Composer: John Mackey, Frank Ticheli, Eric Whitacre
Performer: Julian Bliss, Joby Burgess
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Signum
Release: 2021
Size: 223 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: cover
01. Mackey: Asphalt Cocktail
02. Whitacre: October
03. Ticheli: Blue Shades
Julian Bliss and Joby Burgess combine forces for these recordings made during the 2020 UK lockdown. Working from their homes (although only a few miles apart from each other), each performer combines multiple layers of clarinet and percussion to create these exciting and dynamic new arrangements of much-loved standards of the American Band Music world.
Composer John Mackey describes Asphalt Cocktail as “a five-minute opener, designed to shout, from the opening measure, ‘We’re here.’ With biting trombones, blaring trumpets and percussion dominated by cross-rhythms and back beats… Picture the scariest NYC taxi ride you can imagine, with the cab skidding around turns as trucks bear down from all sides.”
The composer’s favourite month, Eric Whitacre’s October contains “simple, pastoral melodies and subsequent harmonies inspired by the great English Romantics (Vaughn Williams, Elgar)… perfectly suited to capture the natural and pastoral soul of the season.”