Celebrations

101 Original Duets

by Eddie Lewis
http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic.81843439

Sample PDF

Hello,

My name is Eddie Lewis and I want to thank you for your interest in Celebrations.
Celebrations is my thirteenth trumpet book and probably my most significant and
meaningful work. I am very excited about sharing it with you in this way.

This pdf file is intended to give you not only actual duet samples from the book, but also
lots of information about its usefulness and its meaning as a musical work. Celebrations
is a bridge between the old and the new, rooted in traditional music, but also exploring
modern music in a fun yet educational way.

Dick Schaffer (Houston Symphony Orchestra) praised Celebrations as “a wonderful,

cheerful, joyous book” – calling it a “playing encyclopedia, pure and simple” with
“something for everyone, from beginner to professional”.

Chris Gekker - University of Maryland

"Your duets have been a great addition to my teaching. I like to do some sight-
reading at each student’s lesson, and in your book there is so much variety and
range of styles. Some duets are very simple, which can be deceptively
challenging, and others have intervallic and rhythmic demands that are quite
ambitious. I also appreciate the "swing" duets, of which there are a number: gone
are the days when any trumpeter can ignore being able to play well in this
manner. Congratulations on such a fine book, and I'm grateful for your
contribution to our quest of becoming better musicians and trumpeters."

Fun
Reading trumpet duets with a friend or teacher is already something fun to do.
Celebrations presents certain twists and turns in the music which can keep you glued to
the edge of your seat. Lonnie Lalanne (a top pro in the Houston area) called and left this
message on my machine after working on the duets:

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 "I'm on 74, 75 and 76 in your duet book. Man, I just want to thank you for this
stuff. It's really perfect for a pro player to cover those styles and I'm going to tell
you the truth - you're kind of a jerk though - some of that stuff you do, man, that
trickery - I really like it. Thanks Eddie."

He he he..... Trickery!!! I’m glad Lonnie is enjoying the book. But yeah, it’s the twists
and turns and all the unexpected things in the book that make it fun. There is music here
which you won’t find anywhere else in the world.

Sight Reading
Reading duets has long been the prescribed cure for sight reading problems. If you are
having trouble with your sight reading, I strongly recommend Celebrations as part of
your sight reading arsenal. The very same twists and turns that Lonnie calls “Trickery”
are the same unexpected surprises that make for good sight reading.

But let’s take it one step farther than just that. I personally believe that part of what
makes you a better sight reader is your familiarity with different styles. If you’ve never
played swing before, then sight reading a big band gig is going to give you trouble,
whether you are a good reader or not.

I learned this the hard way. When I first started working with the different big bands in
Houston, I was already firmly established as a salsa player. I can sight read salsa music
extremely well. I remember when a congero told me, “Man, you sight read stuff right
even when it’s written wrong.” Exactly!!!! I am familiar with that style. But I wasn’t as
familiar with the dance band stuff and I made far more mistakes on those gigs, in the
beginning, than I ever did playing a salsa gig. Most people will tell you that salsa is more
difficult to sight read than big band music, but I was unfamiliar with the big band at that
time (twenty years ago now) and that caused me to be a poorer reader on those gigs.

Celebrations covers many different styles: everything from renaissance to salsa. It’s a
wonderful way to cover all your bases and get a few new styles under your belt. You
want to be prepared for the gigs when you get them. Celebrations can be a big part of
that process.

What’s different about Celebrations?

Yes, this duet book is unlike anything you’ve ever used before. I have been hesitant to
say such things in the past. “Different” has come to mean “strange” in modern
composition, but these trumpet duets are not weird sounding.

When I recorded a CD with Phil Blackmon, here in Houston, the producer paid me what I
consider one of the best compliments I’ve ever received. He told me, “Your music is
modern, but it doesn’t repulse.” This comment pretty much summarizes who I am as a
musician. Yes, I’m modern, I’m new, and I’m different. But my music is enjoyable to
listen to and perform. It has always been that way.
http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic.81843439
That said, let me be more specific about those things which I believe make Celebrations
different.

