fragments and memories
{Concerto for Trombone}

for trombone and piano (there are also versions for trombone and wind ensemble and trombone and orchestra)

available for purchase from Warwick Music

duration app. 14 min. (piano version); 17 min. (orchestrated version)

Program Notes:

fragments and memories was written for Radu Clipa, an extremely talented trombonist living in Bucharest, Romania, who also gave the international premiere of my Trombone Sonata.

fragments and memories is built upon a few basic motives. The first is a series of repeated notes that then leaps up a sixth and then back down, ending a semitone above or below the initial note. The second is a fast moving passage that eventually rests on neighbor-note figure.. From there, the trombone and piano take off in a flight of fancy, and the motives follow, changing and transforming throughout. The piece is in three larger sections, but within each section the music flows naturally, making references to things that have come before, or will be yet to come. How all of this comes together to make a coherent piece is for theorists to decode. For the listener, I strove to create easy to follow connections, and a motivic saturation that is never stagnant or boring. The title is not a reference to the form or construction, but rather an evocative title as to how the listener might come to understand the piece. My intention was to write a piece that would be fun to play, and hopefully also fun to hear.

The current version of the piece was written for trombone and piano, but throughout, my compositional intent was to write with a larger ensemble in mind. Still I wanted the piece to remain “pianistic”. Hopefully the result is a piece that sounds natural on the piano, but also infuses the listener’s imagination with possible orchestral colors and gestures.

-Ryan Jesperson
10/7/2008

 

this work was written for Radu Clipa and was premiered in Bucharest, Romania on Jan 21st, 2009. It will also be performed as part of the CMU New Music Festival in March, 2009, and is the winner of the 2008/2009 British Trombone Society Composition Contest. Jordan Jacobson and HICO will premiere the orchestra version in the 2012/2013 season.

Fall, 2012: Joseph Abad will premiere a new Saxophone Sonata.

Fall, 2012: Jordan Jacobson will perform fragments and memories in CT.

Spring-Summer, 2012: Jeux pour Jumeaux will be performed in San Francisco, CA.

Spring, 2012: Bobby Watson and the UMKC Big Band will premiere Rhapsody for Dean Moriarty in Kansas City, MO.

Spring, 2012: Ashly Evans will premiere Birdsongs in Houston, TX.

Spring, 2012: BA(da)SS will be performed by Ryan Ford in West Hartford, CT.

Spring, 2012: Jordan Jacobson will perform fragments and memories in CT.

Spring, 2012: Not Death, but Love will be premiered by Ineo Saxophone Quartet.

Spring, 2012: David Tayloe will perform A Page Out of Zen in CT.

May, 2012: The Invisible, Magic, Soccer Phone will be premiered in Middlefield, CT.

April, 2012: The UMKC Opera Dept. will perform portions of Songs from Behind the Curtain.

April, 2012: David Tayloe will premiere A Page Out of Zen in NY.

Feb. 17th, 2012: The 016 Ensemble will be perform Romanza for Alto Saxophone and Violin in Manchester, CT.

Dec. 3rd, 2011: Ryan defends his dessertation, Songs from Behind the Curtain at UMKC.

July 17th, 21st, 24th, 2011: Music Faculty from the Sebago-Long Lake Music Festival will perform ...and those seven dwarfs in a series of concerts in Western Maine.

June 16th, 17th, 23rd, 24th, 2011:Orphée Redux will be performed by Rhymes With Opera on their East Coast Tour (NYC, Baltimore, Hartford, Boston).

June 12th, 2011:Selection from Songs from Behind the Curtain will be performed at the John Duffy Composers Institute in Norfolk, VA.

May 13th, 2011: The Ineo Quartet will perform the 1st movement of Not Death, but Love on their Fischoff Competition program in South Bend, Indiana.

March 19th, 2011: The Ineo Saxophone Quartet will perform ...and love is fire... from Not Death, but Love at the NASA conference in West Point, NY.

Feb. 25th, 2011: I. Jest will be premiered by Robert Olson and the UMKC Orchestra in Kansas City, MO.

Feb. 14th, 2011: Hebdomas Squatinae will be performed at the Nebraska at Kearney New Music Festival.

EVENT HISTORY