Johnny Come Down To Hilo is a boisterous, light-hearted set of diversions on the eponymous traditional sea shanty. The piece depicts a celebration aboard ship that gets slightly out of hand! The solo cornet states the energetic main theme, with the full band joining for the first chorus. Clapping and cheering heralds a playful bass theme, before the ensemble splits into a ‘call and response’ version of the chorus, with cornets and trombones facing out into the audience. A syncopated accompaniment changes the mood, with heroic horns leading the way into another ‘call and response’ chorus, this time with the roles reversed. The melody is then abruptly split around the band, before descending into a drunken waltz – one of the crew has had too much rum! The solo trombone depicts this crew member “in a drunken manner with exaggerated vibrato”. Eventually the crew member slips (slide whistle), strikes their head on the ship’s bell, and sees stars (bird warbler)! A good natured “wahey!” from the rest of the crew restarts the festivities with a flugel horn solo introducing a dancing compound version of the main theme. This develops into a lively fugue between the cornets, horns, and euphoniums and baritones, before building into a joyful recapitulation of the theme, with flowing decorative semiquaver lines in the solo cornets and euphoniums. The music reaches its climax in a triumphant statement from the upper band, with running quavers in the lower band leading into a final, driving statement of the theme, propelling forward toward a joyous shout of “Hoy!” to finish.

Johnny Come Down To Hilo is dedicated to the boisterous crew of Lydney Town Band.