Fight| |Flight - Mara Gibson

Composition: Fight| |Flight Composer: Mara Gibson Performers Eric Siereveld, trumpet Megan George, trumpet James Boldin, horn Tyler Coffman, trombone Richard Perry, tuba From the composer "Fight||Flight – “Fight-or -flight” is a human response to stress and relates specifically to the release of hormones when the body is in danger. Fight||flight (of the honeybees) is inspired by this metaphor and specifically relates to the process that honeybees go through in making honey. Like brass players, honeybees are sophisticated communicators. After building an intricate hive made up of hexagons, the bees begin their work to make honey. First, a worker bee goes out to gather nectar. The bees do a dance, flapping their wings at a very fast buzz to determine where the nectar is (literally which direction from the sun). Once the worker bee gathers the nectar, she comes back and begins the inversion process. This process occurs several times and they flap their wings to make the serum thicker. Finally, once the honey is made, they cap it off and move on to the next cell. Bees make very little honey in their life span. I wrote the piece during the pandemic and thought a lot about the human stress response to being separated. I titled the piece Fight||Flight because I wanted to bring a human component to the piece and possibly prompt listeners to feel like bees, perhaps like humans during the pandemic."