Works for Brass Band & Brass Instruments
Gavin Higgins
NMP1336 Ar Lan y Mor for Brass Band, 3 minutes, Score and Parts £50.00
Can be performed by any band from 4th section to championship section. "Ar Lan y Môr" ("On the Seashore") is a traditional Welsh folk love song and this version is perfect as a concert opener or an encore. First performed by the Tredegar Town Band, conducted by Ian Porthouse, on the 8th August 2022 at the Royal Albert Hall as part of the BBC Proms.
NMP1335 Ar Lan y Mor Ten Piece Ensemble, 3 minutes, Score and Parts £50.00 3 Trumpets in B♭, Flugel Horn, French Horn, 3 Trombones, Bass Trombone, Tuba.
NMP1369 Tree Song for Brass Band, 3 minutes, Score and Parts £50.00
Commissioned and premiered by Forest of Dean Brass in 2012. Can be performed by any band from 4th section to championship section.
NMP1337 Sadly Now the Throstle Sings for Brass Band, 6 minutes, Score and Parts £55.00
Can be performed by any band from 3rd section to championship section. First performance by the Tredegar Town Band, conducted by Ian Porthouse at the RNCM Festival of Brass, RNCM Concert Hall, Manchester on the 28th January 2012. The title for this work is taken from the Oscar Wilde poem, From Spring Days to Winter: But now with snow the tree is grey Ah, Sadly now the throstle sings! My love is dead: ah! Well-a-day, See at her silent feet I lay A dove with broken wings! Ah, Love! Ah, Love! That thou wert slainFond Dove, fond Dove return again.
NMP1331 Two Courtly Dances and a Rave for Brass Quartet (Score and Parts), 10 mins, £55.00
Instrumentation: B♭ Cornet, E♭ Tenor Horn, B♭ Baritone, B♭ Euphonium. I. Minuet, II. Sarabande, III. Rave. A highly infectious and entertaining work to start any concert. Brilliantly crafted for musicians at all levels. Commissioned and premiered by A4 Brass Quartet at the Lieksa Cultural Centre, Finland, on the 23rd July 2023.
Gavin Higgins
NMP1360 So Spoke Albion for Brass Band, 17 minutes, Score and Parts £140.00
Can be performed by Championship section and 1st Section. I have been attracted to William Blake’s poetry and art for some time. Despite the complex and elusive symbolism in his work, I find it rich with powerful imagery, allegory and insight. I have taken inspiration from aspects of Blake’s life: the visionary, the man and his relationship with wife Catherine, and Blake the artist, specifically the mythology surrounding Albion, the personification of Britain, ‘a giant form in whom all the people of England are embodied’. The title comes from Blake’s final and longest epic poem, Jerusalem: the emanation of the giant Albion in which he tells of the fall of Albion (England) who has been infected with a ‘soul disease’: So spoke Albion in jealous fears, hiding his Emanation Upon the Thames and Medway, rivers of Beulah:
Dissembling
His Jealousy before the throne divine, darkening cold!
The premiere was given by the Tredegar Town Band, conducted by Ian Porthouse at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, on the 1st May 2022
I. Angels on Peckham Rye – a child Blake would often venture from his home in Soho and embark on long walks, across the river and into Camberwell, Dulwich and Nunhead. It was on one of these walks that he saw his first vision: a tree filled with angels on Peckham Rye: ‘Sauntering along, the boy looks up and sees a tree filled with angels, bright angelic wings bespangling every bough like stars’.
II. Catherine – Blake married Catherine Boucher in 1782 and they were by all accounts an extremely devoted couple. Catherine not only supported her husband emotionally – never doubting his skill, encouraging him through depressive episodes and tirelessly supporting his art when others would not – she was a highly skilled collaborator actively involved with the engraving and printing process of his illuminated books.
III. Albion Rose – A man, Albion, is stood naked on a rock, beams of light burst out in all directions from behind him. Albion is stretching out, open to the world, optimistic, symbolising England’s political awakening. Albion is in glory. England is in union with the universe. I find an invigorating sense of hope in the image.
NMP1308 Concerto Grosso for Brass Band and Orchestra (Study Score), 38 minutes, £40.00
Score & Parts available for hire (please contact publishing@wyastone.co.uk) Having grown up in an ex-mining community and beginning my musical training in the local brass bands in which my whole family continue to play, this music is close to my heart. Concerto Grosso for Brass Band and Orchestra is a love letter to that music and those communities. Drawing on Brass Bands cultural legacy and musical style, it is a celebratory work that puts the brass band front and centre. Concerto Grosso for Brass Band and Orchestra is a five movement piece in two parts. Part one looks at the mediums geographical, industrial, and socio-economic roots; whilst Part two explores musical aspects synonymous with the music: high lyricism and dazzling virtuosity.
Part 1: 1) Island (mysteriously), 2) Coal (mechanico), 3) Class (confidently)
Part 2: 4) Sentimental Music (espressivo) — Cadenzas, 5) Contest Music (with driving energy)
To be recorded for Lyrita by Tredegar Band and BBC National Orchestra of Wales in October 2025 for release in 2026.
NMP1366 Black Sun for Trombone Quartet (Score and Parts), 14 minutes, £50.00
Black Sun is a four movement work for trombone quartet inspired by artistic representations of the Sun: Olafur Elliasson’s The Weather Project – a blazing light project that filled the Tate’s Turbine Hall in 2003; Monet’s Impression, Sunrise – with it’s pure orange sun playfully glistening over a boat filled body of water; Turner’s Sun Setting Over a Lake – a vivid, red sunset set against hazy and impressionistic landscape; and Damien Hurst’s Black Sun – a dark black disk covered in thousands of dead flies.
