| Sunbreaks is a short and spirited work for full orchestra with an
expanded percussion section. Written in the spring of 1997, it was inspired by an aptly
named meteorological phenomenon peculiar to the Pacific Northwest. When he first moved to
Seattle in the fall of 1995; the composer found the term puzzling and amusing when he
heard it used by local weather forecasters; after enduring several nine-month stretches of
drizzle, he came to appreciate why the occasional "sunbreak" was something to be
celebrated. The music is predominantly dark in color, but its ominous tone is
repeatedly interrupted by bright bursts of wind and percussion sonority. As the
interruptions grow more insistent, the piece develops from a static "cloud
cover" into a swirl of turbulent melodic fragments. Eventually the dark musical
imagery dissipates altogether, and the music ends with a brief quotation from an old song
whose title relates to the tone-poem's subject matter.
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