Malcolm Arnold (1921-2006)
was born Northampton, England to a family of prominent
shoemakers. Early interest in jazz led him to take up the
trumpet, which eventually led him to the position of Principal Trumpet
with the London Symphony Orchestra. By the end of the 1940s
his career had become almost entirely focused on composition.
He went on to write 132 film scores, including the 1958 Oscar recipient
Bridge on the River Kwai,
nine symphonies, seven ballets, twenty concertos, a handful of theatre
music, and wealth of brass band and wind band music. He was
knighted in 1993 for his service to music, having been hailed as one of
the major composers of the twentieth century. He offers his
own program note to Four Scottish Dances (courtesy of the Oklahoma City
University program note resource for band directors):
These
dances were composed early in 1957, and are dedicated to the BBC Light
Music Festival. They are all based on original melodies but
one, the melody of which was composed by Robert Burns.
The first dance is in the style of a slow strathspey-- a slow Scottish
dance in 4/4 meter -- with many dotted notes, frequently in the
inverted arrangement of the ‘Scotch snap’. The name was
derived from the strath valley of Spey.
The second, a lively reel, begins in the key of E-flat and rises a
semi-tone each time it is played until the bassoon plays it, at a
greatly-reduced speed, in the key of G. The final statement
of the dance is at the original speed in the home key of E-flat.
The third dance is in the style of a Hebridean Song, and attempts to
give an impression of the sea and mountain scenery on a calm summer’s
day in the Hebrides.
The last dance is a lively fling, which makes a great deal of use of
the open-string pitches of the violin (saxophones in the band edition).
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