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Winner International Composers Contest
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Winner International Composers Contest

The Estepona City Council informs that the Dutch conductor, composer, arranger and organist Christiaan Janssen (Netherlands – 1974), has been the winner of the III Composition Competition for Symphonic Band ‘Estepona, Jardín de la Costa del Sol’, endowed with a single and indivisible prize of 10,000 euros.

In this edition, open to musicians of legal age of any nationality, a total of 11 composers of recognized prestige have participated. The objective of this competition is to motivate outstanding symphonic music professionals to compose pieces inspired by Estepona.

The jury of this edition has been chaired by the band and orchestra director, composer and pianist Fernando Ferrer Martínez ‘Ferrer Ferran’, together with Óscar Navarro González, director, clarinetist, composer and musical pedagogue, Goya Award for Best Original Music ( La Mula, 2013), and José María Moreno Valiente, director of the Málaga Philharmonic Orchestra.

These professionals of recognized prestige have been in charge of choosing the composer with the best resume and catalogue, in whose compositional project the values of the contest are outstanding, promoting the city of Estepona, its people and its customs through their musical composition. To do this, they have taken into account criteria such as the composer’s career, his musical catalogue, his experience and his dedication to symphonic bands or wind and percussion orchestras.

As established in the rules, the winning composer of the competition must compose the work inspired by Estepona before January 15, 2024.

Once the composition has been reviewed by the specialized commission, the Estepona City Council, in agreement with the author Christiaan Janssen, will set a date for the premiere of the work and the public presentation of the award. The winner will not be able to participate in the next five editions of the contest.

The City Council called the first edition of this competition to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the founding of the Municipal Music Band (1940-2020). After the success achieved in terms of number of participants and quality of the compositions, the City Council has opted to maintain this contest to continue expanding the city’s cultural offering.

The winning works of the two previous contests, ‘Estepona, Jardín del Mediterráneo (Astabuna)’, by the Jaén composer Álvaro López Cámara, and “Estepona, el Jardín del Mundo”, by the Valencian composer Fernando Ferrer Martínez, known artistically as Ferrer Ferran, They are already part of the repertoire of the Estepona Municipal Music Band.

This cultural project joins other artistic competitions launched by the City Council to recognize creators from different disciplines. Among them, the ‘Ciudad de Estepona’ International Novel Prize stands out, which is organized jointly with the Manuel Alcántara Foundation, the ‘Ciudad de Estepona’ International Poetry Prize, which has the collaboration of the Pre-Textos publishing house, the successive editions of ‘Estepona CREA’ or ‘Young Andalusian Designers’, among others.

More info and official announcement: → Website Estepona

Turandot for Fanfare / Giacomo Puccini
Transcriptions for Fanfare Band,

Turandot for Fanfare / Giacomo Puccini

InstrumentationFanfare Band
Grade6
Duration12 minutes
PublisherJanssen Music
Demo Score→ Download

When Puccini’s opera ‘Turandot’ was heard for the first time in April 1926, its composer had been dead for almost a year and a half. Turandot is considered as his best work: Puccini’s mastery of orchestral sound reaches its pinnacle: this is a ripe, opulent, fin de siècle, score, in which deep washes of colour are applied to a profusion of melodic ideas. 

In this arrangement I did use the orchestral material from the opera to make a suite for Fanfare Band.

Le Penseur / The Thinker
Music for Wind Band,

Le Penseur / The Thinker

InstrumentationWind Band
Grade6
Duration13 minutes
PublisherJanssen Music
Demo Score→ Download
Le Penseur (Full Midi)

→ contact us for hiring possibilities…

When The Thinker was conceived in its original size (approx. 70 cm) in 1880 as the crowning achievement of The Gates of Hell, seated on the tympanum, it was given the title The Poet. He represented Dante, author of the Divine Comedy who had inspired The Gates, bent over to observe the circles of hell, meditating on his work. The Thinker was therefore initially both a being with a tortured body, almost a damned soul, and a free-thinking man, determined to transcend his suffering through poetry. The pose of this figure owes much to Carpeaux’s Ugolino (1861) and to the seated portrait of Lorenzo de’ Medici carved by Michelangelo (1526-31).

Remaining in place on the monumental Gates of Hell, The Thinker was exhibited individually in 1888, becoming an independent work. The colossal version, enlarged in 1904, proved even more popular: this sculpture of a man lost in thought, but whose powerful body suggests a great capacity for action, has become one of the most celebrated sculptures ever. There are numerous casts worldwide, including the one now in the gardens of the Musée Rodin, a gift to the City of Paris installed outside the Panthéon in 1906, and another in the gardens of Rodin’s house in Meudon, on the sculptor’s tomb and his wife.

A challenging composition for wind orchestra based on several “leidmotifs”, written from the perspective of the thinker, who ponders the different emotions and characters of the leitmotifs before coming to a conclusion, but with an open ending, because after all, the thoughts go on again…