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In this movement from "The Elements", which Glen Newton composed as part of the 1983 West Bank School of Music composers' workshop, three tenor saxes provide a uniform tonal mass with three-note chords to support the five-note motif B-A-F-E-D. Sometimes, such as at letter B, the tenor sax chords and lines suggest rippling water. A section from halfway through C to halfway through D provides a swinging contrast to the straight rhythms of the remainder of the movement. In the swing section, the cup-muted trumpet adds an inner harmony note to the chord.
The composer comments:
I wanted to take advantage of the availability of three tenor saxes somewhere in the composition, and this movement seemed the best place to do it. In retrospect, the high notes in the first tenor sax part required a very awkward sequence of cross fingerings, so it probably would have been better to have an alto sax on the top.
I learned the technique of using a trumpet with a cup mute to fill out a sax section from Glenn Miller's Method for Orchestral Arranging (Mutual Music Society, Inc., 1943), a book my father had bought me after finding it in a used book store in Fancy Gap, Virginia, in 1962.
I played the third tenor sax part, and during one of the performances, I found it difficult to play the low notes without squeaking. I discovered later that when I had hastily assembled the instrument in the midst of preparations for playing the wide variety of instruments I needed for the concert, I had left the neck twisted slightly on the body, so the connection to the upper octave hole was keeping the hole slightly open. If it hadn't been for my soft reed, I'm sure I would have squeaked even more.