The Five Million (brass, percussion)

This fanfare for brass and percussion was composed during Covid lockdown at the request of the Auckland Philharmonia, to mark a return to open concert-going.

At a time when New Zealand was celebrating it's own succesful response to minimising loss of life during the pandemic.

I wasn't 100% happy with it - and when I'm not totally happy I try to work out why. In this case I think it's because I used certain kinds of percussion samples that sounded great in the computer environment, but didn't translate (i.e. lost a lot of power) in the real world. Also, it needs big brass numbers to really make its impact. The APO committed its brass section (which I knew in advance was what I had to work with), but what I wrote really needs three times the brass numbers, with a lot more percussion layering.

Resources

Interview with Radio New Zealand