The British Trombone Society recently commissioned two works from composer James McFadyen, and later this month they are to be recorded at the Birmingham Conservatoire led by BTS president, Brett Baker.

Quintet

The works, entitled ‘The Magic Forest’ and ‘Flamethrowers and Galaxies’ are written for double trombone quintet.

James has worked personally with Brett on commissions since 2005, but admits that the two BTS commissions proved to be particularly challenging.

I'm not a composer who uses strict form and the resulting piece is somewhat unconventional, as I hope all my music isJames McFadyen

Hardest project

He told 4BR: "When I was asked to work with the BTS to write the pieces, it was one of the hardest projects I've ever worked on. My compositional styling calls for large forces of instrumentation and making this fit within a chamber ensemble had its challenges – particularly Flamethrowers and Galaxies, which is a loose-fitting Fugue."

He added: "I'm not a composer who uses strict form and the resulting piece is somewhat unconventional, as I hope all my music is."

James hope that the recording is well attended and looks forward to hearing the result — being a composer who writes by hand, he's not heard them yet – not even on the computer!