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Isiah 40

This article is taken from the September issue of Brass Band World.

     The words of Isiah "Comfort, comfort my people, says your God" will be 
firmly in the bandspeople's minds as they experience the nerve-tingling 
atmosphere of this year's Boosey & Hawkes National championships final at the 
Royal Albert Hall, London.
     For the first time, General Paul Rader of the Salvation Army has given his 
approval for a serving officer, Lt-Col Robert Redhead, of Canada, to accept the 
commission to compose the test-piece for the finals on October 19.
     The work, entitled Isiah 40, has been commissioned jointly by B&H and brass 
band associations in the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland who also propose to 
use the piece as a National test.  It will be published soon by Salvationist 
Publishing and Supplies.
     Colonel Redhead's compositions have become well-known to bands since the 
relaxation of the SA's policy on the performance of its music by non-SA bands.  
He was bandmaster of the International Staff Band of the SA in London before 
returning to Canada to take up his present post in Canada.
     In notes accompanying the work, Colonel Redhead explains that Isiah's text 
(set by Handel in the Messiah) was written against a backcloth of society 
grappling with an uncertainty about the future, to encourage people facing very 
intimidating circumstances.
     "Both scripture and music sound out a message of hope, as they view life 
from an eternal perspective," he writes.  The SA's press release announcing the 
General's approval expresses the hope that "it will be essential that those who 
teach and play this music become familiar with the scriptural text."

Source: Brass Band World magazine, September 1996

Best wishes,
-- 
Tim Morgan, Bass Trombone, Woolley Pritchard Sovereign Brass.


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