Category: TEST PIECES (Major Works) Composer: Bertrand Moren
Duration 5.00
A short mp3 audio extract is provided here to give you a sample of this work.
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Chatzkele is a work based on two traditional Jewish melodies, Oifn Pripetchik and Chatzkele. The first expresses a sentiment of deep sadness and nostalgia, reminding the listener of the suffering that the Jewish people have undergone over the centuries. The second melody illustrates the unshakeable optimism which drives the Jewish community despite all terrible forms of intolerance it has endured. A wonderful cultural work which your audiences, young and old, will enjoy for many years to come.
Category: TEST PIECES (Major Works) Composer: Michael Ball
Set as the Second Section Test Piece for the 2014 Britsh Brass Band Regional Championships.
Set as the 2nd. Section Testpiece for the National Finals in Harrrogate, September 2004. Duration 11.00
If you have enjoyed listening to the audio extract here, and want to hear the entire performance, you can purchase the REGIONS 2014 CD on this site which contains full performances of all 5 testpieces. Simply type REGIONALS 2014 into the QUICK SEARCH to the right of your screen to find it.
Chaucer’s Tunes (two sections of which began life in less extended form as theme music for a BBC radio series The Road to Canterbury) was originally written for wind band, commissioned by the British Association of Symphonic Bands and Wind Ensembles for its 1993 conference.
This version for brass band, made in spring 1998, was commissioned by Paul Hindmarsh on behalf of the Brass Band Heritage Trust (with financial support from the North West Arts Board) for the 1999 National Youth Brass Band Championships.
The work consists of six interconnected sections which can equally well be played as one complete continuous movement or as independent individual pieces (playing either ‘to continue’ of ‘to finish’ as appropriate).
The Intrada, for example, or Chauntecleer and the Fox (perhaps together with the Finale) would make effective concert openers of finishers, whilst other movements, such as the carol arrangement Es ist ein’ Ros’, may prove useful in a seasonal context. The opening an closing sections were developed from a song for baritone voice and instrumental ensemble (including such instruments as alto trombone and handbells) with the 14th century text Of fantasy is all our fare / But make we merry and slay care / And each man cherish each others’ cheer. The ensuing Fantasia follows Chaucer’s Prioress’s Tale in the story of the small boy who fell in love with the plainsong anthem Alma redemptoris mater and was taught the tune phrase by phrase, reflected in the canonic dialogue between principal cornet and euphonium in the first section; the fuller subsequent sections are lyrical and rumbustious by turn, celebrating further this attractive melody. The Intermezzo The Wife of Bath is a playful and robust contrast, followed by an arrangement of the old German carol Es ist ein’ Ros’ entsprungen. The Chase (of the cock Chauntecleer by the fox, from Chaucer’s Nun’s Priest’s Tale) leads directly into the Finale, a telescoped version of the initial Intrada plus an extended coda.
Category: TEST PIECES (Major Works) Composer: Sir Arthur Bliss Arranger: Eric Ball Difficulty level: Championship
Written in 1937
Duration 15.00 Minutes
Click on "MORE DETAILS" to view the Solo Cornet part and to listen to an audio extract of the Finale.
Bliss made major contributions to almost every musical genre, but these days he is remembered especially for his music for the film Things to Come (1935), cinema’s first great film score, and for his ballets.
Checkmate (1937) was one of the most successful productions mounted by the Vic-Wells Ballet either side of the Second World War. The scenario is based on a game of chess between Love and Death.
The Black Queen plays the role of ‘femme fatale’ and at the end is left in possession of the board. Love has been conquered by Death. Constant Lambert, who conducted most of the early performances, described the music as being full of “gaiety, vigour and abandon”.
Eric Ball made his superb transcription of four of the dances for the National Brass Band Championships of 1978: Dance of the Four Knights;
The Red Knight’s Mazurka;
Ceremony of the Red Bishops; and the finale – Checkmate.
The CD recording is called "PATRONS' CHOICE" featuring the Foden's Richardson Band conducted by Michael Fowles, and is available to purchase on this website in the CD section.
Category: TEST PIECES (Major Works) Composer / arranger: Martin Ellerby
A symphonic Tone Poem for Brass & Percussion.
Duration 13.18
Click on "MORE DETAILS" to listen to an audio extract of this work.
Composer’s programme notes:
CHIVALRY, with its various associations, is a title well suited to a brass band contest piece. I have taken the two principle themes of love and war and allowed them to compete against each other in what can be broadly described as a cinematic structure. The secondary title symphonic tone poem serves to enhance this reasoning. The art of courtly love, the devotion of knights to their ladies, the acts of heroism in the arena of the tournament and on the field of battle are presented here in a musical format in which the individual and the collective interest are represented by the deeds of musicians engaged in friendly combat. To assist both performers and audiences I have indicated a series of internal subtitles to illustrate, or suggest, the scene in question at each given moment in the journey. Although the work is presented without any breaks these are:
Fanfare and Overture,
Combat,
1st Romance,
Pageant,
2nd Romance,
Tournament,
To the Warres,
Honour (to Lucasta),
1st Crusade,
3rd Romance,
Cortege,
2nd Crusade,
4th Romance
Finale.
These sequences and their associated imagery should be broadly recognisable and part of the test is to bind them together in a progressive and convincing whole. To aid this, the romance element returns at various points as a common denominator. Other aspects have their moment, but do not reappear. I have deliberately eschewed incorporating cadenzas for the key soloists, though this is no way deprives anyone from their moment of special attention at some time during its progress. Rather I have aimed at the dramatic and the lyrical, engaged in a language comparable with the golden age of Hollywood cinema, placing this within a concise framework, designed both to challenge and entertain.
One note of explanation — To Lucasta is a poem by Richard Lovelace written in the midst of the age of Chivalry, the final lines of which encapsulate the whole concept of the term:
I could not love thee (Deare) so much,
Loved l not Honour more.
With this in mind let battle commence and may love prove to be the greatest victor of all!
Category: TEST PIECES (Major Works) Composer: Jan de Haan
Grade 3 Duration 10:36
Chorale Variations consists of six variations on an original chorale-like theme. The work was commissioned by the Stichting Culturele Activiteiten Opsterland (Cultural Activities Foundation Opsterland). It is dedicated to the chairman and founder, Germ Nicolaï, as a token of thanks for his commitment of many years to the wind music movement in the Dutch province of Friesland. Nicolaï was the manager of the Spijkerpakkenband (‘Denim Suit Band’) and the Friese Jeugd Brassband (Frisian Youth Brass Band) - among other things. He was also the initiator of the successful Gouden Spiker Festival, an annual event of several days for lower division wind bands. In 2015, Chorale Variations is the test piece at this festival.
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