WELCOME TO BRASS QUINTET FORUM
TO FOSTER THE ADVANCEMENT OF BRASS CHAMBER MUSIC
Hosted by MEMBERS of the ANNAPOLIS BRASS QUINTET 1971-1993
Hosted by MEMBERS of the ANNAPOLIS BRASS QUINTET 1971-1993
For current editing - reference: copy from former "Welcome Page":
________
First, welcome to you: Brass players, brass quintet members, brass teachers, and all brass chamber music enthusiasts! The Annapolis Brass Quintet was organized in 1971 in hopes of functioning as a full-time performing ensemble.
The inception of our quintet was inspired by the New York Brass Quintet, established in 1954, and the American Brass Quintet, founded in 1960. These two extraordinary ensembles played critical roles in establishing the brass quintet as a respected chamber music medium. While New York collectively retired in 1984, the year 2000 marks another milestone in the illustrious career of the American Brass Quintet as they celebrate their 60th anniversary as the high priests of brass!
In the 1970s, new professional chamber ensembles were springing up in record numbers across the country as evidenced by this front page Wall Street Journal article: "Chamber Ensembles Multiply as Interest in Their Music Swells."
In 1976, members of our quintet gathered with several fellow chamber ensemble musicians in New York to share ideas as to how we might initiate new funding programs for chamber music to support ensemble residencies, educational programs, concert tours, composer commissioning programs, all to create new and more diverse audiences for chamber music in non-traditional performance venues.
These discussions led directly to the establishment of:
Both the BCMSA and IBQF initiated annual composer commissioning programs which contributed to expanding the repertoire, not only for brass quintet alone, but in combination with vocal quartet, vocal sextet, string quartet, woodwind quintet, harp, mezzo-soprano, percussion, dance, electronics, piano, organ, narrator, jazz trio, chorus and orchestra.
On April 23, 1993 the ABQ performed its farewell concert -- a program which included the world premiere of a work commissioned especially for the quintet's final performance--Our emphatic symbolic statement that this concert was not an end, but rather just part of a collective continuum in the advancement of brass chamber music.
Over its twenty-two year career the Annapolis Brass Quintet performed thousands of concerts on four continents and in all fifty states and recorded sixteen commercial albums. The ABQ unearthed and performed a large body of early brass music and commissioned and premiered some seventy-five works by many leading composers.
One of our most important decisions was in making our music library easily accessible to the greatest population of brass players and scholars and selecting an institution that would manage and care for the collection for the benefit of future generations. It took us 15 years to make that decision, but the perfect solution was realized in 2008 (See below: Oberlin Conservatory of Music)
Now, and over the past several months, we have come upon many heretofore undiscovered recordings of the Annapolis Brass Quintet historic live recordings that we have digitalized, and will become a part of the ABQ's Special Collection at Oberlin.
But first, we'd like to share these recordings with you. There may be no other recordings of many of these works, and we hope you might find compositions of interest for future study and performance, and/or just for listening. Over the next several months we will do weekly digital releases of live concert and broadcast performances of wonderful compositions for brass quintet alone and in various collaborative settings.
________
First, welcome to you: Brass players, brass quintet members, brass teachers, and all brass chamber music enthusiasts! The Annapolis Brass Quintet was organized in 1971 in hopes of functioning as a full-time performing ensemble.
The inception of our quintet was inspired by the New York Brass Quintet, established in 1954, and the American Brass Quintet, founded in 1960. These two extraordinary ensembles played critical roles in establishing the brass quintet as a respected chamber music medium. While New York collectively retired in 1984, the year 2000 marks another milestone in the illustrious career of the American Brass Quintet as they celebrate their 60th anniversary as the high priests of brass!
In the 1970s, new professional chamber ensembles were springing up in record numbers across the country as evidenced by this front page Wall Street Journal article: "Chamber Ensembles Multiply as Interest in Their Music Swells."
In 1976, members of our quintet gathered with several fellow chamber ensemble musicians in New York to share ideas as to how we might initiate new funding programs for chamber music to support ensemble residencies, educational programs, concert tours, composer commissioning programs, all to create new and more diverse audiences for chamber music in non-traditional performance venues.
These discussions led directly to the establishment of:
- Chamber Music America by 34 chamber musicians in 1977, and
- National Endowment for the Arts' first chamber music grants program in 1980
- Brass Chamber Music Society of Annapolis (1979-1993)
- International Brass Quintet Festival (1980-1992)
Both the BCMSA and IBQF initiated annual composer commissioning programs which contributed to expanding the repertoire, not only for brass quintet alone, but in combination with vocal quartet, vocal sextet, string quartet, woodwind quintet, harp, mezzo-soprano, percussion, dance, electronics, piano, organ, narrator, jazz trio, chorus and orchestra.
On April 23, 1993 the ABQ performed its farewell concert -- a program which included the world premiere of a work commissioned especially for the quintet's final performance--Our emphatic symbolic statement that this concert was not an end, but rather just part of a collective continuum in the advancement of brass chamber music.
Over its twenty-two year career the Annapolis Brass Quintet performed thousands of concerts on four continents and in all fifty states and recorded sixteen commercial albums. The ABQ unearthed and performed a large body of early brass music and commissioned and premiered some seventy-five works by many leading composers.
One of our most important decisions was in making our music library easily accessible to the greatest population of brass players and scholars and selecting an institution that would manage and care for the collection for the benefit of future generations. It took us 15 years to make that decision, but the perfect solution was realized in 2008 (See below: Oberlin Conservatory of Music)
Now, and over the past several months, we have come upon many heretofore undiscovered recordings of the Annapolis Brass Quintet historic live recordings that we have digitalized, and will become a part of the ABQ's Special Collection at Oberlin.
But first, we'd like to share these recordings with you. There may be no other recordings of many of these works, and we hope you might find compositions of interest for future study and performance, and/or just for listening. Over the next several months we will do weekly digital releases of live concert and broadcast performances of wonderful compositions for brass quintet alone and in various collaborative settings.
Oberlin Conservatory of Music
Library Special Collections
Annapolis Brass Quintet Music Library
Available for Performance & Research
READ ALL ABOUT IT
Library Special Collections
Annapolis Brass Quintet Music Library
Available for Performance & Research
READ ALL ABOUT IT
TO FOSTER THE ADVANCEMENT OF BRASS CHAMBER MUSIC
TAP HERE FOR DIRECT ACCESS:
Annapolis Brass Quintet Special Collection at Oberlin Conservatory
TAP HERE FOR DIRECT ACCESS:
Annapolis Brass Quintet Special Collection at Oberlin Conservatory