John Mackey (b. 1973) once famously compared the band and the orchestra to the kind of person a composer might be attracted to at a party. The orchestra seems ideal for you, but clearly feels superior and talks a lot about a whole slew of exes (like Dvorak and Beethoven). The band, meanwhile, is loud and brash, but loves everything you do and can’t wait to play your stuff, the newer, the better! (I’ve rather poorly paraphrased Mackey – it’s best understood in his original blog post on the subject).

With this attitude and his prodigious talent, John Mackey has become a superstar composer among band directors. He has even eclipsed his former teacher, John Corigliano, by putting out dozens of new band works, including a symphony, since 2005. All are challenging, and many are innovative. Mackey’s works for wind ensemble and orchestra have been performed around the world, and have won numerous composition prizes. His Redline Tango, originally for orchestra and then transcribed by the composer for band, won him the American Bandmasters Assocation/Ostwald Award in 2005, making him, then 32, the youngest composer ever to receive that prize.  He won again in 2009 with Aurora Awakes. More recently, he was honored by the American Academy of Arts and Letters with the 2018 Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award in Music. His compositional style is fresh and original. I once heard him state that he counted the band Tool among his musical influences.

John Mackey publishes his own music through his website. This doubles as his blog, which is very informative for anyone looking for a composer’s perspective on new music (and pictures of food). He is featured on Wikipedia and the Wind Repertory Project. He is also on Twitter and has a Facebook composer page.

Night on Fire is the second movement from the suite The Soul Has Many Motions, which Mackey wrote in 2013 on a commission from the University of Texas to celebrate the retirement of Richard Floyd from the University Interscholastic League (UIL) board. Mackey goes into great detail of its genesis on his blog, where he also reproduces the succinct program notes by Abby Jaques:

In physics a motion is a change; in geometry a motion is a transformation. These four songs, written on the occasion of Richard Floyd’s retirement, celebrate that moment of change and transformation by evoking many kinds of motion, of bodies and of the soul. “Violet Crown Fanfare” captures the movement of the heavens and the optimism of the wide-open West; “Night on Fire” suggests the wild dancing of a nomadic camp; “Unquiet Spirits” is a waltz full of longing and an otherworldly sweetness. The final movement, “The Ringmaster’s March,” is a riotous Ivesian circus parade, a joyful noise in honor of a man who has always been at the center of the show.

Here is a live performance. Note the ever-changing (though carefully patterned) meters – I recommend following along in the score:

And a slightly peppier recording:

Check out more about Night On Fire at the Wind Repertory Project, J. W. Pepper, and Mackey’s website.