Music: English Counterpoint

Composer Dan Price reviews the latest new release from young composer, Lewis Furber.

Lewis Furber is a name that I think you will begin to hear more of, if his first attempt at writing for brass band is anything to go by. English Counterpoint was the winning entry of the 2016 Cory Composers’ Competition.

From the opening bars, one is instantly reminded of Vaughan-Williams’s The Lark Ascending and, as the work develops into its perpetual rejuvenation of contrapuntal textures and ideas, you begin to lose yourself in the overall wash of sound.

Although relatively simplistic to look at on paper, this is mature writing, and it will take a sensitive band and director to make sense of how to convey the music.

On the whole, the band is scored as individual instruments (for example 2nd Cornet I, 2nd Cornet II), so you need to have almost a complete band to make this successful in performance. There is only one sparse percussion part, affording the team a rest in a heavy concert!

An interesting new voice for band writing that Section 2 and above level bands would enjoy performing.