…Another Door Opens

wind band • commissioned by Eastern Shore Consolidated School concert band, dir. Allison Penwell

This work is currently under performance exclusivity.

Program Notes

This composition was commissioned by my high school band director, Allison Penwell, to celebrate the opening of the new Eastern Shore Consolidated School, and the concurrent closing of my junior and senior high schools. These changes are bound to come with anxieties, adjustment periods, and moments of missing what we had, which will give way to eagerness for the new experiences to be had. This overture for wind band represents, to me, a blending of old and new: I felt connected to some of the wind band works that I’d played while I was a high school student, but I now get to approach the same concepts on the other side of the sheet music.

...Another Door Opens is dedicated with care to the first band class of Eastern Shore Consolidated School, who will have rehearsed it in a new, unfamiliar place. Even though the paint has barely dried, you’ll have brought your sense of community with you. School is not just a physical space, and the relationships and memories you’ll construct will last far longer than any brick and mortar.

Instrumentation

picc+2fl., ob., bsn., 3Bb cl., b. cl., AATB sax., 2tpt., horn, 2tbn., euph., tuba, s.b., timp., percussion 1 (s.d., sus. cym., bells), 2 (tgl., tamb., b.d.), 3 (cr. cym., marimba or xylophone)