Musical Compositions
(that do not feature the oboe)
by Matthew A. Fossa
Click on the title of the piece to listen to a MIDI.
If you are interested in getting copies of these works, email me.
"Triumph of the Fox" for Horn and String Trio
I finished this piece, officially, on Easter Sunday of 2003! It is dedicated to a quartet of friends of mine from the Penscaola Symphony Orchestra (Jeff Leenhouts, Patti Easton, Sarah Bossa, and Sarah Schmitz.) It's a very programmatic work which makes fun of all those famous rondos for horn that conjure up images of being on a fox hunt. One day, after these four friends put the bug in my ear to compose a piece for them, I asked myself a question, "What would it sound like if the hunter's horse was always stumbling?" Within seconds of asking that question, I had begun composing this 3-and-a-half-minute work. I just hope the horse lovers have a sense of humor! (No animals were harmed in the composing of this piece!)
Concertpiece for Horn and Small Orchestra
This piece was written in 1997 for my friend Scott Bacon, also a fellow Sinfonian. It was inspired by the Gordon Jacob Horn Concerto and the Villanelle by Dukas and, like both of those works, it's in F Major and moves at a very lively tempo. The orchestral instrumentation is 1 flute, 1 oboe, 1, clarinet, 2 bassoons, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings. This is the first piece of mine to be published and it is available from RM Williams Music Publishing. It was premiered in the winter of 1997 a Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia recital.
Concertpiece for Trumpet and Orchestra
I guess I'm a brass player at heart, but stuck in the body of an oboist. Inspired in no small part by the Arutiunian Trumpet Concerto, I wrote this work for my friend Brian Schneckenburger in the Spring of 1998. It's in D Major and, like the horn piece, is stuck in an Allegro tempo. The orchestra for this piece, however, is considerably larger than the one for the horn work with pairs of woodwinds, 3 horns, 3 trumpets, plus timpani and strings.
Caprice Number One for Unaccompanied Violin
This work had, believe it or not, been started off as an oboe piece back in October of 2003! After writing the theme, I'd put the piece down for a while thinking that maybe I'd come back to it later in the year. Then, one weekend in early November, I made the acquaintance of a really terrific violin soloist named Lara St. John. Well, after that it didn't take me too long to decide that maybe I should try writing a violin caprice and it occurred to me that using this newly-composed oboe theme would be a great way to start it off. Assisted by the numerous suggestions of a couple of other violin-playing friends, I began composing a theme and variations similar to Paganini's 24th caprice and finished it by early December. Paganini wrote a work with eleven variations and I only wrote seven, but that's just fine as far as I'm concerned! I included as many different virtuosic elements as possible ranging from fast arpeggios to descant melodies to harmonics.
Variations on a Medieval Folk Tune for String Orchestra
This piece was written in the summer of 2003 for the University of West Florida's string orchestra at the behest of its director Leonid Yanovskiy. I took the old song "L'Homme Arme" and re-wrote it in the styles of Mozart, Johann Strauss, Stravinsky, Copland, Grieg, and Rachmanininov. Naturally, I threw in a few quotes from music written by the aforementioned composers (particularly Stravinsky and Copland).
Concerto in One Movement for Violin and Chamber Orchestra
I started writing this piece in the summer of 1997 for my friends David Keen and Melissa Koenigsreuter, both of whom are very good friends of mine as well as excellent violinists. After many revisions, I finished the piece in the fall of 1998. Finally, in June of 2002, I completed a playable piano reduction. The piece is in G Major and I drew from inspiration I got listening to the Brahms and Mendelssohn concerti. (Though, unlike the Brahms concerto, I only managed to find a place for one decent oboe solo... ah well...) The work starts off slow, then moves into a military march-like section, then returns to the slow tempo as a recap. I orchestrated this piece for a large classical orchestra with pairs of woodwinds, horns, and trumpets, plus timpani and strings.
T-Bone of Contention
This piece was written in November of 2003 for my friend (and boss) Don Snowden to play with the Pensacola Civic Band. It's in E-Flat major, but modulates quite a bit. In addition, like many of my pieces, the work is in sonata form. (A question I got into the habit of asking my musical friends was whether or not they knew where the 2nd theme was.) Also, as is the case with my horn piece and trumpet piece, the tempo for this work is allegro, but the soloist plays many lyrical melodies. (as was requested by Don himself.) I got the idea for the name by looking up "bone of contention" in the dictionary and found it meant "subject matter for an argument." So... why not just add in a "T"?
"T-Bone" was premiered on May 20th, 2004 at a Civic Band concert in Pensacola's "Old Seville Square" attended by over 11,000 people!!! (Imagine my surprise when I found that out!)
The Steadholder's March
This is a piece I wrote in the spring of 2001 for the Cairo High School Band. It was inspired by my repeated readings of the Honor Harrington books by David Weber. (No, not the oboist David Weber... though I do find the name coincidence very interesting...) Honor, the subject of the books, is basically a female (and space-age) version of Horatio Hornblower. These books chronicle her experiences in the Royal Manticoran Navy and her rise to fame and fortune (not to mention the rank of Admiral!). To make a very long story short, she becomes a heroine on many worlds, the most important of which is the planet of Grayson. The Graysons, in recognition of her courage and sacrifice, make her a major landowner on the planet (the equivalent of a Duke) called a Steadholder. Not only this, but she is made an officer in their space navy as well! Normally, a senior officer is piped aboard ship using the age-old bosun's whistle. In the case of Steadholder Harrington, however, a bugler sounds off with a special call entitled the Steadholder's March. I have envisioned (or... would it be en-audiated...?) that call to go like this...
This call, became the main melody and focus of this piece. I did, however, decide that this piece needed some development. I added a slow introduction (which, perhaps, precludes it being called a march) and, after the band plays the bugle theme, added in a contrasting chorale section in which the section leaders of the woodwinds and brass play in a responsorial fashion.
Theme to "Caveman"
This is an arrangement of Lalo Schifrin's theme song to the 1981 movie "Caveman". This movie is a really silly film... the kind of thing to watch when you're looking for something very slapstick... but have seen enough Mel Brooks and Monty Python. A surprising number of famous media personalities are in this film as well: Ringo Starr, Dennis Quaid, Shelley Long, and Barbara Bach. Naturally, one of the things about this movie that I like so much is the music. One weekend, when I was bored and in a mood to compose, I decided to try arranging this piece for wind ensemble. One of my colleagues that I played this new version for suggested that it would make a perfect "stands" tune for a football marching band.