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Stuttgart premiere for Mead

Steven Mead to give the world premiere of a new euphonium concerto with the Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra on November 22, 2007. The new Concerto is called 'The Hallows' and is sure to become one of the most important new euphonium concerti in the intrument's history.

Rolf Rudin is very well known in Germany as a fine composer of contemporary music and has written several major modern works for wind and symphony orchestra. Rolf was invited by the Stuttgart Philharmonic, themselves champions of modern music, to compose a new work for solo instrument and orchestra and, remembering a promise he made to Steve several years before, nominated the euphonium as his chosen instrument. The orchestra asked for more details about this 'mysterious' instrument (!), and after Steve submitted some recordings and a summary of career highlights to date, the orchestra agreed to the choice of the euphonium.

Steve had several meetings with the composer to check out all the various possibilities of the euphonium, including mutings, glissandi, articulations, and various other 'special effects', multiphonics etc all of which have been included in the concerto. The resulting piece is very challenging piece of modern music of around 25 minutes duration, and will give the Stuttgart audience on Thursday 22 November a demonstration of the the true capability of the euphonium in the hands of a virtuoso performer.

Of the theme of the piece, the composer Rolf Rudin writes:

"In Irish mythology it's said that a group of ancient magical people known as the Thuata de Danean came to Ireland- they were the original Irish Fairies - and they brought with them four sacred treasures, called 'The Hallows of Ireland'. So the piece should get a very mythical and epic atmosphere and the euphonium is something like the narrator or an old Druid who is telling the

people something of this ancient and unknown time. I have for a very long time been a huge admirer of Steven's incredible playing and I am so much looking forward to hearing him perform this !"

Tickets can be obtained from the website of the Stuttgart Philharmonic and the performance, in the famous 2200 seat 'Beethoven Hall' in Stuttgart, is destined to be one of the most important euphonium moments of recent times.