David Dzubay

David Dzubay (b. 1964)
Music for Brass

Antiphonal Fanfare No. 2 (2006) for trumpet, horn and trombone

Brass Quintet No. 1 (1988); Acrostic Variations (1998) for brass quintet

Solus 1 (1990) for horn

St. Vitus' Dance (2003) for brass quintet

Performed by Manhattan Brass
Wayne du Maine and Lew Soloff, trumpet
Ann Ellsworth, horn
Michael Seltzer, trombone
David Taylor, bass trombone

BRIDGE 9230

David Dzubay's brass music combines visceral excitement and superb compositional craft to create works that are enjoyable on first hearing and revealing upon deeper experience. A trumpet player himself, Dzubay writes with the kind of virtuosity born of intimate experience, yet with a contrapuntal and formal mastery that are anything but 'performer's music'. After the brief opening fanfare that begins this disc, Dzubay's early Brass Quintet No. 1 opens with an unlikely habañera, and the surprises continue throughout this remarkable disc. Manhattan Brass (formerly, the Manhattan Brass Quintet) is is an ensemble made up of five virtuoso soloists. Throughout its history the quintet has commissioned and premiered the works of a wide range of composers, including jazz greats Wynton Marsalis and Paquito D'Rivera. On this recording, Dzubay's St. Vitus' Dance is a Manhattan Brass commission, given its premiere recording.