Tripartita for Winds (4 Trumpets, 1 Horn, 3 Trombones, Tuba) and Timpani, op. 103e (2000)
I. Intrada
II. Chorale
III. Toccatina
First
performance: August 18, 2000, Würzburg, St. Peter und Paul-Kirche
Fürstbischöfliches
Bläserensemble Würzburg / Richard Carlson Steuart
Duration: 6 Minutes
Publisher: Schott MusicScore and parts: SHS 3010 / ISMN: 979-0-001-20329-6
This
work in three sections draws on pre-baroque performance traditions, in which groups
of wind instruments played brief, pregnant pieces in churches, public places and
from steeples.
The subsidiary titles, Intrada - Chorale - Toccatina
are precise terms for the contrasting sequence of movements.
The
work was written in the year 2000 for 4 Trumpets, 1 Horn, 3 Trombones, Tuba as
well as Timpani and is dedicated to the trumpeter Richard Steuart.
Bertold Hummel
The tripartite work harks back to musical practice from the pre-Baroque period when wind ensembles performed compact, brief pieces in churches, on town squares and from towers. The three movements Intrada, Choral and Toccatina, combined in a type of suite, adhere to the customary musical principle of fast-slow-fast, thereby producing a highly contrasting musical structure.
The first movement is characterised by the alternation of instrumental groups in different combinations with tutti blocks in the central and concluding sections of the work.
The second movement is based on a chorale melody from the Genevan psalter from 1543. The melody is intoned by the trumpets, repeatedly interrupted by prominent motifs on the horn and sporadic shimmering and delicate figures, mostly within a quiet dynamic range.
The third movement concludes the short cycle in a vivacious, virtuoso style with a gradually developing crescendo culminating in three powerful chords.
Claus Cornian
Translation: Lindsay Chalmers-Gerbracht