Reflections

Reflections Premiered by Rex Richardson, trumpet, and Jim Stephenson, piano at the 2010 Grand Valley State Universityʼs International Trumpet Seminar; Richard Stoelzel, host Program Notes from the composer: “Reflections” was extracted from “Day-TUDES” (Vol. I) – a series of etudes written each day during the month of February, 2010. What follows is taken from the original thoughts written on Feb. 17, 2010: “‘Reflections’ has significance on many different levels. First of all, last night I attended a recital by Bob Sullivan (principal trumpet of the Cincinnati Symphony) here in New York. I realized during the course of the recital that there is no substitute for gorgeous melodies played in a beautiful fashion. This “day-tude”, therefore, is a reflection on that realization, and is nothing more than a simple melody to be played as beautifully as possible. There is no doubt that this will sound like a movie score, or even a show-tune from a Broadway musical (must be the New York influence this week, because I’m staying in the heart of Manhattan, near all of the theaters). Another reason for this “day-tude” is that I wanted to reflect on my childhood a bit, when my father would sit and play the piano in our house for hours, pulling out show-tune after show-tune. I could hear his left hand rolling slowly over these chords as I wrote them.” There is another play on the word “Reflection” as well. If one studies the solo trumpet part, from rehearsal A to one before G, it will be revealed that the music can also be played upside down and result in (mostly) the same material. (A few octave displacements had to be made to maintain the melodic line). The piano part was added May 20, 2011.