Maybury Hill Lullaby by Jonathan Bates

Maybury Hill Lullaby was composed for the City of Bradford Brass Band as part of a programme of music based around both the original H.G Wells novel and 1978 adaption of Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds. During the previous day, the first missiles from Mars had crashed into earth and the creature within had gone out invoking chaos and destruction on all human life nearby. The Narrator (an unnamed character throughout) escapes the scene to his home on Maybury Hill, Woking and falls into a deep, haunted sleep recalling the horrors he has witnessed before his own eyes. "The next morning, a crowd gathered on the Common, hypnotized by the unscrewing of the cylinder. Two feet of shining screw projected when, suddenly, the lid fell off! Two luminous disc-like eyes appeared above the rim. A huge, rounded bulk, larger than a bear, rose up slowly, glistening like wet leather. Its lipless mouth quivered and slavered, and snake-like tentacles writhed as the clumsy body heaved and pulsated. A few young men crept closer to the pit. A tall funnel rose, then an invisible ray of heat leapt from man to man and there was a bright glare, as each was instantly turned to fire. Every tree and bush became a mass of flames at the touch of this savage, unearthly heat ray. People clawed their way off the common, and I ran too. I felt I was being toyed with, that when I was on the very verge of safety, this myserious death would leap after me and strike me down. At last I reached Maybury Hill and in the dim coolness of my home I wrote an account for my newspaper before I sank into a restless, haunted sleep." Performed for the first time in a public setting, this beautiful yet haunting piece was written for Flugel, Baritone and Cornet and played by Phoebe Mallinson, Becky Childs and Dan Cullen and of course the City of Bradford Brass Band on our British Open Senior Cup Preview Concert on the 4th May at Ossett Town Hall - we went on to win the Senior Cup later that week to be promoted to the Grand Shield for 2023. We do hope you enjoy and feel free to share!