Diatonic Duets
Long before I ever began working on Celebrations as a full project, I had an idea to
compose a series of trumpet duets to use in conjunction with my “Tonalization” concept.
I use the word “Tonalization” to describe the process of familiarizing yourself with a key
signature. The more time you spend in a key, the more familiar you become with that
key. Celebrations has twelve diatonic duets, one in each of the twelve keys.

Symmetric Scales

The original sketch for duet #75

Similarly to the diatonic duets, it seemed like a good idea to extend that concept to
include symmetric scales. Celebrations has a chromatic scale duet, two whole-tone scale
duets, three diminished scale duets and four augmented scale duets. To my knowledge,
this has never been done before.

Styles
Something else which makes this book very different is the stylistic variety: swing, salsa,
guapango, African 12/8, mambo, march, renaissance, baroque, fanfare, gospel, waltz,
sarabande, and a variety of 20th century styles.

Dissonance
Dissonance is utilized throughout the book, from the beginner duets all the way to the last
duet. It’s nice to be able to give younger students access to the more dissonant sounds in
this setting. It gives us an opportunity to discuss the “strange sounds” and how to play
them.

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Repeats
Instead of avoiding repeats, Celebrations uses them as an educational tool. This is our
opportunity to teach our students how to navigate a professional chart, to pay attention to
the meanings of the different types of repeats.

Polytonality
There are several duets in Celebrations which put each trumpet player in two different
keys. Some of them move in parallel motion. Some of them are cannons. And some are
contrapuntal compositions.

Progressive Order

Original sketch of duet #18

Celebrations progresses steadily on several fronts. The range doesn’t hop around. It
progresses from bigger range to that of a pro, steadily, over the space of one hundred
pages. The intervals become increasingly more difficult. The note lengths are one of the
most obvious progressions, starting with whole notes and gradually working towards
thirty-second notes. Time signatures, key signatures, contrapuntal independence, all of
these progress steadily throughout Celebrations.

Towards the end of its completion, great care was put into the progressive order. The
process of choosing an order for the duets and filling in the gaps with new duets took
several weeks.

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Spider Duets

Original sketch of duet #84

By far the most unusual duets in the book are the “Spider” duets. Spider duets are duets
which utilize an original harmonic language I invented in the1980s. This language was
extremely impractical at that time. It is a work intensive language and the composition I
used it for in 1986 took me several months of intense effort. So I gave up on the idea for
ten years.

It wasn’t until I began doing simple computer programming in the early 1990s that I was
able to use this harmonic language in an efficient manner. I wrote an original computer
program to facilitate the process and these trumpet duets are part of that. With the
program I wrote, I am able to do that same three months of work I did in 1986 in a
minute fraction of a second.

The objective of the language is to give melodic freedom to a traditionally rigid harmonic
structure. I won’t say more than that. I will simply invite you to enjoy this melodic
freedom as you play the Spider duets.

The Celebrations Story

The story behind these trumpet duets goes back to my high school years, at Andres High
School in El Paso, TX. I used to write trumpet duets for fun, but didn't understand that
this was actual composition. My two best friends in high school were Jawn Glass and
Leslie Townsend. We used to get together to play out of the duet books we owned and
then I asked them to try to play some of the duets I wrote.

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 The original surviving duet, #51

I think I composed about twenty trumpet duets in those few years, but only one of them
survived (#51). Later, when I began putting free music on my website, that sole surviving
duet was one of the pieces I offered as a download.

One day I got an email from a student in the Midwest asking for my permission to
perform this duet at his solo and ensemble competition. I gave him that permission, but a
few days later he said he wouldn’t be able to use it because he needed a contrasting work.
Well, I wrote him a contrasting work (#52) to go with the original duet, twenty years after
the first one was composed.

Writing that new duet, after having been a successful composer for over a decade, was
like a blast from the past. I was rediscovering my composition roots..... as odd as that
sounds. I got such a kick out of it that I didn’t feel like stopping. It wasn’t long before I
realized I wanted to write a book.

