Thüring Bräm

Dirge

Between 1980 and 2000, the famous English trumpeter Philip Jones was a regular advisor and guest of the then Lucerne Conservatoire, which I had headed since 1987. He enriched the life of the brass department with his critical suggestions and his brass seminars and concerts. In 1998, at the end of one of his wonderfully humorous concerts, in which he had also rehearsed pieces for his Philip Jones Brass Tentet, he said to me half jokingly and half seriously: My programs are always entertaining and funny, why don't you write a really 'serious' piece for a brass tentet (4 trumpets, horn, 4 trombones, tuba). I wanted to write something new that would force the brass players to use their wonderful soft colors and virtuoso flexibility. At the same time, an outstandingly talented young woman from Lucerne, Brigitte Lang, was studying at the conservatory. I therefore decided to write a violin concerto in five movements for her and the brass classes. Philip Jones received the score around Christmas 1999 and a week before his death (January 17, 2000), I was lucky enough to be able to talk to him about it on the phone. It had been clear for some months that he would no longer be able to conduct it himself. So the 'serious' piece became a dirge (in the Anglo-Saxon tradition, a hymn for the dead). Both the opening chorale and the march emphasize this gloomy view, which gradually brightens and transcends after the enigmatic Sphinx movement. Thüring Bräm, April 2013, Basel, Switzerland The premiere (in memoriam Philip Jones) took place under the direction of the composer on March 3, 2001 in the church of St. Peter in Zurich.