Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata

Description

Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata

by Eddie Lewis and Alex Lewis

“What did you do with your down time during covid lockdowns?”

We get that question every once in a while and one of the things I did was work on my very first collaborative composition. My son, Alex, and I spent about a year working together on Seizing Victory, finishing up in mid 2021. We then performed it at the church where he is the music minister in late 2021.

It is not only the collaboration that makes the Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata different from most of my other work, the objective was also very different. I rarely just write to express myself. There is always something more to it than that. Yet, with Seizing Victory, I wanted Alex and I to enjoy the creative process together. So, in this case, very much in contrast with how I typically work, the objective was 100% expression.

To be clear, I strive to be expressive in every composition I write. By making expression secondary to other needs (such as educational and commercial needs), that expression must be tempered to meet those objectives. Seizing Victory was not tempered in that way.

Another very big difference with Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata is that we were writing it to perform ourselves. This was not for students. It was not primarily commercial. It was something we wanted to do as a father and son project, to write something expressive that we could add to our recital program.

Originality

I have long said that “originality for its own sake is inherently unmusical”. I believe that we are all truly unique individuals and that the best way to create original works of art is to be truly expressive. If we are truly unique, then it follows that our truest expressions will be unlike the works of any other artist.

That’s what I feel we have accomplished in Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata. You won’t find anything like it in the current trumpet literature. It does not conform to a specific genre or style. It pulls on jazz flavors but is not composed in a jazz style. It is odd meter, but doesn’t sound academic in that regard. In other words, it is not just odd meter for its own sake. The odd meters are used to express, not to impress.

Skill Level

The skill level for Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata is advanced. It is in the first of two advanced skill levels in our system. We call it the Trumpet Master Skill Level.

The range in the first trumpet part goes up to F Sharp above High C in the slow, middle movement. Technically, this would put it in the next level, our Trumpet Virtuoso level, but it simply isn’t that difficult. So the F Sharp falls slightly outside the Trumpet Master Skill Level.

The trumpet sonata is over twelve minutes long and does require a great deal of endurance.

We would put it as a university or pro level composition.

Practice Recommendations

I think that probably the most difficult aspect of learning Seizing Victory is the rhythms. Visually, they do not look as complicated as they are. My first recommendation is to study the score with rhythmic analysis. Look for where the rhythms line up and where they contrast each other between the trumpet and piano parts.

Pay close attention to the accents because those accents will help you keep the ensemble together during performances.

There are also a number of finger twisters and odd intervals. It almost goes without saying that this should be practiced slowly and carefully.

Personally, for me the most difficult section of the sonata to work up was between G and H. It may be a good idea to start you work on this piece on that section and then move on to the rest of the piece.

Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata NO Play-Along

As of now, there is no play-along video for this piece yet. I usually source the play-alongs from my original recordings, but the recording of Seizing Victory was done live in a recital. So we cannot separate the piano from the trumpet.

Seizing Victory Trumpet Sonata Demo Video

The following video is a demonstration of the sonata, as performed by me and my son, Alex. We programmed Seizing Victory last on the recital, so it is not of the quality that we usually publish on this channel. I even cracked the last note. Ha ha ha…

That said, I do think that it is an honest representation of Seizing Victory. The flaws do not detract from the express I spoke of at the top of this page.

I hope you enjoy it.