Tone Poem for Concert Band

Instrumentation: 3fl (all alt=pic).2ob(2=CorA).3cl(1=EbCl; 2,3=BC),2bn / ssax.asax.tsax.bsax / 4hn.3tp.2tb.tba / timp.3perc (tb.glsp.BrkDm.trgl.Tam-t.flex.slap.mar.vib.marktree.2BD.SD.xyl.splash.drumkit.FD.templeblx) / cb

Year: 1997

Duration: 12’

First Performance: 20 September 1999 / Baylor University Concert Hall, Waco, Texas / Baylor Winds / Michael Haithcock

Dedication: “For Mike and the Baylor Winds, 1997.”

Publisher: E.C. Schirmer score sale | rental

Buy the Study Score: all-sheetmusic | Front

Listen: Spotify | iTunes

Recording: Arsis

Program Note:

There are four musical ideas in the piece: (1.) a melodic wedge — a handful of notes which lead inward towards, or splay outward away from a central tone; (2.) a cluster — a simultaneous sounding of adjacent pitches; (3.) a harmonic constellation of four triads — B flat major, E major, G major, and D flat major, associated with one another by (4.) the interval of the tritone — three whole steps.

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

Robert Frost