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Mountain Pastures - James E. Green - (for Concert Band)

601 views · Published 16 May 2017 · 4:25 · Indexed 25 October 2026

Channel: James E. Green · 2017 · Music

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"Mountain Pastures" - James E. Green
Original composition for Concert Band
About the Music:

With the focus on the homophonic longer sustained tones, this piece is “chorale like.”  Playing these tones perfectly together is very important.  This can be difficult for younger players, especially when adding rubato.  Rubato with the longer sustained tones makes it even more difficult to stay together.  With the sustained whole-notes, there is no rhythmic pulse for reference. This creates an exercise for learning to watch the conductor and listening closely to what is happening around you.  This also allows younger, less advanced players moments to work on tone, tuning and blending as a group.  Even though these rhythms are simple, they are the focus – the foreground.  Because the notes don’t change as frequently, it allows for the players to keep their eyes on the conductor.

The imagery (or scene) of the music features the homophonic sections (the foreground) as a meadow (or pasture).  The meadow is full of wild flowers, with a gentle breeze moving through the flowers causing them to sway slowly back and forth.   Imagine this while driving through the mountains on a warm summer evening. The gentle breeze is light and refreshing with a periodic gust of wind that’s signified by the rubato.  These slight gusts increase the swaying of the flowers and the taller pieces of grass.  The shorter homophonic rhythms (middle ground) that are found early in the clarinets and flutes signify the occasional birds and wildlife that pass over and through the meadow (or pasture), ornamenting the scene with by off-setting the movement of the sustained whole-notes.  Often this section hangs over the barline as if suspended in air.  Then comes the melody, which is actually the background ...  the polyphonic sections.  The melody also consists of simple rhythms but with a mix of larger and smaller note values to allow more motion.  The melody signifies the mountains (or rolling hills) that sit behind the meadow.

The sections with more motion can be seen as a larger gust of sustained wind.  Also, it can be seen as arger herds of animals passing through. 

The audience can focus on any of these elements, just as people focus on different images when looking at a mountain pasture.  This allows for a unique experience for each audience member when it is performed. 

The middle ground is a great experience for playing tied-notes across the barlines.  This also creates a harmonic structure that sustains and blends chordal movement – not necessarily in a suspended way, but more in a coloring. The chord tones that are hanging over do not add dissonance, but color.  The idea is that there are no barlines with almost a continuous sustained sound. 

If interested in performing this with your school or community band, please contact me for score and parts:  [email protected]
This sound here is a midi sample

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