Review

Paul Wehage
Sonata Eroica:

Langy sur Marne, , France
Publisher: Musik-Fabrik
Date of Publication: 2005

Piano score and solo part

Primary Genre: Solo Tenor Trombone - with piano

A native of the United States, Paul Wehage currently lives and works as a saxophonist and composer in France. Although much of his work involves promoting and performing French music, Sonata Eroica is written in a neo-classical style, following traditional forms in each of the three movements. Wehage explores a variety of keys and modulations to move the music along. The opening two bars provide a rising and falling arpeggiated theme that serves as thematic material for the entire work. Both trombone and piano are given ample opportunity to explore and develop the many facets of this simple idea. The texture is dense and dark. The piano writing is characterized with octaves in one hand and full three- and four-note chords or continuous sixteenth-notes in the other. This texture seldom varies throughout the entire work, providing either a perpetual forward motion or a dreary monotony, depending on your point of view. Wehage’s trombone writing is fluid and continuous. In three movements and three hundred and sixty-eight measures, the trombonist rests for only eleven bars. Needless to say, endurance is an issue. Tessitura resides in mid to upper registers but range covers the full spectrum of the instrument from B-flat to e2. Confidence in the high range is essential as the music often rises above c2 on sustained notes and in technical passages. The score uses both bass and tenor clefs. Sonata Eroica is a tour de force for advanced trombonists and pianists. With an ever growing wealth of trombone literature choices it is questionable whether its musical rewards equal the effort required to learn it.

-Bill Mathis
Bowling Green State University