Sweet like that was written to be a fun, exciting new piece for band. The piece incorporates requests from students at Betsy Ross Arts Magnet School with whom Mr. Theofanidis workshopped the piece.
The title of this work comes as a response to the students’ love of jazz titles. Theofanidis looked to the work of the great jazz cornet player, King Oliver, Louis Armstrong’s teacher, and one of the great pioneers of ‘hot jazz’ (where soloists improvise collectively). He wrote a piece called, “Sweet like this.”
Of Sweet like that, series editor Thomas C. Duffy wrote, “It is exuberant, joyful, with a whiff of gospel – it is sound of the American street, instrumental doo-wop; an urban march.”
Instrumentation
1-Conductor
Piccolo
Flute
Oboe
Bassoon
Bb clarinet 1
Bb clarinet 2
Bb bass clarinet
Eb alto saxophone 1
Eb alto saxophone 2
Bb tenor saxophone
Eb baritone saxophone
Bb trumpet 1
Bb trumpet 2
Bb trumpet 3
F horn
Trombone 1
Trombone 2
Trombone 3
Baritone
Tuba
Percussion 1: Xylophone, Whistle
Percussion 2: Bongos, Slapstick
Percussion 3: Egg Shaker, Bass Drum, Sleigh Bells, Vibraslap
Percussion 4: Drum Set
Meet The Composer
Christopher Theofanidis (b. 12/18/67 in Dallas, Texas) has had performances by many leading orchestras from around the world, including the London Symphony, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Moscow Soloists, the National, Atlanta, Baltimore, St. Louis, Detroit, and California Symphonies, and many others. He also served as Composer of the Year for the Pittsburgh Symphony during their 2006-2007 Season, for which he wrote a violin concerto for Sarah Chang.
Mr. Theofanidis holds degrees from Yale, the Eastman School of Music, and the University of Houston, and has been the recipient of the International Masterprize (hosted at the Barbican Centre in London), the Rome Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, six ASCAP Gould Prizes, a Fulbright Fellowship to France, a Tanglewood Fellowhship, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Charles Ives Fellowship. In 2007 he was nominated for a Grammy for best composition for his chorus and orchestra work, The Here and Now, based on the poetry of Rumi. His orchestral concert work, Rainbow Body, has been one of the most performed new orchestral works of the last ten years, having been performed by over 100 orchestras internationally.
Mr. Theofanidis’ has recently written a ballet for the American Ballet Theatre, a work for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra as part of their ‘New Brandenburg’ series, and he currently has two opera commissions for the San Francisco and Houston Grand Opera companies. He has a long-standing relationship with the Atlanta Symphony, and has just had his first symphony premiered and recorded with that orchestra. He has served as a delegate to the US-Japan Foundation’s Leadership Program and is a former faculty member of the Peabody Conservatory and the Juilliard School. He currently teaches at Yale University.
About The Premiere
Sweet like that was workshopped January to June 2011 with the Betsy Ross Arts Magnet Middle School Band in New Haven, CT under the direction of Matthew Fried.