Martin Gaskell - Musical Compositions in Progress

(Updated 2009 September 16)

You can find links below to MP3 files of short excerpts from some of my musical works in progress.

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra

This is the top thing on my composing “to-do list” right now. The concerto is in three movements.

- start of 1st movement – introduction, first theme, and transition to second subject. [If this file doesn’t play correctly in Quicktime – set your browser to use Windows Media Player instead]

- start of 2nd movement – the pianist works hard throughout the first movement so it’s now time for him/her to relax! Here are the first two minutes of the second (slow) movement.

Concerto for Organ and Orchestra

This is the number two thing on my composing “to-do list”. The concerto is in three movements. It is scored for strings, three (or four) horns, and timpani.

- start of 1st movement – Moderato maestoso (first 30 seconds)

- start of 2nd movement – Adagio (first two minutes)

- start of finale – Allegro marziale (the first 40 seconds)

Symphonic poem: Aurora

This is a fairly long symphonic poem for large orchestra (about 20 mins). I’ve been working on this for a long time, but there are other composition projects I want to finish first, so I’m not sure when I’ll get it finished. The title is simply the Middle English word for “dawn” which is used as a poetic personification of the break of day. (The title does not refer to the nocturnal astronomical/atmospheric phenomenon of the aurora borealis.)

- excerpt 1 – a stream bubbling over rocks.

- excerpt 2 – the stillness before the sunrises. If you pay attention to sunrises you will notice that the birds hush right before the sun comes up.

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