GIDEON MATCHEY
Music
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All Music includes:
Digital Download of Full Score and Parts
Permission to Photo Copy
Educational Content or Lesson Opportunities
Supplemental Materials
Whether it’s musical terminology, music history, theory, or direct quotes of Classical music, every piece has a little something extra to add to your lessons.
Latest Works
Featuring chaotic, fast paced, and delightful surprises at every turn, On Clowns and Carousels captures the raucous environment of a circus. Through direct quotation of Fučík’s March of the Gladiators, racing chromatic melodies, and dancing rhythms throughout, this piece engages every section of the Band. I know my bandroom sometimes feels like a circus, and now yours can too! All jokes aside (well, maybe not all of them), the goal of this piece is for the performers to have fun and be a little clown-ish themselves on stage. I hope this piece brings smiles to your students and laughter (the good kind!) from your audience. May no one ever again tell you to “stop clowning around!”
“Get in, get out.” It’s a simple direction, but even the most well-thought-out schemes don’t always go according to plan…
“Unmanaged Mischief” is a piece about just that: a group of individuals put together a plan to carry out their dastardly deeds. From the sneaky introduction, to the chaotic escape (or did they?) at the end, you can almost picture the oh-so-familiar story, scene by scene, unfolding in front of you.
The piece features two prominent musical story-telling techniques that are intentionally placed so that your students can derive their own meaning behind the notes.
M25–40 features a Fugue, with four prominent soloists (and plenty of cues to fit your ensemble’s strengths). Each melody brings more complexity as the “plan is hatched” by your ensemble. Be sure to point out that the term “Fugue” comes from the Latin word “fuga”, meaning 'flight' or 'escape.'
Starting at m48 and lasting until nearly the end of the piece is a prominent solo line. The score features the Bb-Clarinet as the solo instrument, but solo pages for every instrument are included with the piece (with idiomatic adjustments made for different instruments). The solo is ideally played by one of the soloists from the Fugue section in m25–40. The soloist serves as the “mastermind” behind the plan, and sneakily tries to carry out the “plan,” only to find themselves on the run!
Do they escape? That is up to your ensemble to work out together. I hope that your students’ imaginations run wild with “Unmanaged Mischief"!
Whether it be in a movie, book, video game, or real life, the greatest heroes gain the most experience through trials and difficult times. They use this experience to become stronger, eventually overcoming all obstacles to save the day. “XP” takes us on a hero’s journey and allows every player of the ensemble to feel like they are the main character in their own adventure. The piece begins with feelings of daring adventures and perilous journeys through driving percussion and aggressive motifs from the winds. Transitioning to the middle section we feel our heroes question their own ability and we wonder if they will fall. Moving to the final section, our hero finds a glimmer of hope and with renewed energy (perhaps after leveling up in a video game), faces the challenge head on. We all face challenges in our lives that bring us valuable experience; will you level up?
A daring escape…from what? The imagination of your students will fill in the gaps of this storyline. Who is escaping? From what? Why? Have your students use their imagination to decide what is happening during each major section of the piece. Most importantly decide with them how the piece will end: will the person/people get caught in the end (Ending 1) or will they escape triumphantly (Ending 2)? Each ending creates a different story. Let your students come up with the ending to the story by vote or some other means.
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