Ben's Brass Blog

 With another presentation on various brass music on the horizons, I decided that it made sense to go ahead and post about the music that I plan on sharing.  All of this music is written by female composers.  Through my research, I found a lot of great music though a great deal of it was missing recordings which was truly a shame.  Hopefully, these great pieces can be recorded and posted in the near future! The first piece to talk about is Florence Anna Maunders's Transmission 1.  Maunders has won multiple international awards for her music.  Her music has many unique stylistic fingerprints which are based on the music that interested her in her childhood.  For more information about her, please visit her website .  This particular performance is played by a group of New York City performers named The Brass Project .   This group is active around the world at various conferences and performances.  Simultaneously, the group has commi...

 Upon review of some of my favorite trombone quartets, one group stuck out to me as having both a fantastic group of players and an incredible group sound.  That group is called Four of a Kind. Four of a Kind consists of Joseph Alessi (New York Philharmonic and Julliard), Scott Hartman (Yale University), Mark Lawrence (former San Francisco Symphony Orchestra), and Blair Bollinger (Philadelphia Orchestra).  The group has released two albums: Four of a Kind and Four of a Kind 2.  Although the group hasn't released an album in 18 years, their albums still stand as great examples of what trombone quartets should sound like.  

 After learning about Beethoven's Drei Equali for Four Trombones , I was intrigued by what was the earliest piece written intentionally for Trombone Quartet.  It turns out, the earliest piece written was a piece by Biagio Marini (who was a student of Monteverdi).  Canzona for Four Trombones was originally written in 1626 in the infancy of the Baroque period.  This particular recording performed by "His Majesties" performs the piece on period-age instruments.  These instruments look like the trombones to the right.  In particular, the bells of these instruments are substantially smaller than modern trombones.  Also, the bore (or diameter of the slide) is smaller than modern horns.   This recording incorporates not only the period-age trombones but also continuo.  This recording features clean articulations and solid intonation.  Furthermore, the artistic decisions to incorporate continuo and period-age instruments make this particula...

 This week, I took some time to explore a small array of various brass chamber groups to deepen my knowledge of the subject.  After taking that time to explore the groups, I figured I would share my findings with you!  Here are the groups that I found, what they played, and a little bit about each one of them: The Alchemy Quartet performing Ashokan Farewell and Vladimir's Steamboat The Alchemy Quartet is America's longest-running professional tuba euphonium quartet.  Originally the Atlantic Tuba Quartet, the Alchemy Quartet has continued strong for over 40 years.  To learn more about them, I recommend going here . The two pieces that they performed were originally written by Jay Ungar and arranged by Gary Buttery.  Ungar is a well-known American folk musician (fiddler) and composer.  His piece, Ashokan Farewell was used in a documentary titled The Civil War .  For more information on both Ungar and his wife, Molly Mason, please check out their web...

 This is my first post to this blog!  Here is a video . The name of this group is Slide Monsters .  The piece they performed is Trisense by Eijiro Nakagawa.  This trombone quartet combines classical and jazz flavors to create a unique experience that is enjoyable for all listeners!