Beneath the underdog

Beneath the Underdog is composed specifically for Rising Winds, a ten piece ensemble, which consists of four woodwind players, four brass players, a percussionist and a bassist. The woodwind players in Rising Winds all double on a variety of instruments and I take advantage of that in Beneath the Underdog. The percussionist in the ensemble, on the other hand, has a limited number of instruments to choose from, and so this piece he plays the vibraphone exclusively. Beneath the Underdog is in on movement but has three different sections that are generated by metric modulation. The first section is slow, the second section is moderate, and the third section is fast. The first section serves as an introduction. The second section is the longest of the three sections, and takes up about half of the piece. The third section is climactic and ends somewhat abruptly. Beneath the Underdog is an attempt to express through music my feelings about the growing "underclass" population in the U.S., people for whom "economic violence" is a day to day fact of life; people who were supposed to have been born equal to the rest of Americans, but somehow weren't: people for whom the "work ethic" is a cruel joke. In this piece I try to achieve a balance between hope and despair, optimism and reality.