2025 Regional Tests Announced
The Music Panel of the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain has revealed the all-important 2025 Regional test-pieces, as:
Championship Section: Diversions (Derek Bourgeois)
Published by R. Smith & Co, now Studio Music
Section 1: Introduction, Elegy and Caprice (Morley Calvert)
published by R. Smith & Co, now Studio Music
Section 2: Friendly Takeover (Oliver Waespi)
published by Beriato Music
Section 3: Arkansas (Jacob de Haan)
published by de Haske
Section 4: I, Daedalus (Andrea Price)
published by Kirklees Music.
Skellerup Brass Band commissioned Derek Bourgeois to write Diversions set for the Championship Section in the summer of 1985. After his last test-piece for the National Championships, the aggressive and forceful Blitz, the composer decided to write a work of a completely different character, which whilst very technically demanding is, as the title suggests, light-hearted in style and easy-on-the-ear.
Cast in three movements, the first has two main contrasting themes, one bold, jaunty, and heavily scored, the other, announced by solo horn, more lyrical in character. In sonata form, the development section and recapitulation are merged into a continuous interplay of the two themes.
The second movement, an expressive andante, is in a free rondo form, which for the most part is lightly scored and features a lot of solo passages that make demands on the musicianship of players and conductor alike. The very simplicity of its textures and the breadth of its melodic writing demand firm control of vibrato, phrasing and rubato.
The brief finale is a romp with ternary structure. Highly rhythmic in character, only rarely do the performers enjoy the luxury of two consecutive bars in the same time signature!
Meanwhile, Section 1’s Introduction, Elegy and Caprice was commissioned from Canadian composer, Morley Calvert, for the very first European Championships in 1978 and forms part of a series of major works by him, which include Suite from the Monteregian Hills, An Occasional Suite, Suite on Canadian Folk-Songs, and Romantic Variations.
In three contrasting movements, the piece opens dramatically with fanfare-like unison notes, after which a slow, mysterious figure in the horns, above ostinato timpani, leads to the main section – a quick ‘one-in-a-bar’ boisterous allegro harnessing the same, but much speeded-up material centred around the persistent figure.
The slow Elegy movement is simple in structure and opens with an unaccompanied euphonium solo, which is passed to the horn, cornet, and basses in the manner of a passacaglia, which is then broken as the movement fragments. A lamenting theme is repeated four times, each occasion with different contrapuntal and harmonic colouring, and it leads without pause into the final Caprice that brings much-needed relief in a very rhythmic, sprightly dance thrown around the band with abandon.
Oliver Waespi’s Friendly Takeover, set for Section 2, was composed for the 2016 Swiss Wind Band Convention in Montreux. In this three-movement piece, the composer experiments with lyrical motives combined with rhythmical pulses in different metres throughout. The musical scene in the finale is taken over completely by groove-based rhythms of a friendly nature, infusing energy and vitality to give the impression of an ongoing acceleration throughout the piece.
Arkansas, the American state often referred to as ‘the natural state’ or ‘the land of opportunity’, is the latest of Jacob de Haan’s output and belongs to his series of musical montages depicting various states in the USA that include Dakota, Oregon, and Virginia. Set for the Section 3 ‘Regional’, it is a suite cast in three movements based on a well-known native American folk song, which appears in complete form, and in major and minor fragments as a ballad in a lyrical orchestration; as a blues accompanied by a jazzy rhythm, and again at the end in its pure form. In the process, all instrumental groups of the brass band get their chance to shine as the folk song provides continuity throughout the three movements.
Composed by Andrea Price, I, Daedalus is a new, programmatic test-piece inspired by the mythology of Daedalus, father of Icarus. Set for the Section 4 ‘Regional’, the music is through-composed with a short introduction leading to five main sections. The introduction is stately and dramatic; based on a four-note motif ‘G-E-C-Eb’ representing ancient Greece, which leads to the fast-paced, rhythmic Inventor in the Tower section with fanfare-like ideas and melodic moments, as Daedalus plans his escape and builds the famously ill-fated wings. Then follows a short slow section, Father and Son, in which the euphonium and solo cornet lead, representing Daedalus and Icarus respectively in their final moments before they make their escape.
Flight and Fall sets off in a quick compound metre, with driving rhythms propelling the music forward, accompanying playful then soaring melodies shared across different sections of the band as the pair delight in successful flight. As this section progresses, tension builds, leading to one of the most famous moments in Greek mythology – Icarus falling from the sky. The music becomes dissonant, then despairing.
The Lament is hymn-like, with a euphonium cadenza and slow, plaintive music from the band signalling Daedalus’ grief and remorse. At the start of the final section, Seeker of Knowledge, the music returns to a major tonality and brings back some of the musical material of the introduction before building to a triumphant finale featuring a tutti version of Daedalus’ theme, heard earlier in the euphonium solo. The music comes to a trumphnant close with a final fanfare declaring Daedalus’ legacy.
The piece has plenty of technical and musical challenges for everyone, and lots of rhythmic complexity, moments of harmonic intrigue, and detailed articulation and dynamics for conductors to work on.
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