(formerly M-R Music)

The Wind Band Report:

Advanced sale music, Grade 1-6 recommendations, Berlioz, and a few random lists.

Click here past issues of the Wind Band Report

Hello welcome back to the Wind Band Report. The nice thing about early October is that the initial "I need music because classes are starting" rush is over, but the "time for my second concert" hasn't quite hit yet, so I have a little time to do some side projects for the store. I've organized the upper level music we're putting on clearance, kept track of a few music lists people have asked me for, and kept track of a few new works and resources you should know about.

Band Sale - Grade 4-6, Marches/Pop

$10 each (mostly)

As I mentioned before, we need space in the store for more new band materials. Instead of expanding the store physically, we decided to make some room by clearing out some older charts that have been sitting around for a while. If your school has little to no budget, or you're looking for some sight reading materials, or if you see a small gem from your past, this could be a find for you. I'd much rather locate a home for these than to throw them out.

Grade 4-6 Sale List

Marches/Pop Sale List

If something here strikes your fancy give me a call, drop me an email, or order it through our website (see below). Just be sure to let us know you got this from the sale promotion to get the $10 pricing. A few select titles are $25, they are marked on the list. I'll refresh this list after each purchase, so if you have to wait a few days to order, download the list again for an updated version.

I also updated the list of marches and added in a number of Popular tunes that I overlooked the first time around. You can download that list here.

Random lists for this month:

Paso Dobles, Video Games, Rudolph

I regularly get calls from directors needing help finding a certain type of piece or pieces that fit a theme. I've been keeping careful track of band works over the years and can extract some pretty useful information from it. It occurred to me a few weeks ago that since I've got the resources and I'm putting in the work to generate this list for someone, why not make it available to others? So whenever I'm asked for a list now, I save a copy of the file so I can share it here with other who may need it (or at least find it interesting).

So for today, I have 3 lists for you. I've tried to include as many sound files as I can along the way. Here they are:

Paso Dobles

Music from Video Games

Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer versions

Not for everybody, but you never know what someone may need - or what ideas it may spark. I'll do additional lists like this in future volumes.

New recommendations, Gr. 1-6

Here are a some of the band charts that caught my eye this year, from grades 1 through 6 (plus a Berlioz bonus at the end). I only have room to go into detail for 2 pieces per level. Feel free to ask me about the complete list of music that I've put onto my "recommended" list, I can send you the file which includes all the sound links.

Click on an image to listen.

Grade 1

Starry Night

Timothy Loest

This is a lush and musically interesting setting of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. It's not the harmonies you expect, but it's still completely accessible tonally. There are some good teaching moments for phrasing and shaping melodic lines and harmonic material. If you want to hear another set of Twinkle Variations for your young band, also check out Star Fantasy by Yo Goto.

Set - $40

Bravado Tango

Jack Wilds

This is by far the most interesting and fun piece for a starting band that I have found since last year's Showdown at High Noon. It captures the Tango style very well for using only the basic first 6 notes for each instrument. You can teach the importance of accents and how to drive a line forward. It's almost a shame it's only a Grade 1/2 work, I'd enjoy seeing what Jack could do with a grade 2 version of the same Tango.

Set - $45

Grade 2

Solstice Dance

Jack Wilds

Set - $40

Tiny Creatures from Planet XYZ

David Bobrowitz

OK, first things first, just get past the title. Personally I wish they had called it Tiny Sprightly Creatures or something like that. The music is a delightfully fun, quasi-ragtime style rondo. There's plenty to keep the percussion busy, and it's a good change of pace piece to put a smile on the audience's faces.

Set - $65

Grade 3

Lead Me Home

James Hosay

The melody for this setting is the 19th century American gospel tune, "Precious Lord, Take My Hand". It's presented 3 times, the first setting incredibly warm, dark, and lush. The mood increases in brightness until the final stanze bursts out in festive brilliance. It's a very moving setting, though I don't why it was published in Germany rather than his usual publisher Hal Leonard. It's gorgeous though, just listen to it.

Set - $100

Companion of My Voice

Randal Standridge

Normally I would like to present an uptempo piece in contrast to a lyric piece of the same level (Lead Me Home), but this one is just too good. It's an emotional work starting in Db who's title comes from the Greek poet Arion in his poem that begins, "You harp, companion of my voice, come with me to the land of darkness." It was written to commemorate a student who passed from leukemia, and it's very moving.

