching Larkin's contrasting references to daytime and the living, I strove to bring out warmth, connectedness, and melodic direction in both instruments. The result is a work that follows the narrative arc of the poem; the initial motive, developed throughout, returns in its original form as a sign post at the end of the work.

Night Music

Enjoy this sample of my composition on Transit Brass's debut album "Soundscapes," released this spring! A virtuosic and fast-paced brass octet, Rapid Transit challenges brass players with the exhilarating brass music that audiences love. You can hear the whole recording on Transit's CD, available through their website (transitbrass.com)and streaming on Spotify or via iTunes (search "Transit Brass"). And visit www.wixonmusicworks.com to learn more about my compositions in many genres!

Rapid Transit

Process is a funny thing to describe. "Trailing Image" is all about process — my process of composing a work while balancing the demands of an unrelated career for the first time, and the process by which a piece composes itself, in a sense. This work spins out over the course of nine minutes, exploring itself through new prisms, always reaching for something that it can never achieve. Let this sample recording wash over you and simply listen it as it passes by, moment by moment. "Trailing Image" was commissioned by the University of Maryland Repertoire Orchestra and premiered under the direction of Tiffany Lu.

Ross Wixon's Compositions

Trailing Image

"Sparkling Dialogue" was composed for DC trombonist and former principal trombone of the U.S. Marine Band Bryan Bourne. The piece blends demanding virtuosic fanfares with bounding rhythms and gentle melodies reminiscent of classic American musical theater. Enjoy this sample — you can purchase the full recording of this work, and Bryan's complete solo CD "Transitions," through his website: http://boneidentity.net/music/

Sparkling Dialogue

I'm a composer of music for concert halls and other media. Enjoy a sample of my works in a variety of genres here, and visit my website to hear more music, learn about the kinds of projects I tackle, and follow my blog, where I write about music composition, film and video game soundtracks, and arts marketing.

WixonMusicWorks

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