was inspired by the sight of a hawk circling obsessively on a bright November day, hence the constantly circular nature of the music and, especially, its melodic material. Though the central section isquicker, the underlying pulse remains the same, and the transition to a quicker tempo is hardly noticeable.

The piece is therefore, and unusually for a brass quintet, a single entity, in which the outer sections are closelyrelated, the final part being partly a repr...