Wolfs Percussion

I guess now that I have the details for both of the concerts I should probably talk about this?

I recall having two separate conversations with Gibson and Reidling, back in May, during which they both said something to the effect of "Why don't you do more with the stuff you write? You should put your writing out there more, besides just marching band". I kinda stashed that away in my mind as it just being people who are important to me saying nice things because they're being supportive of me.

But I wound up feeling inspired to write some new stuff over the summer and early in the fall semester, which was unusual for me because I'm usually so laser focused on writing marching band stuff and doing marching band camps and whatnot. Plus it was concert band stuff. And I didn't really think of myself as a "concert band composer". I'd never really done it before, after all.

Around September I started seeing a few different ensembles and organizations posting about a 'call for scores' and I thought "nah they'd just reject my stuff. It's not worth it". But then Gibson and Reidling both - again in two separate conversations which just further affirmed that I had to do this - told me I should go for it because "what's the worst that could happen?"

Fast forward to now. Well, December was when I found out that of the three 'call for scores'/composition competitions I submitted things for, my compositions were selected in some capacity for all three of them.

Which means that, including the percussion ensemble piece my own kids will be playing this semester, my name will be attached to the words "World Premier" on 4 occasions this spring. Which is absolutely baffling. I'm not a "real" composer. I'm just a percussion-guy that kinda knows music theory? Or at least that's what I've always told myself. But I guess this is further validation (along with the fact that 3 bands trusted me to write their entire marching band show last season...) that I'm actually good at this?

I'll wait until I receive the concert videos before I post these pieces, since having actual humans playing them will absolutely be better than a Finale recording.

What a weird few months it's been...