Tonight’s chamber music concert looks back at this era entirely through works written or arranged for brass ensembles. While strings and keyboards have chamber music traditions going back centuries, music written exclusively for brass instruments remained mostly for military bands, local village brass groups, and some religious ensembles through much of the 19th century. Following on the heels of the Industrial Revolution, the manufacturing of modern brass instruments, and music for them, exploded in the 20th century, leading to a rich and rewarding body of work. 

Spanning 1910 to 1999, tonight’s concert showcases the power, versatility, and clarion beauty of the brass section. It fittingly opens with a pair of fanfares by American composer Joan Tower (b. 1938). Traditionally intoned by a trumpet player or another brass musician, fanfares traditionally announced the entrance of a dignitary. In 1942, Aaron Copland turned the form on its head with his Fanfare for the Common Man, an ode to those bearing great sacrifices during World War II. Tower’s Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 1 (1986) is an overt reference to Copland, and Tower herself reflected that her piece could be considered both a response and tribute. It represents a rallying cry for “women who take risks and who are adventurous,” she explains. Tower has returned to this theme throughout her career, infusing a modern air into her brilliant and empowering statements. The Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 2 (1989), also written for large brass ensemble and percussion, follows, and the leaner fifth entry in the series (1993), for trumpet quartet, opens our second half. 

Composed in the 1930s, Sensemayá by Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas (1899–1940) is based on a poem of the same name by Cuban writer Nicolás Guillén, who found inspiration in an Afro-Cuban folktale about a sacrificial killing of a mythical snake. Having originally written the piece for chamber ensemble, Revueltas arranged it for full orchestra in 1938. Our arrangement by Bruce Roberts, a former horn player for the San Francisco Symphony, is a spectacular vehicle for brass and percussion and showcases the brutal, driving energy of Revueltas’ most famous work. 

From this hair-raising ritual, we go back nearly 30 years to 6 Quartets for 4 Horns by Russian composer, conductor, and pianist Nikolai Tcherepnin (1873–1945). Written in 1910, it’s the oldest composition on our program and filled with warm lyricism, a lively hunt, and dance movements—perfect for spotlighting the LA Phil horn section. 

No brass concert is complete without a brass quintet—that esteemed ensemble of two trumpets, a horn, a trombone, and either a bass trombone or a tuba. Our first half closes with a favorite example: Sonatine by Eugène Bozza (1905–91). A spry and joyful work from the early 1950s, it features some of the greatest writing for this perfectly balanced group of instrumentalists. Practically all serious brass musicians have played this charming piece in their training at one point or another, and it is a treat to revisit this beloved work with such talented colleagues. 

The trumpet section calls us all back after intermission with Tower’s Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 5 and then gives way to the LA Phil trombone section for another uncommon composition: Winged Suite (1999) by Steve Holtman (b. 1956), a Los Angeles resident and a stellar trombonist himself. As its title suggests, Winged Suite evokes the spectrum of birdsong, from solo warblers to cacophonies of flocks shifting together in murmuration. In the symphonic repertory, flutes, violins, and oboes usually portray the chirping and cooing of birds, but Holtman shows off the trombone’s incredible range in its ability to mimic our avian friends. 

Looking at the brass literature across the 20th century, we would be remiss not to include an element of jazz. For that we looked to a champion of modern brass composition, saxophonist Daniel Schnyder (b. 1961). His Brass Trio for trumpet, horn, and trombone (1996) grooves with a dash of the avant-garde and a wonderful sense of humor. The first movement is marked by bouncing triplets and syncopated rhythms, leading without pause into a more somber section tinged with an air of the Baroque. The playful third passes around funky riffs among all three players, but clouds darken in the melancholy and soulful fourth. All three parts come together in unison in the final movement. 

For the evening’s finale, we have chosen a work by Australian composer Percy Grainger. His music is a cornerstone in the wind ensemble repertory, and his composition Lincolnshire Posy has a special place in all of our hearts. Tonight’s concert features an arrangement by Timothy Higgins, a good friend and principal trombonist of the San Francisco Symphony. 

The six songs that make up the composition come from Grainger’s 1905 visit to Lincolnshire, England. During his tour, he and his friend Lucy Broadwood recorded, on wax cylinders, several local residents singing folk songs. In 1937, Grainger scored the recordings, faithfully capturing the qualities of each singer. “This bunch of ‘musical wildflowers,’” he wrote in the score, is “dedicated to the old folksingers who sang so sweetly to me. Indeed each number is intended to be a kind of musical portrait of the singer…our folksingers were lords in their own domain—were at once performers and creators.” 

Full of bounce, beauty, and tunes that any audience member can whistle out the door, Lincolnshire Posy is the ideal culmination of our evening. —James Miller