I've been busy...

JANUARY 2024 NOTICE:

WE ARE HAVING TROUBLE RECEIVING EMAILS AT THE tim@timothymahr.com EMAIL ADDRESS PREVIOUSLY CITED WEBSITE.

PLEASE SEND ALL COMMUNICATIONS TO mahr@stolaf.edu.

Our apologies for this disruption in communication, which has been going on for sometime, but of which we’ve only recently become aware. It’s frustrating and a very common problem we’ve found with Squarespace-designed websites communicating with the GoDaddy site host. VERY FRUSTRATING!

PLEASE KNOW THAT ALL SALES TRANSACTIONS THROUGH THIS SITE REMAIN SECURE AND ARE RUNNING CLEARLY.

Thank you for your understanding. Again, please now use mahr@stolaf.edu.

There are days when the writing flows easily and others when a day seems to be intent on stopping any creative thought at all. I’ve been lucky of late, having just come off of a three-month burst of activity. I thoroughly enjoyed composing “a plaintive cry, a hopeful dream” for The United States Air Force Band, Col Don Schofield, commander and conductor. As I understand it, the work will be premiered this coming season with MSgt Matthew Nudell as the trombone soloist. A graduate of St. Olaf College, Matt and I both agreed to explore the lyrical side of the trombone (what I lovingly and smartly call “God’s Instrument”), rather than explode with virtuosic pyrotechnics. I’m really please with the results; I think it reflects some of my finest writing and I can’t wait to hear what this amazing soloist and ensemble will do with it!

I also just finished “Old Man Run” for the Three Rivers Conference Honor Band in SE Minnesota. This was really fun to write - I explored fleshing out for a band (grade 3 level) a four minute, primarily melodic improvisation at the piano that I had recorded. I’ll conduct the premier in early November.

I’m deep into a fantastic project currently - a work tentatively titled “Urgent Voices” commissioned by a consortium of ensembles led by Col. Timothy Holtan and the Maryland Winds, who will premiere the work in February 2020. The formal premiere will be with the Music for All High School National Honor Band, under Col. Holtan’s baton the following month in Indianapolis. The ten minute work (gr 4+ - 5 on a 1-6 scale) is centering on the remarkable work of the young among us, represented primarily for this piece in the activism of Malala Yousafzai, Emma Gonzalez, and Greta Thunberg. I am inspired by their intensity, courage, and effectiveness, and I hope to react musically in a meaningful way that will engage the musicians and audiences that might encounter the work.

The Minnesota Symphonic Winds is going to produce a second performance of “Imagining Peace” at the Minnesota Music Educators Association MidWinter Clinic in Minneapolis. Additionally, the St. Olaf Band will be presenting the work on its winter tour to California in early February, with additional performances in Minnesota. You can hear the premiere performance here: https://www.timothymahr.com/imagining-peace

This is all after writing and premiering three works this past spring, too - whew! I’m a very lucky composer!!

Thank you for your interest in my music!