Soar
for Trumpet and Piano
Written: 2022
Duration: ca. 8’30”*
for C trumpet and piano
Commissioned by Lexie Signor
World Premiere: Mostly Modern Festival, Lexie Signor, trumpet; Geoffrey Burleson, piano; Skidmore College, Arthur Zankel Performing Arts Center, Helen Filene Ladd Concert Hall, Saratoga Springs, NY, June 21, 2023
Publisher: Bill Holab Music
*For competitions, the following measures may be omitted to reduce the duration of the piece: mm. 190-234 (will reduce to ca. 7:55); mm. 274-325 (will reduce to ca. 7:30). These cuts should not be used for live performances or recordings.
PROGRAM NOTe
Many composers associate orchestral instruments with animals to great effect, such as Prokofiev with Peter and the Wolf, Rimsky-Korsakov with Flight of the Bumblebee, Saint-Saëns with Carnival of the Animals, and perhaps most obsessively, Messiaen with birds from all over the world. In Soar, I associate the trumpet with an eagle, a bird that can fly as high as ten thousand feet and as fast as two hundred miles per hour. Like an eagle soaring above mountains, Soar requires the trumpet player to play fast and high, and both the trumpet and piano parts are, at times, quite virtuosic. In this sense, Soar is really meant as a show-off piece for expert trumpet players. Soar was commissioned by Lexie Signor.