Joni Greene (b. 1981) is an American composer based in Austin, Texas. She has written a wide variety of music for a range of ensembles, from bands and orchestras to chamber groups and operas. Trained at Indiana University (BM and MM degrees), her principal teachers included Michael Gandolfi, Sven-David Sandstrom, Kevin Puts, Don Freund, David Dzubay, Claude Baker, and Rafael Hernandez. Her music has been performed extensively, and has won her several awards, notably in the Frank Ticheli Composition Contest. Greene emphasizes instrumental color and its transitions in her wind band music, with melodies and textures often passed between sections. Learn more about her and her music at her website, the Wind Repertory Project, and the Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music. Also, check her out on the One Track podcast.
Glow is a peppy, somewhat abstract fanfare that Greene describes thusly (from her website):
Glow was written rapidly in the summer of 2018 in only two weeks. For years I had imagined this work as bursting clusters. And when I sat down to write it, the music poured out of me. The work features shining harmonies and melodic lines in small instrument pairings similar to my other works. Using an ABA format, pulsing harmonic rhythms and falling sixteenths create a minimalistic background. The B section was my favorite part of this work. True to the format, it offered a moment to break away from the previous ideas. This section is quiet and dry, presenting the music in a falling motive in the woodwinds while creating glowing effects in the mallet percussion and muted trumpet. Once the original A material returns, the syncopated sixteenth note motive repeats several times. Thick scoring along with the pulsing sixteenths culminate into a final burst to close out the piece.
Glow is dedicated to Maestro Paul Popiel and was premiered on September 20, 2018, by the University of Kansas Wind Ensemble.
Listen to that premiere performance:
See more at Greene’s website, Murphy Music Press (includes a score preview), and the Wind Repertory Project.