In the past I liked to visit my dear friends, Peter, and Roberta, who live about half an hour to the south of Bremen, in the village of Bramstedt, North Germany. As I was walking down the straight, flat road across the fields, on my way to Bramstedt ’International’ (actually just a platform on the main railway line!), this little march tune came to me, rather in the manner of a Beethoven sketch - but whereas he jotted it down in a notebook, I hummed it into my mobile phone’s voice memo!

It is very much intended as a tongue-in-cheek, fun German march, with a direct lift from a famous German folksong in the trio, and another brief Germanic reference at the end!

It has already been recorded on CD in a version for Wind Band and this is part of a series of further versions for popular smaller ensembles.

As before, for the Norfolk Reeds Clarinet Quartet, I have made available a version of the Bass Clarinet part either for Alto Clarinet, or ordinary Bb, where a bass is not available. Obviously the harmony is less successful as each higher instrument is substituted.

N.B. In the present economic climate, a good number of smaller ensembles understandably buy just the set of parts as, in reality, these alone are all that is needed in performance. Equally, a similar number buy both the parts and the full score. To compensate for this, I intend to reduce the cost of the full score by $4, and increase the price of the lead part by $3, a differential that wasn’t available to sellers at the former SibeliusMusic.com.