Multitudes

As the pedagogy of percussion has developed, it has become increasingly important to address the area of multiple percussion. Multi-percussion encompasses many typical performance genres from wind ensemble to drumset, or from a musical pit orchestra to some of the best repertoire available for solo percussionists. Regardless of career focus, almost any percussionist will be required to perform using more than one instrument in their daily routine.

Despite the importance of multi-percussion, there is a substantial gap in the pedagogical repertoire, leaving only a small selection of works for intermediate students to study. At the intermediate stage in a student’s development, it is important to work on bite-size pieces, where the focus can be on sound concepts and technical development. The solos in this collection are designed to bridge the gap for percussionists who are proficient on the core instruments (snare drum, timpani, and keyboards) yet not quite ready to tackle some of the advanced solo multipercussion repertoire that already exists.

When delving into multiple percussion solos, many schools face challenges with space as well as equipment. The solos in this collection ease this challenge. Multitudes contains nine solo pieces by different composers which all use the same nucleus of instruments. This provides a number of benefits to the performer and the institution:

• Students can all practice on the same general setup, while all working on different, individualized pieces.
• Sharing this equipment allows the setup to remain intact, reducing setup and tear-down time while also being economical with studio or band room space.
• This shared approach also reduces stress on the amount of equipment available; many schools do not have enough gear to facilitate a variety of solos that all use similar equipment to be setup in different places at the same time.
• Performance situations such as studio class, solo & ensemble, or juries are made easier due to the ability to have multiple students perform on the same general set of equipment.

The composers of the Multitudes incorporate a wide variety of inspirational concepts due to their varied backgrounds as innovators in the fields of multiple percussion performance and pedagogy. Composers are James Campbell, Andrew Bliss, Julie Hill, Robert Parks, Anders Åstrand, Dan Moore, Brian Nozny, Ben Wahlund, and Eric Willie.

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