Something In The Moon

January 5, 2011 By Russell Scarbrough

Just completed my third jazz ensemble commission in as many months… a piece for Bucknell University called Something In The Moon. It is a trombone feature (!), which I have not done for about 8 years. He gets to play the melody at the top and at the end, as usual. But for his creative role, I’ve tried something different in this one. Instead of the trombone improvising over the rhythm section playing time, I’ve given him a series of ad lib cadenzas, each over different chords. The only instance where he plays over time is for a few bars at the very end, and it’s still cadenza-like. Then on the last chord, he doesn’t improvise… just holds a unique note in the chord. We’ll see how that goes over.

Something In The Moon will be premiered at Bucknell University on April 1, 2011.