Description
Laura Estes brings a lot of drama to the table in this new work for the youngest musician. “After Impact” is programmatic and a powerful soundscape using only the first few notes that they know!
Program Notes
“After Impact – Chicxulub Asteroid: Day 3” continues the storyline of “Ancient Badlands,” both commissioned in back-to-back years by the Brandon Valley Intermediate School 5th Grade Band from South Dakota. With the students’ connection to South Dakota paramount in my mind, the ancient history of the South Dakota Badlands piqued my interest. Millions of years ago, the prairie landscape of the Badlands was covered by a sub-tropical shallow sea called the Western Interior Seaway. Towards the end of the Cretaceous period, this seaway had partially receded, leaving in its wake temperate forests and rivers in what eventually would become the Badlands of South Dakota. These forests and rivers were teeming with life, filled with creatures large and small. It was the age of dinosaurs.
While “Ancient Badlands” takes us back 66 million years to a specific point in time – one day before the catastrophic Chicxulub Asteroid slams into the Yucatan Peninsula, causing the mass extinction of dinosaurs and most non-avian life on our planet – the journey now continues with “After Impact – Chicxulub Asteroid: Day 3,” which zeroes in on the same area of South Dakota just 3 days later. Fires are still burning, sunlight is blocked by thick dust and ash in the atmosphere, and the only survivors are mammals and reptiles who hid in caves or burrowed into the ground. Fires provide the only light. And now, these survivors are beginning to carefully venture from their hiding places in search of food, determined to live.
Even after this cataclysmic event, one would have heard all sorts of sounds along with the chatter of the soon-to-be-extinct remaining dinosaurs. Percussionists will enjoy creating the sounds of the landscape while imitating dinosaurs clicking and scratching with sandpaper blocks, ratchet, wood blocks, and vibraslap. Wind players further enhance the ambiance with different hand sounds such as clapping and rubbing palms together. Utilizing only 6 notes (concert Bb – G) and 1 tempo change, “After Impact” is a substantial level 0.5 concert work for our youngest musicians. With its use of limited extended rests, students in all instrument sections will remain engaged and busy during rehearsals. I hope you and your students enjoy learning “After Impact – Chicxulub Asteroid: Day 3.”
