SKU: A0.1361865

Includes: Digital .pdf w/Full Score and Parts

Clashing Destinies was originally a work for digital media composed in March-April of 2023, later adapted for Full Orchestra/Symphonic Wind Ensemble. Clashing Destinies takes the listener through a spiral into insanity, starting with the constant thudding of the lows. Even as different parts add on, the thudding persists, representing one's inability to think clearly. There is a sharp dissonant line initially played by the glockenspiel that comes up time and time again, representing the internal panic that cuts through one's rational thoughts during their spiral into madness. Finally we hit the breaking point, a moment of silence followed by the screams of pain one experiences after reaching their breaking point. Soon after, a screaming trumpet takes the spotlight, any form of rational thought has now dithered away. Nothing is left but screams. After an intense battle of struggling to find a grasp on reality, there is a moment of calm. Things slow down as it is believed sanity is being regained, but still, there is that persistent thudding and sharp dissonance. Alas, the realization occurs, it is impossible to regain sanity. As the brass section overtakes the calm of the woodwinds, insanity fully takes over. The homestretch of this piece is pure chaos, every motif comes back. It is one huge reprise of all the feelings that have been experienced, except now they are all sounding much more rapidly, all just a small part of the chaos that is ensuing. Now there is nothing left to do except yell for help. There are three final screams, three final pleads for help. After screaming for help, it is realized... No one is there. Now there is nothing, left unresolved, all alone in the silence.

SKU: A0.1023994

Formations, is a celebration of the cosmos; a celebration of the tiniest of particles to the largest galaxies and everything in between. Since I was a child I've looked up at the sky and seen a world full of wonder, beauty, and mystery. The same wonder that filled my heart when I was in elementary school still takes hold when I look up now, decades later. I chose the formation of things for a specific reason. When I was a kid I had a habit of asking my parents where everything came from. It wasn't enough that a star was there, I needed to know how it got there and if possible why it was there. As I grew up I developed an immense appetite for almost all things science and history and with that came some of the answers I needed. The reality of how these things came to be was so much more interesting and astounding than my imagination that all these years later I am still captivated by the idea of an exploding star or the Big Bang. So lets take a journey, you and I. First we'll see the death of an immense star and watch as its own gravity rips it apart and forms a black hole. We'll see it feed on matter and light around it until it too finally dies. Next we'll go back 13.7 billion years and watch as tiny particles dance in and out of existence in the endless nothingness that once was. We'll see one of these tiny bits expand in an instant and give rise to everything that ever has been or will be. Watch hydrogen form and gravity pull it into the first stars. Those stars will form galaxies and we'll see glimpses of the Universe as it exists now. Finally, we will travel to the end of time, a trillion years or more into the future. There we will witness the dissipation of the galaxies, the death of stars, and the final moments as even tiny electrons are pulled apart into the nothing from which we all came. Parts of this piece are violent, but we will see that at the end of time, the formation of nothing is just as beautiful as the formation of a star. Everything has its time and everything ends. Premiered by the Hartt Wind Ensemble - Glen Adsit, Conductor.

SKU: A0.1433072

It's a Saturday morning.  After a busy and hectic week, you have nothing scheduled. Your wife and kids are happily occupied with things that don't involve you. Time to mentally check out, retreat to the man cave and find something to do that doesn't involve anything other than what is physically in front of you. On the radio in the background, there are some old blokes musing laconically about football.   You don't really know what you'll be doing, but it will involve tools and not giving a flip about anything else for a little while. You may even need to make a trip to the hardware store at some stage... who knows?

 

Tooling-a-Round is the first movement of what is (planned to be) a multi-movement work for concert band, depicting the cherished role of backyard shed in the life of a typical suburban middle-aged family man.  Quavers are to be played rhythmically swung, with articulations observed whole-heatedly to highlight the playful and irreverent mood throughout - staccato markings in particular are to be exaggerated.   The sound of real tools should be used in the percussion parts where indicated (e.g. saw, file, hammer, toolbox, circular saw, power drill etc.) with rhythms to be approximated in order to give the impression of a project getting underway as the piece progresses and the protagonist meanders from one task to the next.


This piece is dedicated to busy fathers who work hard to preserve their capacity to create, play and explore.

SKU: A0.1153691

My first complete concert band piece. It's been in the works for about 3 months. The early drafts of this piece were written in April/May and were then left to collect dust for months. I wrote it to experiment with melodic/harmonic minor scales and did not intend to finish the piece. Around the same time I wrote the early drafts of the piece, my high school band director asked if I wanted to write a piece for the concert band. I agreed and spent months working on different pieces of music, completing none of them. Around late October I stumbled across this looking through old pieces of music for some new ideas. I listened through it 3 or 4 times and decided to continue the piece. After spending roughly two months finishing the draft, and another month revising and adding parts, I had finally finished Trapped. When I started working on this piece with the intention of finishing it, I was at a difficult point in my life. I had recently come home from my rookie season of drum corps and was still transitioning back to the real world. The freedom of tour had been taken away from me, I had mentally matured a lot during the summer. While only 17 I felt like I was stuck with a bunch of kids. I had spent all summer with friends much older than me, learning a lot from them and taking inspiration from them in many ways. When I started this piece, I was conflicted with many thoughts and emotions. I was still under the impression that my peers in the music program hated me because of some of my actions last year. The girl from home I had been talking with all summer while I was gone, and hoped to start a relationship with, lied to me while I was gone about many things, causing me to remove them from my life. The last year and a half have involved many events like losing my best friend of 5 years because of, what I consider, an overreaction on my part; being used for my kindness; lied to; having secrets about me revealed behind my back by those I trusted; being a therapy friend; constant overthinking; as well as toxic friendships I didn’t want to leave because I gave them the benefit of the doubt. I felt trapped. I had spent so long trying to improve myself to become who I am today, and I still felt like crap. Even though I knew and promised myself I wouldn’t follow through, I was battling suicidal thoughts and I was in a severely depressive episode of my life. I wrote this piece to express the feeling of overthinking, being trapped in your mind, and the road to recovery. The constant back-and-forth battles with yourself, unsure of where to go and what to do next; feeling trapped. I hope that this piece connects and resonates with those of you in a similar position to what I was in, and I promise there is a way out and that life does get better. And with that, I present to you, Trapped.