A score-study version of this piece is available for Score Level patrons over on Patreon.

Listen to Snowfall Serenade:

Instrumentation:

Flute
Oboe
Clarinet in Bb
French Horn in F
Bassoon
Bass Clarinet in Bb

Program Notes:

I first wrote an initial version of this piece in 2014, when I was still in high school. I had the idea for a winter themed chamber piece for woodwinds, and wanted to get it played. I wrote a piece, lasting only about 1 minute and 40 seconds, and I came up to my band director asking if he would be willing to play it. He liked it enough to at least try rehearsing it. I still remember the feeling I got when I heard the piece in real life for the first time. Though it didn’t up end up being a part of the Christmas concert, he still made a point to tell the audience that I had written a piece but that there just wasn’t enough time in the program to play it.

Now, several years later, I have finally fleshed out the piece with many of the original themes I came up with when I was sixteen years old. It’s also written for six wind instruments. Though a woodwind quintet is typical, I wanted to add bass clarinet because I just love the sonority of the instrument so much.

My intent was always to write a secular winter-themed chamber piece. I didn’t want any excplicitly Christmas tunes, but rather music that was evocative of the kind one may hear during the Winter season. So, the first movement uses jazzier harmony than one might expect from a classical chamber piece, but still with an innocent feeling to it. The middle movement is fast and fairly zany from a harmonic standpoint. I use polychords (where two different chords are played at the same time) at various moments, and the lines are highly chromatic. The final movement is a chorale, with more traditional counterpoint between trios of instruments in a slower and more pensive fashion.

Snowfall Serenade takes you through a fun winters day in three parts:

1 - Morning Snow captures the feeling of waking up to a blanket of snow outside, ready for play.

2 - Snowball Fight depicts the lively fun of a battle of snow with friends and family.

3 - Evening Flame gives you the feeling of being warm near a fire at the end of a frigid winters day.

Watch the behind-the-scenes creation of this piece: