Review

William Pagán-Pérez
Short Piece:
Contrabass trombone (or bass trombone or tuba) and piano

Yauco, , Puerto Rico
Publisher: William Pagán-Pérez
Date of Publication: 2013

Score and solo part

Primary Genre: Solo Bass/Contrabass Trombone - with piano

The contrabass trombone is in the midst of a revival, with many players around the world exploiting its capabilities outside the small body of orchestral works that call for the instrument. Among the most high-profile contrabass trombone players in the world is the dedicatee of William Pagán-Pérez’s Short Piece, the Spanish player Javier Colomer, whose text, The World of the Contrabass Trombone (co-authored with Heinrich Thein) was reviewed in ITA Journal Volume 42, No. 3 (Summer 2014).

After a short, slow introduction, Short Piece transitions to its main section, an episode with a bouncy, Latin feel. Range demands are modest, from GG to g, and the piece lies reasonably well on a contrabass trombone in F. Short Piece is a brief, fun work to play and should find its place on recital programs where a player wishes to showcase the contrabass trombone in a piece that is not especially difficult and is also enjoyable for the performer and the audience. Unfortunately, the solo part for Short Piece is laid out in such a way that both page turns are impossible. As a result, the performer is then then faced with the moral dilemma of needing to photocopy pages of a piece that, on its first page, makes the important point that copying the publication “in whole or in part” is a violation of copyright law. Surely Pagán-Pérez will forgive this legal indiscretion in order to secure performances of this unpretentious and pleasant piece for the largest member of the trombone family.