Pale Blue Dot

Pale Blue Dot

Composed in 2020, commissioned by Brass Band Pro Rege Heerenveen

I composed this work during the time when the COVID-19 pandemic had the world in its grip. Not only this pandemic, but also the unstoppable effects of climate change caused by global warming, made me realize even more profoundly how vulnerable our planet is. This brought to mind a famous photograph of Earth taken in 1990. Captured from a distance of 6 billion kilometres by the Voyager 1 space probe, the image shows our planet as seen from the edge of the solar system, nothing more than a tiny speck in the vast expanse of the universe.

This remarkable image inspired me to write this composition. The photograph was aptly named Pale Blue Dot. Thanks to Carl Sagan, the Voyager 1 mission’s leading advocate at the time, this also became the title of the concert work.

Composer:	Jan de Haan
Instrumentation:	Brass band
Genre:	Concertwork
Level:	5
Duration:	14:00
Download score:	Pale Blue Dot (pdf, 1.19 MB)
Publisher:	music@jandehaan.com Order this work

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