Seven years ago I embarked upon a trip to the moon.

Not in a practical since but, spiritually.  In other words, I stretched my composition legs out and wrote an orchestration dedicated to the Apollo missions.

Moonscape is a symphonic tone poem.  The piece opens with a theme for the moon which seems very distant at first.  You hear the complete theme in all of its glory once they land.  There is theme dedicated to the engineers and technology it took to make it there.  Usually played up high on a Xylophone or a flute.  The “traveling to the moon” has a wooden sound to it.  I used an oboe, English horn, and bassoon to give it a dry human feel.  It is vulnerable, warm, and brittle in its texture.

The trip was full of troubles.  It seems obvious now that we made it.  The same can be said about life.  Sometimes you just need to press on to the end.

I have edited some raw footage of many of the Apollo missions.  The lift off and “one small step” landing are from Apollo 11.  The pictures of the Earth rise are from Apollo 8.  The moon buggy is from Apollo 16.  Together they tell the collective story of humanity’s journey to the moon.