Street Song (for Brass Quintet)

“The founding members of the Empire Brass Quintet were some of my oldest musical friends. Our meeting dates back to student days at Tanglewood in the early 1970s when we discovered that we had reverence for good notes, good tunes, and good licks, whether from organum, serialism, or bop­shoo­wop. They commissioned and premiered Street Song and made the first recording.

I’m pleased that the quintet version has found its way into brass chamber programs. On the occasion of a concert with the London Symphony brass, the larger version was created. The group is expanded to twelve players and introduces one new instrument: the flügelhorn. I am indebted to Eric Crees for making this version possible.

Street Song is in three continuous parts—an interweaving of three “songs.” The first song opens with a jagged downward scale suspending in the air a sweetly dissonant harmony that very slowly resolves. This moment of resolution is followed by responses of various kinds. The harmonies move between the world of the Middle Ages and the present, between East and West, and always, of course, from the perspective of twentieth­ century America. Overall, the movement is about starting and stopping, the moments of suspension always leading somewhere else.

The second ‘song’ is introduced by a singsong horn solo. It is followed by a simple trumpet duet, which was first written around 1972. It is folk­like in character and also cadences with suspended moments of slowly resolving dissonance.

The third song is really more of a dance. It begins when the trombone slides a step higher, bringing the work into the key of F-­sharp and into a jazzier swing. The harmonies here are the stacked­ up moments of suspension from the first two parts of the piece. By now, I hope these “dissonant” sounds actually begin to sound “consonant.” There is a resolution, but it is the world of a musician who, after many after-­hour gigs, greets the dawn. Finally, the three songs are brought together, and the work moves toward a quiet close.

Street Song is dedicated to my father Ted, who was and still is the central musical influence on my life.”

—Michael Tilson Thomas

This recording is of the version for Symphonic Brass.