Flashback

Wayne Oquin

General Info

Year: 1996 / 2016
Duration: c. 5:10
Difficulty: V (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: Watersong Press
Cost: Score and Parts (print) – Rental ($350.00)

Instrumentation

Full Score
C Piccolo
Flute I-II
Oboe I-II
English Horn
Bassoon I-II
Contrabassoon
B-flat Soprano Clarinet I-II-III
B-flat Bass Clarinet
B-flat Contrabass Clarinet
E-flat Alto Saxophone I-II
B-flat Tenor Saxophone
E-flat Baritone Saxophone
C Trumpet I-II-III-IV
Horn in F I-II-III-IV
Trombone I-II
Bass Trombone
Euphonium
Tuba
String Bass
Piano
Harp
Timpani
Percussion I-II-III-IV-V, including:

Bass Drum
Chimes
Crash Cymbals
Glockenspiel
Marimba
Slapstick, large
Snare Drum
Splash Cymbal
Suspended Cymbal
Tambourine
Tam-Tam, large
Temple Blocks
Tom-Toms (5)
Triangle
Vibraphone
Xylophone

Errata

None discovered thus far.

Program Notes

Some of the happiest years of my young musical life were those I spent playing piano at Texas State University in John Stansberry’s wind ensemble. Two decades later, part of me still wishes I could have stayed forever.

Mr. Stansberry was quite something on the podium: energetic, motivating, communicative, full of vitality, notoriously hard to please, and, above all things, a consummate teacher. In 1996, early in my freshman year, I approached him with a band score I had then recently completed: a short, frenetic work entitled Momentum. It was among my earliest attempts at composition. To my surprise, he programmed it!

In hindsight, I would be hard pressed to think of a point more pivotal in my compositional development. It was the first piece I had written for band, my first time working with a conductor, and my first public performance of a piece for large ensemble. It was this experience, as much as any other, that led me to music composition.

Many years passed. I graduated, moved to New York, continued my studies, and eventually became a college teacher myself. Mr. Stansberry and I remained in touch until the end of his life.

When Clay Stansberry asked if I would compose a tribute to his father’s memory, one he would conduct with his own band at Legacy High School in Broomfield, Colorado, I was honored. I began, not in my usual way by sketching or improvising at the piano, but by pulling that early band score out of a dusty drawer where it had sat untouched for almost twenty years.

My original thought was to tweak, tighten, and perhaps touch up a few loose details. But soon, the process took on a life of its own. I found myself making changes to virtually every note of every bar. Shorter passages were expanded. New themes emerged. Harmonies once limited by a young composer’s not-yet-fully-developed technique were now traveling rapidly to new destinations. Just as I could never go back in time and play again in Mr. Stansberry’s band, I could not separate myself from my own compositional development in the intervening two decades.

Not a single measure remains intact from the previous version. The new work, so radically different from its predecessor, demanded a more suitable title. Yet, the initial idea from so many years previous -- its overall structure, its short melody in the Lydian mode -- can still be recognized in what is now quite literally a flashback. The result is not a revision but rather a collaboration between a composer and his younger self, both of whom owe an enormous gratitude to John Stansberry.

- Program Note by composer

Media

Audio: Reference recording. Ensemble and conductor unknown
Audio CD: Drake University Wind Symphony (Robert Meunier, conductor)

State Ratings

None discovered thus far.

Performances

To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project

Washington State University (Pullman) Symphonic Wind Ensemble (Dahn Pham, conductor) – 2 October 2019
Indiana University of Pennsylvania (Indiana, Penn.) Wind Ensemble (Timothy Paul, conductor) – 2 March 2019
University of North Texas (Denton) Wind Ensemble (Nicholas E. Williams, conductor) – 10 April 2018
Cedar Park (Tex.) Winds Community Band (Christopher Yee, conductor) - 20 December 2017 (2017 Midwest Clinic)
Legacy High School (Broomfield, Colo.) Wind Ensemble (Clay Stansberry conductor) – 4 March 2017 *Premiere Performance*

Works for Winds by This Composer

Affirmation (2014)
Flashback (1996/2016)
Horizon (2021)
Momentum (1997)
River Sanctuary (1998)
A Solemn Place (2013)
Song for Silent Voices (2018)
Tower Ascending (2009)

Resources

Chamberlin, Reed. "Flashback." In Teaching Music through Performance in Band. Volume 12, Compiled and edited by Andrew Trachsel, 767-772. Chicago: GIA Publications, 2021.
Michael Scott Butler, personal correspondence, December 2018
Wayne Oquin website Accessed 14 December 2017