On Playing Well With Others

for eb clarinet and trumpet in C (8 min.)

For the most part, On Playing Well With Others is a piece in which the two instruments involved do not  “play well with each other”.  The clarinet and trumpet play together like stubborn toddlers, meeting together harmoniously for precious few moments in the midst of their otherwise futile and clumsy attempts at “getting along”.  In the end, however, it turns out that the best strategy for getting along is perhaps the simplest one.  Uncomplicated counterpoint that is flirted with through the opening of the work becomes the basis for a reconciliatory ending.  On Playing Well With Others was written for the Ludovico Ensemble.