The Manes Scroll
General Info
Year: 2010
Duration: c. 11:00
Difficulty: (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: OU Publications
Cost: Score and Parts - $60.00 | Score Only - $0.00
Instrumentation
Player 1: Glockenspiel
Player 2: Crotales
Player 3: Chimes
Player 4: Xylophone
Player 5: Xylophone
Player 6: Vibraphone
Player 7: Vibraphone
Player 8: Marimba
Player 9: Marimba
Player 10: Marimba
Program Notes
The Manes Scroll was commissioned by the OU Percussion Ensemble in the fall of 1983 and completed in March of 1984. The piece was premiered by the University of Oklahoma Percussion Ensemble under the direction of Dr. Richard Gipson in April of 1984. The title comes from the Latin Des Manes, which is a term that represents the collective spirit of the dead. The piece has as its structural motivation an imagined event in which spirits are released from an ancient parchment found deep within the Catacombs beneath the city of Rome, Italy. One requirement of the commission was to use only keyboard percussion instruments. For me, the challenge was to find a new voice within a fairly standard instrumental ensemble. I chose to open the piece by employing a technique that, to my knowledge, had not been used on the resonated keyboard instruments. This technique is the use of exhaled air columns directed into the resonators of the marimbas, vibraphones, and xylophones. Performance Notes The “wind” technique requires the performers to blow into the resonators to produces a “pitched air” effect. In order to have this technique work effectively, the performers should direct their air column towards the edges of the resonator tubes to cut the air column in a similar way that a flute produces sound. It is effective for the pairs of instruments (marimbas, vibraphones, and xylophones) to stagger their entrances so that a longer wind effect is possible. (ex. Marimba I begins the air crescendo and marimba II joins the wind effect just prior to the peak of the crescendo).[1]
Errata
Awards
Commercial Discography
Online Recordings
Recent Performances
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Works for Percussion by this Composer
Solo Works
Dis Qui Etude – Vibraphone
Etude for a Quiet Hall – Marimba
In the Sea of Clouds – Marimba
Mourning Dove Sonnet – Vibraphone
Prelude I – Timpani
Sea of Clouds – Marimba
The Apocryphal Still Life – Vibraphone
The Process of Invention – Marimba
Three Shells – Marimba
Ensemble Works
Almost Perpetual Torque - Mallet Trio
Arcanical Plains - Percussion (12)
Marimba Quartet No. 2 - Sensing the Coriolis - Percussion Quartet - Marimba Quartet
Scavenger Music – Percussion Quintet
The Manes Scroll – Percussion (10)
Vespertine Formations – Percussion Quartet - Marimba Quartet
Additional Resources
References