"Four Pieces for Brass Septet and Timpani" - study in varying degrees of formal symmetry

Symmetry in music has long been a preoccupation of mine. While many traditional forms incorporate some degree of symmetry - be it the simple return of previously established material or even the employment of symmetrical forms - literal symmetry is somewhat rare. Just as the two halves of the roughly symmetrical human face are essentially never perfect mirror images of one another, even the most mirrored of musical forms tend to harbor differences on either side of their supposed axis of symmetry. As music is, with notable exceptions, typically a more organic experience than a scientific one, perhaps there is little surprise that such an artificial construct as perfect symmetry does not lend itself naturally to its conception. Nonetheless, I was determined to explore numerous handlings of the concept - ranging from simple formal returns to almost perfect axial symmetry. While the recollection of previous material fosters alludes to symmetry in within the ABCDC'B'A' form in Bela Bartok's (1881-1945) famously "palindromic" Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta, "III. Adagio," the proportions of the mirrored formal sections differ considerably. The instrument selection for "Four Pieces for Brass and Timpani" had a certain degree of symmetry at heart - a lone Horn in F is situated between three trumpets and three trombones. The brass family itself is fairly homogenous as it pertains to timbre - perhaps not to the same degree as the modern string family, but certainly a great deal more than modern woodwinds. Perhaps the choice to work with brass instruments was also a sentimental one - as a former brass player, many recurring elements of my writing were born of immersion in brass idioms. The timpani has long been at home among brass ensembles, and its role here is largely to lend density, the occasional percussive front to attacks, and heartbeat-like pulses (the latter of which being a gesture brass instruments cannot carry credibly for extended periods of time). (See more in text.)