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Release Date: January 24, 2020
Catalog #: NV6267
Format: Digital & Physical
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Lines at Dusk

Traci Mendel composer
James M. David composer
Otto Ketting composer
Bernhard Krol composer
Alexey Posin composer

John McGuire horn
Kevin Chance piano
Wesley Ferreira clarinet
The Fortress Brass Quintet

On LINES AT DUSK, acclaimed hornist John McGuire presents seven pieces, written by a variety of composers, with performances that are at once deep and expansive. The three movements of Landscapes, Series II, inspired by Japanese landscape paintings and woodcuts, travel from the dangerous mountains through the tranquility of the countryside and the bustling energy of a large city. It closes with an extended coda, with longer note values and a more sustained piano part that indicates a return to a calmer, more serene environment.

Beginning with Landscapes, Series II and throughout the album’s next three selections, McGuire is accompanied by pianist Kevin Chance. The duo’s performance on the programmatic Lines at Dusk: Hymn to the Rising Moon, which was inspired by two of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s poems, effectively utilizes harmonic color to convey atmosphere as well as emotion.

Nocturne was written by Traci Mendel for horn and piano for McGuire’s birthday in 2000. Embedded in the chords is the opening melody from Strauss’s Horn Concerto No. 1, which McGuire was working on at the time. The piece’s solemn, almost foreboding pace belies the composition’s celebratory inspiration.

On Bataque, McGuire and Chance are joined by Wesley Ferreira, one of the prominent clarinetists of his generation. “Bataque” refers to a genre of music and dance associated with coastal West Africa and Brazil, and this two-movement composition explores the heterophonic and call-and-response techniques of the genre. The first movement focuses on the tuneful melodies performed by the kantaderas (singers) while the second, more energetic movement captures the complex polyrhythms of the batukaderas (drummers.)

The album’s two solo pieces – Intrada and Laudatio – highlight McGuire’s ability to deliver revelatory performances that embody each composer’s inspiration. LINES AT DUSK closes with Brass Quintet No. 1, presented by the Fortress Brass Quintet, of which McGuire is a founding member. Opening with the energetic, inspiring “Allegro Vivo,” the piece’s three movements deliver a sense of enthusiastic forward momentum and emphatically conclude the album.

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Track Listing & Credits

# Title Composer Performer
01 Landscapes, Series 2: I. Tall Mountains, Rising Mist, and Shinto Shrine Traci Mendel John McGuire, horn; Kevin Chance piano 5:17
02 Landscapes, Series 2: II. Rain Falling on Rice Fields Traci Mendel John McGuire, horn; Kevin Chance piano 4:14
03 Landscapes, Series 2: III. Tokyo in the Distance Traci Mendel John McGuire, horn; Kevin Chance piano 6:47
04 Lines at Dusk (Hymn to the Rising Moon) Traci Mendel John McGuire, horn; Kevin Chance piano 4:28
05 Nocturne for Horn & Piano Traci Mendel John McGuire, horn; Kevin Chance piano 5:26
06 Batuque: I. Kantaderas James M. David John McGuire, horn; Wesley Ferreira, clarinet; Kevin Chance, piano 5:28
07 Batuque: II. Batukaderas James M. David John McGuire, horn; Wesley Ferreira, clarinet; Kevin Chance, piano 3:51
08 Intrada (Version for Solo Horn) Otto Ketting John McGuire, horn 4:21
09 Laudatio Bernhard Krol John McGuire, horn 4:56
10 Brass Quintet No. 1: I. Allegro Vivo Alexey Posin The Fortress Brass Quintet | Bradley Ulrich, trumpet; Eric Yates, trumpet; John McGuire, horn; Bradley Kerns, trombone; Michael Dunn, tuba 3:42
11 Brass Quintet No. 1: II. Intermezzo - III. Rondo-tarantella Alexey Posin The Fortress Brass Quintet | Bradley Ulrich, trumpet; Eric Yates, trumpet; John McGuire, horn; Bradley Kerns, trombone; Michael Dunn, tuba 5:30

Tracks 1-9 recorded May 20-21 and July 28-30, 2019 at The University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa AL
Produced and directed by Eric Yates and John McGuire
Recording Engineer Michael Wilk
Mixed by Michael Wilk and David Myers

Tracks 10-11 recorded November 17, 2018 at The University of Kentucky in Lexington KY
Recorded, directed, and mixed by John Handshoe
Album package artwork Caleb Knobel instagram.com/calebknobel

Executive Producer Bob Lord

Executive A&R Sam Renshaw
A&R Director Brandon MacNeil
A&R Chris Robinson

VP, Audio Production Jeff LeRoy
Audio Director Lucas Paquette
Mastering Shaun Michaud

VP, Design & Marketing Brett Picknell
Art Director Ryan Harrison
Design Edward A. Fleming
Publicity Patrick Niland, Sara Warner

Artist Information

John McGuire

Hornist

John McGuire has a vast array of performance and teaching experiences. He has performed with many orchestras around the country, most notably the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Dallas Opera, the Fort Worth Symphony, the New World Symphony in Miami FL, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Illinois Symphony Orchestra, and the Florida West Coast Symphony. McGuire has also toured internationally with the acclaimed Fortress Brass Quintet, of which he is a founding member.

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Kevin Chance

Piano

KEVIN CHANCE serves as Assistant Professor of Piano and chair of the Gloria Narramore Moody Piano Area at the University of Alabama. He maintains a studio of award-winning students at the pre-collegiate and collegiate levels, and in addition to being named the Alabama Music Teachers Association Teacher of the Year, he was recently named the 2019 Music Educator of the Year by the Tuscaloosa Council on the Arts and Humanities for his outstanding contributions to the Tuscaloosa community.

