Category: SOLOS - Euphonium Composer: Philip Sparke
Grade 4.0 Duration 2.0
Solo for euphonium and brass band.
A Final Fling was written at the request of David Childs for a CD recording with a Celtic theme, which he released in 2007.
The phrase ‘a final fling’ means a last quick effort at doing something, perhaps when this item is used as an encore, and also, a fling is a type of Scottish Highland dance, which tied in with the Celtic theme. A light-hearted piece, A Final Fling starts in the mood of a folk dance and quotes from The Irish Washerwoman before flying to a close. A perfect way to put your euphonium player in the spotlight.
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Sir Eu is a virtuoso euphonium showcase, written for the euphonium player Steven Mead, who premiered it and has played it regularly in concerts around the world, The title Sir Eu alludes to the master of the euphonium himself and also to the concept of the European Union. From jazz through romanticism to elements of folksong, this work offers everything that the musical heart could wish for!
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Sambezi is the brass band version of the last movement of Philip Sparke’s Trombone Concerto. It starts in a joyful and outgoing mood with the soloist playing a carefree samba tune. A jazz-influenced central tune explores the higher ranges of the trombone before the samba rhythms set up a ‘contest’ between the soloist and the band’s trombone section. The soloist is the eventual ‘winner’ and he celebrates by reintroducing the samba melody before bringing the work to a virtuosic close. A real treat for your trombone soloist.
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1. The Time Traveller
2. The Final Problem
3. The Great Race
COMPOSER’S NOTE
Playing the euphonium was something of a family tradition in the Graham household. With my father (Peter) and late grandfather (Thomas) active in their respective local Salvation Army Brass Bands, my uncle Tommy solo euphonium with the mighty Tullis Russell Mills Band and my school brass teacher Robert Sands also an aficionado of the instrument, hardly a day passed when performances and recordings by the “greats’, dough, Groom, Sullivan et al were being discussed and appraised. And so when one of the greats of today, Steven Mead, asked me to write a concerto it was with this background in mind that I set to the task.
In League with Extraordinary Gentlemen combines two of my life interests - composition and 19th century popular fiction. Each of the concerto’s three movements takes its musical inspiration from extraordinary characters who have transcended the original genre and have subsequently found mass audiences through film, television and comic book adaptations.
The first movement follows a traditional sonata form outline with one slight modification.
The order of themes in the recapitulation is reversed, mirroring a plot climax in the H.G. Wells novella The Time Machine (where the protagonist, known only as The Time Traveller, puts his machine into reverse bringing the story back full circle).
The Adventure of the Final Problem is the title of a short story published in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle. This is an account of the great detective’s final struggle with his long-time adversary Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. The music takes the form of a slowed down ländler (a Swiss/Austrian folk dance) and various acoustic and electronic echo effects call to mind the alpine landscape. The final bars pose a question paralleling that of Conan Doyle in the story — have we really seen the last of Sherlock Holmes?
The final movement, The Great Race, follows Phileas Fogg on the last stage of his epic journey
“Around the World in Eighty Days” (from the novel by Jules Verne). The moto perpetuo nature of the music gives full rein to the soloist’s technical virtuosity. As the work draws to a conclusion, the frantic scramble by Fogg to meet his deadline
at the Reform Club in Pall Mall, London, is echoed by the soloist’s increasingly demanding ascending figuration, set
against the background of Big Ben clock chimes.
The concerto is dedicated to the aforementioned family members, three “extraordinary gentlemen”, P.G. Graham, T.H.
Stewart and T. Stewart.
Category: SOLOS - Trombone Arranger: Ivan C. Philips
Bass Clef
CONTENTS
01. PAVAN: ‘The Earl of Salisbury’ W. Byru (1542-1623)
(from the keyboard works)
02. SARABANDE (from a Suite for harpsichord) J. C. DE CHAMBONNIERES
(1602-1672)
03. SARABANDE (from a Suite for harpsichord) J. KUHNAU (1660-1722)
04. HYMN: ‘The heavens declare’ BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
05. EVENING SONG (Op. 96, No. 3) SCHUBERT (1797-1828)
06. HUNTER’S SONG (Album for the Young) SCHUMANN (1810-1856)
07. PRELUDE (Op. 28, No. 20) CHOPIN (1810-1849)
08. NATIONAL SONG GRIEG (1843-1 907)
(Lyric Pieces: Op. 12, No. 8)
09. GAUDEAMUS IGITUR (Student Song)
10. SONG: ‘Abschiedslied’ BRAHMS (1833-1897)
(from 14 Deutsche Volkslieder)
11. CHORALE (Die Meistersinger) WAGNER (1813-1883)
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