Estrellas Azules

Spanish for "blue stars," Estrellas Azules is a vibraphone solo featuring a lyrical, sweet melody using extended 4-mallet techniques while bringing in the use of the motor. It explores voice leading and phrasing through mallet dampening and pedaling to demonstrate a high level of musical interpretation and expression.

Program Notes

Estrellas Azules is Spanish for “blue stars” and was written for my wife, Estela, who of Hispanic descent also has blue eyes. The piece juxtaposes two contrasting styles of music to present a wide variety of musicality for the performer. The first presents a playful “Shuffle” feel to give the sense of a classic, timeless lullaby sound found in a music box. This is brilliantly defined in the vibrato of the motor creating an imaginative perspective to mimic the “twinkling” of stars in the distance.

The second style takes the vibraphone on a pianistic role in a quasi “half-time ballad” feel demonstrating a modern approach to the instrument. Its lyrical melody seems to float effortlessly above the surging 4 mallet permutations depicting a night sky swirling in its milky way beauty. The inspiration came from a star trail photograph which uses long exposure times to capture the individual streaks of stars across the night sky.

- J.T.

Grade Level: Medium
Copyright: 2020
Publisher: C. Alan Publications
Category: Percussion

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Instrumentation

Vibraphone (3-octave)