Snowflakes Dancing (2016, Kjos)

 

Snowflakes Dancing was commissioned by Dr. Scott Jones, Dr. Peter Haberman, and the Concordia College Bands for the 2013 Honor Band. My intent in writing the piece was to create a minimalist work for high school band.  The basic process at work throughout Snowflakes Dancing revolves around the idea of layering.  Every musical idea that enters is in a four bar pattern that repeats four times, so that every four measures one musical element leaves the texture and a fresh element siimultaneously enters.  This creates a constantly shifting texture that gradually morphs over time.  Additionally, most of the  melodic elements return several times, each time becoming either more or less complex.

 

When I completed the piece, I still had no idea what to call it.  Since I finished the work during the winter, it occurred to me that the shifting textures of the work created musical images that were always related but never identical, just like snowflakes.  It also occurred to me that the premier would be in northern Minnesota in early April.  I joked with my wife that, although it was spring, it would be ironic if it snowed that weekend of the premiere...which it did!

 

Snowflakes Dancing won the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA) Young Band Composition Contest in 2013.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Performance by the Nagaoya Academic Winds, Mamoru Nakata, conductor