But I don’t just write books. To date (2007) I’ve written fifteen trumpet books.
Each of these fifteen books offers something different, something which has never been
done before. With all the pre-existing literature, it doesn’t make sense to JUST write a
book.

I decided to put considerable effort into research to see what was already out there and
what I could do differently. I bought as many books as I could find. But let me tell you, it
wasn’t so easy finding these things. There isn’t a whole lot of duet stuff out there
anymore. It seems to me that good duet books were a lot easier to find thirty years ago.

I did find one wonderful book which I want to tout here for a second. It was an
inspiration to me and a pure delight playing through the book with students and friends.
“Trumpet Duets” by Thomas Morley – transcribed by Leigh Anne Hunsaker. This is my
favorite duet book and was a huge inspiration while writing Celebrations.

Having done my research, I was ready to start writing and I had a blast with it all. I had
plenty of ideas about things I could do with the book which hadn’t been done yet.
http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic.81843439
Coming up with ideas wasn’t a problem. Picking only one of them was. In my mind, I
had six different duet projects to choose from but I finally decided to write all of them
and compile them into one book.

That’s why the book is so diverse, even more diverse than what is typical for me as a
composer. There are diatonic duets, duets based on symmetric scales, contrapuntal duets,
jazz duets, Latin duets, polytonal duets and Spider duets.

Spider Duets??? What are Spider Duets?

See the “What’s Different About Celebrations” section of this file to learn more about
Spider Duets.

The Stack

In the early stages of development, I was posting the trumpet duets on my website in a
pdf file similar to this one. I called that file “The Stack of Trumpet Duets” and it was
available as a free download. In it, I dedicated each duet to a fellow trumpet player from
my past: teachers, students, and colleagues. It was a tribute to those people who had made
an “Actual Reality” (as opposed to virtual reality) contribution to my music career.

In the end, I decided to drop the dedications for the final version of Celebrations. I do
feel like I owe those people an explanation. When the book had grown to sixty duets, I
had a terrible loss in my life. More than one actually. My life changed and something
happened to my music which will forever mark that time in my life as a turning point.

I had always been a Christian. I have always lived my life as a Christian and my faith was
ever-present in my music. However, one area of my life where I never let God enter was
into the business. While I thought, all along, that I was upholding Godly values and such,
I never thought to ask God to take an active role in the business, the way I had in other
areas of my life. When that changed, I asked God what to do about the duet book. At that
point, I didn’t even know if He wanted me to continue writing it or not.

After a series of personal messages, God showed me what He wanted me to do with the
duets. He wanted me to develop them as a tool to use with my students. Thus, the work
commenced anew. At that point the objective had become more clearly defined. This was
to become a progressive book, offering a little bit of something for players of every level.

At that point, the biggest challenge was in connecting the duets in a more progressive
order. My music room floor was covered with the duets as I made an effort to sort them
in order of difficulty. I was doing this with basically six different duet books, mixing
them up in the hopes of finding a sequential order. With them all on the floor, I could
better see the gaps in the order and those were the duets I knew needed to be written next.

http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic.81843439
The final step was to add the beginner duets, adding then a seventh duet book to the list.
My son was only then learning to play trumpet and was the first one to play them with
me.

Why title the book “Celebrations”?

As far as the actual writing is concerned, it took me four years to write this book. Those
four years were an emotional and spiritual roller coaster ride. The completion of the book
was during a great time of new beginnings for me. Not one new beginning. Many new
beginnings. I was facing an entirely new life with a new family that is completely
centered on God in all things.

“Celebrations” is about second chances. It’s about new opportunities. It’s about enjoying
God’s goodness. It’s about friendships and lasting relationships.

It’s almost funny. I removed the dedications from the book and one of my friends
jokingly told me that it wasn’t right to give God someone else’s left-overs. She wanted
me to keep the dedications because it wasn’t right to those people to take those
dedications away. But she thought I was, instead, dedicating the book to God. I was, but
not in the way she thought. I was dedicating the book to God through obedience. I was
doing with the book what God told me to do with it. It was no longer a tribute piece for
the friends I’ve made over the years. It became an educational work meant to serve my
students’ needs.

