World Premiere, Århus, Denmark: Concerto for Marimba and String Orchestra, Pius Cheung
Pius will have the world premiere of his own composition “Concerto for Marimba and String Orchestra” in Percussion Plus Festival in Århus Denmark on 25 February, 2012.
Method Book: Colors – Intermediate Etudes for Marimba
On November 12, 2011, Pius Cheung will conduct a marimba clinic in PASIC 2011 with the theme “Colors – The Art of Tone Production”.
This event will also mark the official release of “Colors – Intermediate Etudes for Marimba”, a 104-pages method book written, composed and published by Pius Cheung. Limited copies of the first release will be available for sale during the event.
Below is the excerpt of the introduction of “Colors”
Colors is a series of short marimba etudes, all of which were written within the range of
a 4 1/3 octave instrument. The purpose of these compositions is to assist intermediate marimba
students in exploring the wide palette of tone colors that one can produce on the marimba,
which I find to be the most attractive attribute of the instrument’s sound.
Before examining the mechanics of how to produce different tone colors, I think it is
crucial to always keep in mind a three-step approach towards tone production, which I have
lived by for many years, including:
1) Thinking, imagining and knowing the sound I want to produce.
2) Producing it.
3) Listening and checking if the sound I am producing matches with what I imagined.Conceptually, these steps seem very simple, but in the frenzy of playing, coupled with
performance anxiety, one can easily forget steps one and three. Especially since marimba
playing is such a physical act, I can speak from personal experiences that one can easily fall
into the trap of playing without thinking or listening.In analyzing the mechanics of tone production on the marimba, I have divided the
physical stroke of marimba playing into three categories. For every note, one is to use a
combination of these three stroke aspects to produce sound.1) Stroke Shades
2) Stroke Weight
3) Stroke Speed
This is not a conclusive system of all the tone colors one can produce on the marimba.
It is simply an introductory window, which I have found helpful for tone color explorations.
Music Sheets: Flight of the Bumblebee, arr. Pius Cheung
The download pdf version of Flight of the Bumblebee, composed by Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov and arranged by Pius Cheung for solo marimba is now available for sale in Pius Cheung Online Music Shop. Printed version will be available in mid-November 2011. Bumblebee is a very standard virtuosic encore piece on most instruments. In my arrangement, I decided to add some octaves, octave displacements and bass lines to feature 4 mallet marimba playing to its fullest advantage. Pius
Colors
Colors is a series of short marimba etudes, all of which were written within the range of
a 4 1/3 octave instrument. The purpose of these compositions is to assist intermediate marimba
students in exploring the wide palette of tone colors that one can produce on the marimba,
which I find to be the most attractive attribute of the instrument’s sound.
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