''Spangled Unicorn'' is a composition for brass ensemble by the British-born composer

Anna Clyne Anna Clyne (born 9 March 1980, in London) is an English composer, now resident in New York, US. She has worked in both acoustic music and electro-acoustic music. Biography Clyne began writing music as a child, completing her first composition a ...

. The work was commissioned by the

Chicago Symphony Orchestra The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) was founded by Theodore Thomas in 1891. The ensemble makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival. The music director is Riccardo Muti, who began his tenu ...

, for which Clyne was then

composer-in-residence Artist-in-residence, or artist residencies, encompass a wide spectrum of artistic programs which involve a collaboration between artists and hosting organisations, institutions, or communities. They are programs which provide artists with space a ...

. It was first performed on March 21, 2011, at

Symphony Center Symphony Center is a music complex located at 220 South Michigan Avenue in the Loop area of Chicago, Illinois. Home to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra; Chicago Symphony Chorus; Civic Orchestra of Chicago; and the Institute for Learning, Access, a ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

by the brass section of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Composition

Clyne was inspired to write the piece by the "powerhouse" brass section of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. She later described the experience as "an opportunity to take a stab at writing for such an ensemble for the first time." The title of the work comes from the book ''Spangled Unicorn'' by

Noël Coward Sir Noël Peirce Coward (16 December 189926 March 1973) was an English playwright, composer, director, actor, and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what ''Time (magazine), Time'' magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combina ...

, which Clyne spotted while shopping at a Chicago bookstore. Clyne wrote in the score program notes, "I scooped it up, but alas, none of the poems made even the slightest of references to a unicorn of a spangly nature. So, I instead turned to the young writers Helena McBurney (age 11) and Charlotte McBurney (age 9) who created their very own stories about this magical beast. I then spliced their two stories and reassembled them to form one story..." A tape of the girls reading this story can be played as an optional accompaniment to the piece.

Instrumentation

The work is scored for a brass ensemble consisting of three horns, three

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standar ...

s, three

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrat ...

s, and a

tuba The tuba (; ) is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass instrument, brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibrationa buzzinto a mouthpiece (brass), mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th&n ...

Reception

Reviewing the world premiere, Lawrence A. Johnson of the ''Chicago Classical Voice'' called the piece "well-crafted, virtuosic and written with great flair and a quirky off-center humor". He added: Conversely, Evan Kuchar of

ChicagoNow ChicagoNow was a blogging site managed by Tribune Publishing, owner of the print ''Chicago Tribune'' newspaper. It featured a network of blogs of international, national, and local interest on a variety of topics ranging from crime to public scho ...

called ''Spangled Unicorn'' "a big disappointment" and described it as "banal ideas combined in boring ways—and then brought back a second time. There's some fanfare, a waltz that hangs around for too long, and there's even a polka that sounded like one of

Brahms Johannes Brahms (; 7 May 1833 – 3 April 1897) was a German composer, pianist, and conductor of the mid- Romantic period. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, he spent much of his professional life in Vienna. He is sometimes grouped wit ...

' ''

Hungarian Dances Hungarian dance refers to the folk dances practised and performed by the Hungarians, both amongst the populations native to Hungary and its neighbours, and also amongst the Hungarian diaspora. According to György Martin, a prominent folklore expe ...

''. Not unicorny at all; just corny. And nothing dreamy about it."

References

{{italic title Compositions by Anna Clyne 2011 compositions Chamber music compositions Music commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra