Guy Turner: Antiphonal Fanfare for double bass octet

About the Composition

Antiphonal Fanfare was composed in October 2007, at the request of David Heyes, and was premiered on Friday 18 April 2008 at Wells Cathedral School (Somerset). It was the first piece of the opening concert of Bass-Fest @ Wells and was one of fifteen premieres during the weekend, including six bass fanfares.

Two groups of basses are pitted against each other, taking in turns to play rich chords or jagged syncopated melodies. The music is entirely diatonic but, as in much of Guy Turner's music, the richness of the harmonies owes a great deal to the predominance of the interval of a major 7th.

Antiphonal Fanfare is playable by bass octet or larger forces and offers few challenges for the good intermediate ensemble. It is a fun and lively work which would be suitable for any audience or occasion.

About the Composer

Guy Turner studied Music at Cambridge, where he sang in Clare Choir under John Rutter, and founded the St Michael’s Singers, a choir which still meets annually to sing together over 40 years on.

He was a music teacher for thirty-one years, and during this time he also conducted chamber choirs, choral societies and a youth orchestra. He founded Somerset County Youth Choir and was director of music at St John the Baptist, Yeovil.

In 2008 he moved to Nottinghamshire to take up a post singing in the Cathedral Choir at Southwell Minster, where he remains. He continues conducting, is archivist of the Eric Thiman Collection, and a question setter and verifier for TV quizzes. He is one of the founders of the nationally acclaimed Southwell Music Festival. Guy is occasionally allowed out into the community to perform Comic Songs.

As a composer, he is mainly known for his choral works (including Under the Wide Sky, and a Requiem) and for his shorter choral pieces – carols, arrangements, and lighter numbers such as the famous Tequila Samba and Over the Rainbow, and the pieces published in the volume called Potato Music. As an arranger he has worked for Cantabile, Voces8 and the King’s Singers. He has occasionally composed for instrumentalists, in particular for the flute, tuba and double bass.