I hope you enjoy the book the way so many others have already. It means so very much
to me as its author.

God bless you.

Satisfaction Guaranteed
One of the best things about buying Celebrations from CafePress.com is that they have a
money back guarantee. This was important to us as a publisher because we strongly
believe in our work and always offered the same guarantee, in the past, when we were
selling books straight from our home. We believe in the old saying, “Put your money
where your mouth is.” If you buy Celebrations and later find that it’s not what you
expected it to be, CafePress will make good on the guarantee.

http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic.81843439
Contact Information
Eddie Lewis

+1 713-594-4584

eltigredo@sbcglobal.net

http://www.eddielewis.com
http://www.cafepress.com/tigermusic
http://www.myspace.com/eltigredo

Duet Samples
The following duets are offered as samples from the book. We hope you enjoy them as
much as I enjoyed composing them.

14) Tritones
An easy trumpet duet to help younger students become more familiar with this mild
dissonance.

45) Swing
A swing duet of moderate skill meant to help students work on the swing style.

51) Major & Minor

The original surviving duet from my high school years.

53) Whole Tone

An interesting and happy sounding duet written in the C whole tone scale.

66) Guapango
A diatonic duet in the key of D flat. Guapango is a folk dance style of Mexico.

96) Spider March

One of more than ten Spider duets in the Celebrations book.

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14) Tritones

           
      

  
           

               

    
               

                


                

                 

 
     
            

                   
rit.

              

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 8

45) Swing 

 
         
3

         
          
   
     
3

               
3 3

                
    
   

                        
  
              

                             
 
                  


     
                          
          
  3

            
3

       
                  
 
   

          
  
3

                   
    

                                      
3

         
  
        

            
3

   
         
3

 

  3
      
              
                
3

  


"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 46

             
                           
3


3

 

                  
                  
3


3

     

         
            

                      


"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 47

51) Major & Minor 
    
                                     


              
   

    
                                 


                               
  

  
                        
   

    
              


   
                                       

 

         
                      

                     

          
   
 
         
                 
 

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 58

   
                                        


                           
 

                 
                 
rit.
 
    
                        
 
Maestoso
             
       
 rall.

        
                           

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 59

53) Whole Tone 
             
             


                     
      

        
    
      
    


            
             
   
       

        
                    

  

                            

    
  
 
  
             
3


3

 3    
    
3

    
3

        
Tempo 1

                      
Slower
   
                           
  
accel.

         
          

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 62

                        
     

                            
   

                             


                        
         

    
atempo
        

       
rit.

  
             
      

         
       

                   


 3     
   


 
    

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 63

66) Guapango 
       
       
 
       
        


        
      
 
        
          


     
                          
 


    

                           
    
     
                           

  

        
              
   
  
  

 
                        
       
 
   

            
           

         

      
   
              
  

    
        

   
        

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 88

            
                    
 
     

              

                          
    

      
          
           
1. 2.

     

              
             
      
    

         
      

  
                



    

        
                   
 
   
                        
   

            
   
           

 
                       
  
    


                       
      
    

                 
        

 
   

  
   
"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 89
96) Spider March 3 3

   
            
3 3

      
     
 
   
 
          
                      
  
3 3

                     
3 3 3
1. 2.

    
3

         
  
         
                     
   
 
3 3


         



                                     
            
       
            
   
   
    

                
  

 
                          
    
    

  
   
          

          

                    
   
        
 

                                   
          
"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 152
             
             
   
   
    
              
    
       
 
             
            
Atempo
 
    
       
   

  
   
       
  
  
        

      
         

         
       
           
   

                 
         
  
 
 
    
             
3

     
    
  
       
              
  
 
 
  3
3 3

   
     
3 3

       
          
   
 
      
                   

 
3 3


3

         
3

 
       
 
       
    
rit.

       
 
3

"Celebrations" by Eddie Lewis - pg. 153