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Scoring

2.2picc.2.2.0-4.2(solos).0.0-perc(3):glsp/crot/susp.cym/vib-pft-harp-strings

Abbreviations (PDF)

Publisher

Boosey & Hawkes (Hendon Music)

Territory
This work is available from Boosey & Hawkes for the world.

Availability

World Premiere
04/04/1986
Jones Hall, Houston, TX
Houston Symphony / Sergiu Commissiona
Composer's Notes

Tromba lontana (‘distant trumpet’), was written at the request of the Houston Symphony, part of a fanfare commissioning project initiated by the composer Tobias Picker, who wrote his own well-known Old and Lost Rivers for the same series.  Taking a subversive point of view on the idea of the generic loud, extrovert archetype of the fanfare, I composed a four-minute work that barely rises about mezzo piano and that features two stereophonically placed solo trumpets (to the back of the stage or on separate balconies), who intone gently insistant calls, each marked by a sustained note followed by a soft staccato tattoo. The orchestra provides a pulsing continuum of serene ticking in the pianos, harps and percussion. In the furthest background is a long, almost disembodied melody for strings that passes by almost unnoticed like nocturnal clouds.

Although Tromba lontana was published by Boosey & Hawkes in a grouping called “2 Fanfares for orchestra,” I never intended the piece to be paired with Short Ride in a Fast Machine. They are united only in the fact that they are orchestral fanfares, but in fact it is difficult to make work in a satisfying manner in live concert. I myself have never programmed them together.

Reproduction Rights:
This programme note can be reproduced free of charge in concert programmes with the following credit line:
reprinted with kind permission of www.earbox.com

Subjects
Recommended Recording
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San Francisco Symphony / Edo de Waart
Nonesuch 7559791442

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