Sunset City (2023)

for Trumpet and Percussion

Duration: 12 minutes

Performed by Christopher Probst, Trumpet, and Matthew Jordan, Percussion

Commissioned by: Christopher Probst, Trumpet, and Matthew Jordan, Percussion, Jacksonville State University

and consortium:

Deborah Caldwell, Trumpet

Jonathan Bagley, Trumpet

Alexander Sanso, Trumpet

Niklaus Egg, Trumpet

Ralph Marks, Percussion

Joseph Spearman, Percussion

Ryan Smith, Percussion

Julia Ryan, Percussion

Program Note 

The inspirations for the work are both secular and sacred: they include John Sloan’s painting, “West Twenty-third street,” and selected verses from the psalms and canticles of Catholic Vespers (evening prayer). For me, the painting and verses are connected, and I offer them here as a meditation to inspire performance and listening. The verses are are marked on the sections of the score that they inspired:

Oh God, come to our aid.

Oh Lord, make haste to help us.

Introductory Verse

My soul magnifies the Lord,

and my spirit rejoices in God, my salvation.

Luke 1:46–47 (Magnificat)

I was glad when they said to me, Let us go to the house of the Lord.

Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem.

Psalms 122:1–2

There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High.

Psalms 46:4

Be still, and know that I am God.

Psalms 46:10