Recently elected the Vice President of the Music Teachers National Association, he remains in demand as a teacher and clinician throughout the country, and he tours extensively throughout the United States and abroad as both soloist and collaborator. Chance holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music, Louisiana State University, and Birmingham-Southern College, where he was a student of Barry Snyder, Constance Knox Carroll, and William DeVan.

Wesley Ferreira

Clarinet

WESLEY FERREIRA, one of the prominent clarinetists of his generation, has been praised by critics for his “beautiful tone” and “technical prowess” (The Clarinet) as well as his “remarkable sensitivity” (CAML Review). Fanfare Magazine notes that Ferreira is “clearly a major talent.” He is Assistant Professor of Clarinet at Colorado State University.

Ferreira has been the featured soloist with numerous wind bands and orchestras in North America and Europe, and has been broadcast nationally on both the Canadian and Australian Broadcasting Corporations. He has given performances and masterclasses at numerous colleges and universities throughout North America. His innovative teaching methods are acclaimed, including the development of the breath training program for musicians, Air Revelation Breath Support Training Program for Musicians ®. Ferreira holds degrees from Western University (B.M.) and Arizona State University (M.M. and D.M.A). He is a D’Addario and Selmer Paris Artist. For more information, visit wesleyferreira.com

Traci Mendel

Composer

TRACI MENDEL considers the natural world, paintings and sculptures, and poetry her most significant influences; her favorite color is water, and she has no favorite composer. She holds degrees from Centenary College of Louisiana, and Florida State University.

Mendel is a Lecturer in Music at Troy University in Troy AL. When she’s not teaching, she’s composing; when she’s not composing, she’s teaching. When on vacation she likes to visit art galleries and botanical gardens. Her compositions are published by Potenza Music, her website is www.tracimendel.com.

James M. David

Composer

JAMES M. DAVID (b. 1978) is an internationally recognized composer who currently serves as Associate Professor at Colorado State University and is particularly known for his works for winds, brass, and percussion. His music has been featured at over 50 national and international conferences and festivals throughout North and South America, Asia, Europe, and Australia.

His works have received numerous awards from such organizations as ASCAP, the National Band Association, the National Association of Composers, USA, the Dallas Wind Symphony, and the Music Teachers National Association. His commissions include projects for the Des Moines Symphony, Joseph Alessi (NY Philharmonic), John Bruce Yeh (Chicago Symphony), James Markey (Boston Symphony), the Playground Ensemble, and the International Saxophone Symposium and Competition as well as hundreds of university music faculty and ensembles.  His music is available through Murphy Music Press, C. Alan Publications, Potenza Music, and Wingert Jones Publications and has been recorded for the Naxos, Summit, Albany, Navona, Mark, MSR Classics, and GIA Windworks labels. More at jamesmdavid.com

Notes

I. Tall mountains, rising mists, and Shinto shrine
II. Rain falling on Rice Fields
III. Tokyo in the Distance

Composed for hornist John McGuire, Landscapes, Series II is inspired by Japanese landscape paintings and woodcuts. The melodies are influenced by Japanese Shakuhachi compositions. The first movement depicts a pilgrim climbing a steep and dangerous path to a Shinto shrine located atop a mountain. In the second movement a farmer sits inside his hut waiting for the rain falling on his rice fields to stop. He is neither frustrated nor worried, but patient. In the final movement, the busyness of a large city and the forward momentum of a high-speed train were the inspiration for the tempo and textures, even while fragments of the melodies from the first movement returned. An extended coda, with longer note values and a more sustained piano part, indicate a return to the calmer countryside.

Lines at Dusk: Hymn to the Rising Moon is a programmatic composition inspired one evening as I sat watching the full moon rise over Lake Catherine in southeastern Louisiana. It was a clear, damp, and cloudless night, and as the moon rose, I felt an odd primal connection to it and to the ancient lunar-oriented cultures. My feeling the entire time I was working on Lines was that lunar worship must have been as fear-inspiring as it was beautiful to behold, and that the risk of not propitiating the goddess was hopefully balanced by her stark beauty.

I owe something to Shelley’s poems “The Waning Moon,” and “To the Moon” for the title and the inspiration, and to the Italian opera composer Bellini and his aria “Casta Diva” from Norma, for the vocal quality of the opening lines, but the indebtedness stops there. The harmonic language of Lines has little in common with Bellini’s aesthetic except the use of harmonic color to convey atmosphere as well as emotion. Where Bellini’s melodies are florid, mine are direct and without the elegance of ornamentation.

Nocturne, for horn and piano, was composed in 2000 for hornist John McGuire’s birthday. Embedded in the chords is the opening melody from Strauss’s Horn Concerto No. 1, which John was working on at the time.

“Batuque” refers to a genre of music and dance associated with coastal West Africa and Brazil. It is considered one of the primary influences on Latin American dance music including samba and the ubiquitous son clave. This two-movement composition explores the heterophonic and “call and response” techniques found in batuque as well as its typical binary structure. A secondary influence is found in the 20th-century works of such luminary composers as Villa-Lobos, Ginastera, Messiaen, and Revueltas. The first movement focuses on the tuneful melodies performed by the kantaderas (singers), while the second movement features the complex polyrhythms of the batukaderas (drummers).

— John McGuire