NMP1302 Fanfare, Air & Flourishes for Unaccompanied Solo Horn, 7½ minutes, £15.00
NMP1303 Fanfare, Air & Flourishes for Unaccompanied Solo Euphonium (treble clef), 7½ minutes, £15.00
NMP1364 Fanfare, Air & Flourishes for Unaccompanied Solo Euphonium (bass clef), 7½ minutes, £15.00
The first movement of this piece as commissioned by the Royal Academy of Music as part of the 200 Pieces Project and was premiered by Johan Stone. The third movement was commissioned by the BBC as part of BBC Radio 3’s Postcards from Composers project and premiered online by Tim Thorpe. Recorded by Ben Goldscheider, horn, for Lyrita, available on CD, Download and Streaming.
Richard Blackford
Championship Band Commission - Richard Blackford has been commissioned to write a new work by five of the UK’s Championship Brass Band’s. Foden's Band (Cheshire), Flowers Band (Gloucestershire), the Cooperation Band (Glasgow), Tredegar Band (Wales) and Cory Band (Wales) as well as Brass Bands England (BBE). The 15-minute piece will be performed in concerts with the aim for it to be chosen for a major competition in the future. For more information on this project please email publishing@wyastone.co.uk
NMP1077 Canticle of Winter for soprano saxophone or ♭ flat clarinet & string orchestra (Score & Parts), 7 minutes, £50.00
NMP1085 Canticle of Winter for soprano saxophone or ♭ flat clarinet & piano (parts), 7 minutes, £15.00
Canticle of Winter was inspired by the last stanza of Robert Frost’s poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening: The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. The sense of restlessness, of something unresolved, despite the beauty of the winter landscape, permeates the music. It is written in rondo form, and the first theme, soft, sustained and melancholic, is contrasted with rhythmic string writing against which the saxophone plays exuberant flurries of notes, as if improvised. The dynamic range of the entire piece is from ppp to barely more than mf, and it is the soft, plangent sound of the soprano saxophone that evokes the stillness of the winter night and the traveller’s journey through it. Canticle of Winter was first performed on October 19th 2019 by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra the soloist was Amy Dickson, to whom the work is dedicated.
Augusta Read Thomas
NMP1031 Avian Capriccio for Brass Quintet two trumpets, horn, trombone and tuba (Score & Parts) 12 minutes, £30.00
For movement No. 1 imagine the musicians as playful, capricious, virtuosic hummingbirds darting around a garden, whizzing across multifaceted, rapid-changing chord progressions in a bebop-like fast tempo. For movement No. 2 swans majestically floating in a lake, as the morning sun gradually rises. For movement No. 3 envision active, jaunty and alert canaries crisscrossing the perfumes of Charlie Parker’s Yardbird Suite and Ornithology.
NMP1191 Laetitia’s Caprice a fanfare for solo saxophone (Score), 3 minutes, £15.00 “Laetitia, deriving from the root word lætitia, (Latin), meaning "happy", "glad", "jubilation," "prosperous", or "abounding", was a minor Roman goddess of fertility. Her name was used to mean happiness with prosperity and abundance. She is usually shown with greenery to depict the abundance of seasonal decorations that many sites would include. Wreaths of flowers or leaves are commonly worn at festivals or holy rituals, similarly Laetitia would be shown wearing a garland to mean celebration. The world premiere performance was given by Phil Pierick, soprano saxophone, at the 2023 International Saxophone Symposium on 14 January 2023. This work is a reimagining of Euterpe's Caprice for solo flute and has a duration of three minutes.
George Lloyd
SRMP0101 A Miniature Triptych for Brass Quintet: two trumpets, horn, tenor trombone and tuba (Score and Parts), 18 minutes, £40.00
Composed for Equale Brass in 1981. The three movements are entitled ‘Lost’, ‘Searching’ and ‘Found’. The first movement is ruminative and bathed in half-lights. The second movement contains agile, tense music which requires great precision. The final movement opens with a trombone solo which is somewhat akin to a recitative; thereafter the music is extrovert. Recorded 1984 by Equale Brass, led by John Wallace SRCD425 George Lloyd works for Brass is available on CD, streaming and download.
SRMP0019 November Journeys’ for Brass Orchestra (Study Score), 29 minutes, £40.00 Score & Parts available for hire (please contact publishing@wyastone.co.uk)
“I was commissioned by the BBC to write a work for Northern Brass Ensemble and at that time I was visiting various cathedrals I had never seen before. As I journeyed around the country I kept thinking of sounds for the brass and these became mixed up with the magnificent buildings I was seeing; this led me eventually to write on the score ‘Impressions and reflections’. There is nothing very ecclesiastic about the music except for the second movement which is rather like a carol. I was able to have any combination of instruments so in order to achieve flexibility together with soft bright sounds I scored the work for 1 Piccolo Trumpet, 3 B flat Trumpets, 1 Flugelhorn, 3 Horns, 3 Trombones, 1 Euphonium, 1 Tuba.” Recorded by BBC Philharmonic Brass available from Lyrita SRCD2418 on CD, download and streaming.
Kenneth V. Jones
SRMP0166 Quintifid for two trumpets, horn and tuba (Score and Parts), 11½ minutes, £20.00 Quintifid means “that which is cleft into five parts”. The five contrasting sections are linked by short cadenzas. Various dispositions are presented, including the witty, the ruminative and the confident. Brass-playing techniques include flutter-tongue and muted trumpet. The middle Jiocoso – Andante lyrico suggests a smoochy smoke-filled room, whilst the Duet – Shadow Play, the briefest movement, provides respectable counterpoint between the two trumpets. A work of this quality should be in the
