Millennium III - BAR0122997 | Musica

Commissioned by the Sony Corporation for the 40th anniversary of the founding of the Sony Concert Band, this brilliant greeting to the Third Millennium was first performed by this outstanding wind group on their anniversary concert in U-Port Hall, Tokyo under the direction of the composer, on November 20, 1998.

A powerful opening fanfare-like motive, from which nearly all of the other thematic material in the work is derived, in multi-rhythmic groupings and patterns representing, perhaps the wide diversity of peoples and cultures in a world entering upon a third millennium, leads to a bright, optimistic theme that ultimately winds its way through the whole ensemble as it develops, first in woodwind and saxophone colors then joined by the brasses.
This, in turn, is succeeded by a slower more reflective section, as if to look back on past themes with a mixture of joy and nostalgia, and then a series of fanfares builds the musical texture towards the return of the brightly moving second theme, which leads to the return of the first brilliant fanfare, bringt the work to a brilliant optimistic conclusion.