Trombone Travels continues its journey, exploring English song at the start of the twentieth century and the great song cycles of Edward Elgar (Sea Pictures, Song of Flight, Arabian Serenade, In Smyrna), Ralph Vaughan Williams (Songs of Travel) and Charles Stanford (Songs of the Sea). The trombone’s propensity to mimic vocal techniques – for example, vibrato, portamento, and microtonal inflections – combined with its ability to sustain and manipulate its sound orally, allows a vast spectrum of colours to be achieved. Tone can be adjusted further by inserting a mute into the instrument, giving rise to a whole host of colours not available to the singer.

The initial problem is that of removing the words. Vocal emotion and expression is largely conveyed via the shape and colour of the text, and understanding and interpreting the vocal accents and resulting shape of the English language was the first consideration of the arranging process. Working in English presented a very different challenge to the German of Schubert’s Winter Journey (Trombone Travels Volume I); the language is far softer and to match the expressive articulation of a singer required a careful reevaluation of technique.