(Concerto for Brass Band No. 14)
The test piece has been commissioned by the Swiss Brass Band Association for the 42nd European Brass Band Championships. The title, Dear Cassandra, is taken from Greek mythology. Cassandra predicted the arrival of the Trojan Horse. In his virtuoso and highly personal work, composer Ludovic Neurohr attempts, in his words, ‘to interrogate through the music and the compositional process the future direction brass band music might or might not take. Beyond the curiosity of knowing how the future will be written, the fear to being locked into writing only for human technical capacities haunts my thoughts, and especially composing what has already done hundreds of times before…’

Dear Cassandra is cast in three movements playing continuously. It opens in exploratory mode, as the players search for new sounds from a single tone. Using the rhythm of Dear-Cas-san-dra (long-short-long-short) as the principal motif, the material gradually coalesces as the composer asks the question, ‘Is this the right path to follow?’ Other musical elements and styles are drawn into the musical ‘discussion’.

Several references are used in this 16' minutes work to picture few images created by the composer. The Finale will invite the audience to imagine what the composer finally think about Cassandra’s advices. People can also make their own opinion about this theme but the principal goal of this work is asking ourselves about this:
Where are we going?