Swinging original composition

Raphael Benjamin Meyer is primarily known as a film composer (e.g. The mortician), but he is also a recorder player who studied at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis and conducts three recorder orchestras. The Swing Thing is a commissioned composition in which he is able to combine his professions, experiences and passions in a congenial way.

The Swing Thing works in both single and choral scoring. The two-part composition is in principle for five voices (SATTB) with additional optional C bass and sub-bass voices. However, these additional voices do not simply double the lowest voices of the movement, but occasionally form interesting counter-voices that lend the swinging, largely ternary composition an additional groove. The composer probably also had the different levels and realities of recorder ensembles in mind when creating the formal structure: a short introduction is followed by a longer swing section at a moderate tempo, which leads into a metrically more complicated stretta with a significantly higher level of difficulty. This is again optional; the composition can also be ended at the Fine notated in brackets at the end of the first part.

The Swing Thing enriches the repertoire with a genuine composition that is based on the qualities of the instrument and does not have to adapt an existing composition for recorders. However, Raphael Benjamin Meyer proves in arrangements (such as Mozart's famous motet Ave verum corpusHeinrichshofen & Noetzel N2687) that he also masters this craft very well and takes into account both the advantages of the instrument and the structure and beauty of sound of the composition.

Raphael Benjamin Meyer: The Swing Thing, for 5 to 7 recorders; score: N2890, € 10.00; parts available separately; Heinrichshofen & Noetzel, Wilhelmshaven