Gorb: Ascent

This first complete recording of works by Adam Gorb on NMC focuses on the genre with which he is most widely associated, music for Symphonic Wind Ensemble. The title piece on this release, Towards Nirvana, was commissioned by the Tokyo Kosei band in Japan and it was decided that the work should to reflect the teachings and journey to enlightenment of the Buddha Siddartha Gautama. The music is simple and lucid in form and intent and take us on a journey through the Buddhist universe from Hell to Nirvana. In contrast, Scenes from Bruegel Gorb uses the Flemish painter’s reflections on human folly, greed, cruelty and lust as inspiration, interpolating that best-known of all medieval tunes ‘Sumer is icumen in’ to evoke scenes of sixteenth- century Netherlands.

Adam Gorb has won three British Composer awards for Wind Ensemble pieces: Towards Nirvana (2004), Adrenaline City (2008) and Farewell (2009.) His first major Wind Band piece Metropolis (1992) has won several prizes including the Walter Beeler prize in the USA.

In March 2010 Gorb premiered his new Wind Ensemble piece War of the Worlds, based on the H.G. Wells novel and the panic caused by the Orson Welles broadcast to an unsuspecting American public on October 31st 1938. Forthcoming commissions for Wind Ensemble include an oratorio for the Exeter Festival Choir and the Royal Marines based on the war in Afghanistan, a saxophone concerto and a large scale work for an ensemble in Denver, Colorado in the USA.

Adam Gorb is Head of School of Composition at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.