Full disclosure: I wrote this piece. I'm also the one publishing it. So consider this less a blog post and more a composer talking about his own music, which is either refreshingly honest or deeply self-indulgent depending on your perspective.
White Mage Music is my publishing company — I started it in 2004, initially as a vehicle for marching band show design, and it's grown over the past two decades into a full catalog of concert music alongside the custom design work. If you've landed here looking for wind band literature, here's what you should actually know about what I write and why.
My catalog runs from young band to advanced wind ensemble, with a handful of works that incorporate electronics and electroacoustic elements. The through-line is probably this: I write music that has something to say, and I try to say it without being obscure about it. Post-minimalist tendencies, some extended technique, occasionally complicated rhythmic structures — but always in service of something a live ensemble can connect to and an audience can feel.
A few pieces worth knowing:
Shades of Red is probably my most-performed work. It's built around the mellophone — yes, the mellophone, that slightly identity-confused brass instrument that lives somewhere between French horn and flugelhorn — and the color red as a cultural symbol. What red means in one culture versus another is genuinely fascinating, and the piece tries to sit inside that tension. It was a finalist for The American Prize, which I'm still unreasonably proud of.
Spirals and To Thee // From Thee were both American Prize semifinalists in 2023. Spirals is a wind ensemble work that does exactly what the title suggests, though hopefully in a way that's more interesting than that description makes it sound. To Thee // From Thee is a choral/wind hybrid that came out of thinking about devotion — the kind that's reciprocal and the kind that isn't.
Mandatory Social Distancing was a virtual ensemble piece I wrote during the pandemic. It started as a necessity (nobody could play together in the same room) and became something I'm actually proud of as a standalone work. It's also the piece that accidentally made me much more interested in multi-stream video production, which is a whole separate rabbit hole.
If any of this sounds like it might fit your program, the wind band catalog is the best place to start. Most works include audio samples and instrumentation details. And if you want to commission something specifically for your ensemble, that conversation starts here.
