Two Moods for Tuba

[Blueant2B]

Hey guys,

I was wondering if anyone knows anything about the piece "Two Moods for Tuba" by Donald Swann.

I'd like to know more about the background of this piece. So I sound more knowledgeable about the piece for my solo performance this year.

I know as much as it was written for Gerard Haffnung. Also that the Elegy was inspired by Honneger's Third Symphony.

But that's as much as I know.

Any additional information on the piece would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

[Jayhawker]

I don't know much about the piece itself(sorry!), but Donald Swann was prolific as a composer of both serious and not-so-serious music. One of his more interesting serious works was a song cycle called "The Road Goes Ever On" and it contains poems from the Lord of the Rings. Swann supposedly did this with the approval of J.R.R. Tolkien and one of the songs was based on a tune that Tolkien wrote as well. Don't know if this helps, if not, I'm sorry, but Swann's music is very cool!

[Blueant2B]

Thank you Jayhawker! Anything is more than nothing!

[mbeastep]

Hoffnung was famous for his (very English) musical humor. There are two collections of cartoons published by Dover with images like that of a blindfolded prisoner facing a squad of trombones, a natural horn player looking like he is holding a knitting project and another line of trombonists in which the player with the longest slide is accommodated by having a trap door opened. These can look good on programs.

There are recordings of a series of "Interplanetary Music Festivals" organized by Hoffnung which featured such things as a concerto for a number of vacuum cleaners and Dennis Brain (look him up) playing a Mozart horn concerto on a garden hose. Evidently there was a lot of Monty Pythonesque visual humor going on, but it's hard to reconstruct from the recordings. Hoffnung was apparently a very good amateur tubist, but one who was not averse to seeing the humorous side of the instrument.

mb eastep