Composers Datebook

Mountains can have unforeseen consequences on the imagination, it seems. For Philadelphia-native Melinda Wagner, serving as a composer-in-residence at a musical festival in Vail, Colorado, this resulted in the composition of a new Trombone Concerto, a piece tailor-made for Joseph Alessi, the principal trombonist of the New York Philharmonic. “During my free moments in Vail,” said Wagner, “I found myself gazing—in disbelief really—at the jagged, youthful beauty of the Rockies. By comparison, ‘my’ mountains—the old Endless, Allegheny, and Pocono ranges of Pennsylvania—seemed to be no more than a set of soft wrinkles in the skin of the earth!” “Nobility and power, hallmarks of the trombone sound, are words that come to mind in the presence of mountains, old and new. And a truly great musician, as I learned while hearing Joseph Alessi play, can coax so much more out of the trombone: aching tenderness, sadness, lyricism, mirth.” Alessi gave the premiere performance of Wagner’s new Concerto at Avery Fisher Hall, on February 22, 2007, with the New York Philharmonic conducted by Lorin Maazel. Since winning the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1999, Melinda Wagner has been called to write works large and small, including a 2002 Piano Concerto entitled “Extremity of Sky” for Emanuel Ax and the Chicago Symphony, and a 2004 choral piece entitled “From a Book of Early Prayers” for the Chamber Choirs of the College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University in Minnesota.