Shadows
for marching battery ensemble
Shadows by Roger Carter is an intense and action-packed lot jam for marching battery, written for and premiered by the 2024 DCI World Champion Bluecoats drumline.
Inspired by the Meshuggah tune The Exquisite Machinery of Torture, this advanced piece is scored in triple and quadruple compound meter with polyrhythmic sub-phrasing. It is replete with features for every section of the drumline and is NOT for the faint of heart!
Whether you’re honing your drum corps or indoor percussion audition chops or simply want to study the work of one of the great contemporary battery writers, Shadows will be a valuable addition to your repertoire.
Shadows ships as a fully bound score and includes individual parts in PDF format for either printing or tablet viewing.
- Marching snare drums
- Marching tenors (sextets)
- Marching bass drums (5)
Reviews
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Brian Nozny –
The “Lot Jam” exercise has become increasingly prevalent over the last few decades. From Blue Devils’ “Ditty” and Santa Clara Vanguard’s “Double Beat” to Phantom Regiment’s “Immigrant Beat” and Cavaliers “Latin Lover,” these extended exercises aim to combine all facets of a technical development program with an artistic factor that makes them highly entertaining.
Taking inspiration for these pieces from other works, Roger Carter delivered “Vortex” in 2014 based on the Meshuggah song “Beneath.” Carter delves the same depths again with “Shadows,” which is based on Meshuggah’s song “The Exquisite Machinery of Torture.” This is an advanced work with a few challenging passages for every section as well as the ensemble as a whole.
Carter provides extensive performance notes for the piece, breaking down every section to highlight the focus of the section as well as challenges performers will face during that portion of the work. Outside of the opening and closing sections, each area is a feature for one of the sections, or in the case of the penultimate section, a series of tradeoffs between the snares and tenors.
Predominantly based in compound meters of 9/8 and 12/8, performers will need to be familiar with several different tuplet values throughout the work. Snares and tenors will need to be well versed in a variety of hybrid flam rudiments, while the bass drum part has extensive use of split sixteenth and thirty-second notes with single notes on different drums.
“Shadows” is technically challenging, musically demanding, and entertaining for performer and listener alike. To say this piece is challenging is an understatement, but the payoff will be worth it for any ensemble that can tackle this unique and virtuosic four-minute piece.
—Brian Nozny
Percussive Notes
Vol. 63, No. 2, April 2025