Forged in Rhythm
General Info
Year of Published: 2025
Publisher: Brian Monroe Music
Instrumentation
Player 1: Glockenspiel & High Tom Tom (played with Hard Bell Mallets)
Player 2: Xylophone 1 (Polyball Mallets) & Snare Drum (played with SD Sticks)
Player 3: Xylophone 2 (Polyball Mallets) & High Brake Drum (played with SD Sticks)
Player 4: Vibraphone & Medium Tom Tom (both played with Medium Cord Mallets)
Player 5: Marimba 1 & Low Tom Tom (played with Medium Yarn Mallets)
Player 6: Marimba 2 (Bass Clef) & Metal Trash Can (played with Medium Yarn Mallets)
Player 7: Chimes & Metal Trash Can (can be larger or smaller): (played with Chime Mallets)
Player 8: China Cymbal, Ride Cymbal (play on bell & bow), Sizzle Cymbal (cymbal with a chain of paperclips suspended on the top), Brake Drum, Trash Can (Metal or Plastic.) (played with SD Sticks)
Player 9: Gong (played with SD Sticks, Triangle Beater or Optional Bow) & Hi Hat & Floor Tom: (played with SD Sticks)
Player 10: Bass Drum (muffled) & Rhythm Crasher & Triangle (played with BD Mallet, SD Sticks, Triangle Beater)
Player 11: Timpani
Description
Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Mahoning Valley in Ohio rose as one of America’s great steel-producing regions. Major companies such as Youngstown Sheet and Tube—founded in 1900 & later the largest corporation in Ohio— along with Republic Steel and U.S. Steel, transformed the valley into a manufacturing powerhouse. The mills ran day & night, their towering smokestacks & glowing furnaces defining the skyline & fueling an industrial boom that shaped daily life for generations. Thousands of residents, including members of my own family, labored in the mills, producing the steel that built our nation and defended it in times of war. Yet alongside this world of heat and clamor, Mill Creek Park—Ohio’s first metropolitan park—offered a peaceful counterpoint, with its natural beauty & quiet standing in stark contrast to the roar of blast furnaces & the thundering of the rolling mills. Forged in Rhythm seeks to capture these dual rhythms of the past—the power of industry and the solace of nature—that together shaped the spirit of the Mahoning Valley.
Works for Percussion by this Composer
Percussion Quartet Works
Arcade 1920s
Jubilee (Monroe)
Of Thunder & Steel
Percussion Quintet Works
Dialogues (Monroe)
Gravitational Ripples
Percussion Sextet Works
Percussion Septet Works
Percussion Octet Works
Seconds In Time
Snowfall Dances
Large Percussion Ensemble Works
Forged in Rhythm - 11 Players