Set - $70

Grade 4

Mare Tranquillitatis

Roger Zare

Mare Tranquillitatis, also known as the "Sea of Tranquility," is the famous location on the moon where Apollo 11 landed and the first man set foot on the lunar surface. Roger Zares's music does a good job capturing a dichotomy of emotions - tranquil beauty and restless isolation. There's a lot of chamber writing involved so you'll want confident yet sensitive players. A little haunting, a little noble, alternating delicate and lush textures with a nice, tender ending.

Set - $125

A Copland Portratt

David Conte

This work is not an arrangement of Copland's music. Rather, it's an original work that draws inspiration from Copland's compositional style. By combining aspects of Copland's music with the composer's own musical personality, David creates an energetic and lively work. The pastoral Americana sections are charming, and you can hear David's nods to some of Copland's signature pieces along the way. It's a much more creative way to honor a composer's work than just a rehashing of his popular themes.

Set - $135

Grade 5

Bulgarian Dances II

Franco Cesarini

A follow up to his original Bulgarian Dances, Cesarini takes 3 folk songs from the Bulgarian region and gives them a full symphonic treatment. He preserves all the typical characteristics of the region's music, such as particular dissonances and comlex, irregular rhythms. The three extended dances give us a meditative, moving folksong, a lively dance, and a glittering symphonic finale

Set - $315

Monk By The Sea

Markowski, Michael

I think Michael's writing style seems to have particularly matured of late, with his latest works Monk By the Sea and Embers showing an even greater emotional connection to the music. Monk by the Sea was inspired by a painting by Caspar David Friedrich, and does a good job of portraying the stark, haunting desolation of the landscape image. The phrasing work is subtle and delicate, and can be a good musical challenge to truly bring out the work's emotional essence.

Set - $195

Grade 6

Auguries of Innocence

William Pitt

Auguries of Innocence takes its name from a poem by William Blake. Just as the poem is filled with randomly organized cuplets of paradoxical imagery, focused on the idea that it is wise to see the world through two eyes rather than one, so too does William use the idea of paradoxes to create competing elements presented in various instrument groups, textures, tempos, tonalities, etc. Originally dedicated to Eugene Corporon, it's a rich, complex and moving work for your top ensemble.

Set - $250

Pilgrim Concerto (for Alto Sax and Concert Band)

Jack Wilds

When I was at WASBE this summer I was fortunate enough to receive from Hal Leonard's booth a number of scores to European publications that were available in Europe but hadn't made it to the states yet (ask me for a list). Not every school will be able to tackle this challenging concerto, but it caught my ear and kept my attention. Alternately minimalistic, romantic, expressive and moderm, it conveys the spiritual simplicity of a traveler or pilgrim.

Set - $343

One more to know about:

Grande Symphonie

Funebre et Triomphale

Finally there is a modern, typeset transcription of the standard classic work by Hector Berlioz. Prepared by Matthew Inkster, this edition converts all the instrumentation to the modern concert band norm. While no saxophone are used in the original, Matthew uses them in this edition to periodically support the clarinet and horn parts and at tutti passages. The optional organ and choral parts are available to use as well.

Many conductors, including Berlioz himself, performed selections from work instead of the entire piece, so there are options to fit this in your concert. It'a a masterpiece from one of history's great orchestrators and I'm glad to see a clean new edition available to use again so others can experience it.

Set - $375

Website status

The second phase of our website is nearly done and currently active, though we'll give it some major cosmetic change once we've finalized our tweaks.

The initial searchable database is ready. At this moment it only contains products from Hal Leonard, Alfred, Carl Fischer, and Lorenz, as well as all their subsidiaries. There's a search box at the top of the ordering page where you can enter in key words and get a list of results. Click the item you want to get more details like scores and sound files, then add it to the cart.

If what you want is not in the database, you can just type as much information as you know directly into the order form. You can combine searched items and typed in information on the same order. If there are no major bugs, we'll start adding in the other publishers that we have ready to go, and eventually my own personal wind band database, which has information on lots of really foreign or obscure titles.

Check it out if you like. We're still making minor changes to the search function, and the layout will get a good revision, but we're another step closer to what we want. The next email you get from me will likely be me announcing that our web pages for conducting classes and symposiums will be ready to go. More details then.

New W9 forms

If your bookkeepers need a new W9 form because of our name change, you can download it here. Our tax information, address, and FEIN has not changed, only the name of the store.

That's enough for now. I'll have to start working on Midwest soon, there will be plenty to talk about with that. If you have an idea for me, like an obscure new band publication, or a listing of examples of a certain type of band music, or a new book or DVD not published through a regular music publisher, feel free to share it with me so I can share it here. Thanks for your calls, we'll talk again soon.