GUS Butlins Programme
Summon the Heroes – John Williams arr. Joanne Riseley
Summon the Heroes is an Olympic theme written by John Williams for the 1996 Olympics in
Atlanta, Georgia. It commemorates the Centennial Celebration of the Modern Olympic
Games and was premiered on July 19, 1996. Williams has a flair for inventing this genre of
regal and heroic music with an honesty comparable only to John Phillip Sousa. It is a fine
work, energetic and antiphonal, and the perfect start to any programme.
Of the music, Williams says "There is unquestionably a spiritual, non-corporeal aspect to an
athletic quest ... that brings us close to what art is all about."
This is a fine arrangement for brass band by Joanne Riseley with the opening trumpet solo
played by the bands soprano cornetist Gary Fountain.
A Spin through Moscow – Shostakovich arr. Gareth Westwood
Dmitri Shostakovich was born in St. Petersburg (now Leningrad) and died in Moscow. His
entire musical career was therefore spent within Russia's Communist system, and in many
ways it is clear that he had to strike a balance between his own artistic inclinations and the
demands of the state. Some of Shostakovich's work seems to be simply paying his dues as an
upright citizen but in many cases, although his music might outwardly be conforming with
the party line, there is nevertheless the feeling that he is rebelling against this.
This foot-tapping breeze through the Russian capital is one of Shostakovich’s more lighthearted works. Don’t blink or you’ll miss it!
Brown Bird Singing – Haydn Wood, arr. T Dodd
Cornet Solo – James Fountain
Haydn Wood was born in 1882 in Slaithwaite, Yorkshire, of a large musical family. His
father Clement, an innkeeper, was a brilliant amateur who conducted the local brass band.
The family moved to Douglas, Isle of Man, where Haydn first studied the violin with his
brother Harry, an orchestral conductor known as 'Manxland's King of Music'.
Haydn Wood became a multi-talented professional, as a well-known violinist, a successful
composer of light and classical music, and a conductor of his own works. The BBC, who
commissioned some of his compositions and for whom he conducted many concerts of his
works, often broadcast his music.
He composed 180 songs and ballads, 80 orchestral pieces (suites, overtures, intermezzi,
rhapsodies, marches), a piano concerto, a violin concerto, variations for cello and orchestra,
works for piano solo, violin and piano, flute and piano, oboe and piano, string quartet,
accordion, choral works and three musical plays. He also composed a symphony, which was
never published.
Our principal cornet, James Fountain son of Gary our Soprano cornetist, is aged just 14 and
current principal cornet of the NYBBGB is our featured soloist in one of Woods’ most
beautiful melodies of which the lyrics are:
All through the night
there's a little brown bird singing
singing in the dusk of the darkness
and the dew
Oh how I wish that my heart
could go awinging
could go awinging
straight through the nighttime
to you
to you
Temptress for Trombones - arr. Roger Harvey
The music plays homage to the creative talents of Tutti Camarata. Although a trumpet player
for bands led by Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey and Benny Goodman, Maestro Camarata (born
Salvador Tutti Camarata) made his greatest mark as an arranger. In addition to orchestrating
numerous big band hits for Jimmy Dorsey, including "Green Eyes" and Tangerine," Camarata
orchestrated and/or produced historic recordings by Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, and
Duke Ellington. He also recorded two albums for Disney's Buena Vista label: Tutti's
Trumpets in 1957 and Tutti's Trombones in 1980, featuring some the finest trombone talents
ever assembled in one studio. Mercifully, the Temptresses are in form of 3 jazz standards,
Georgia on My Mind, The Girl from Ipamena and Lulu’s back in town and therefore the
temptations are purely of a musical kind.
Roger Harvey originally produced this version for Chris Jeans and the trombone section of
The Black Dyke Band for performance at the National Finals Gala Concert in the RAH in the
mid 1990’s
The Virtusoi GUS Band Tutti Temptresses are Chris Jeans, John Hopkins & Nigel Love
Fat Bottomed Girls – Brian May- arranged Phillip Harper
Fat Bottomed Girls was a hit single by the rock band Queen. It was released in 1978 on the
album Jazz and was written by Queen guitarist Brian May. The lyrics express the axiom
"Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder", albeit done in a humorous and overtly sexual
tone!!!!!
Fat Bottomed Girls" was released as a Double A-side with the song "Bicycle Race." This cut
of Fat Bottomed Girls includes the line "Get on your bikes and ride". Bicycle Race also
contains the line "Fat bottomed girls, they'll be riding today, so look out for those beauties, oh
yeah", completing a double cross-reference between the two songs.
The original single cover featured a nude woman riding a bicycle. When many stores refused
to stock the single because of the cover, the label subsequently altered the image so that the
woman was wearing panties
This arrangement is by Phillip Harper
Feste Romane (Roman Festivals) - Lorenzo Respighi
Respighi, an Italian composer who completed most of his output during the early 20th century,
was best known for his spectacular ‘Roman Trilogy’ - Fountains of Rome’, ‘Pines of Rome’,
and ‘Roman Festivals’.
‘Roman Festivals’, completed in 1928, was the third and final part of his Roman trilogy, and
was premiered by Toscanini and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra in 1929. Toscanini
recorded the music twice for RCA Victor, first with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1942 and
then with the NBC Symphony Orchestra in 1949, and RCA released both versions, first on LP
and then CD.
As the culmination of this series, it is somewhat the longest and clearly the most ambitious of
the three works—and by no means the most subtle. In this case the customary translation,
“Roman Festivals,” seems a pale image of the grand-scaled panorama Respighi sought to
evoke. While some of his tone poems are designated “symphonic impressions” and allude to
the moods or impressions stimulated by various scenes or events, rather than the events
themselves, ‘Feste romane’ is unreservedly graphic in its descriptiveness. Respighi declared
that this work represented his “maximum of orchestral sonority and color”; with it he brought
to an end not only his Roman triptych but a very prominent sector of his creative activity.