Jupiter Jane: A Cinematic Adventure (2017)

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Galactic Battle

Love

Victory Parade

Program Notes

Jupiter Jane: warrior, diplomat, leader, comrade. The greatest air captain ever to patrol the stars of a distant galaxy. Sometimes a free-wheeling private soldier, sometimes commander of the rebel guard, Jane and her crack squadron of flying fighter ships combat evil and advance justice wherever they may be.

This piece is a symphonic journey through Jane's adventures in The Battle of the Blue Planet, an imaginary cinematic blockbuster.

Jupiter Jane's squadron and the enemy imperial forces form opposing ranks as the opening fanfare sounds. A fantastic battle follows. Both armies desperately heave missiles, torpedoes, streams of lethal fire at each other.

At last – astoundingly – the plucky rebels destroy all the enemy vessels, leaving the imperial command satellite unprotected in its orbit around the beautiful, mythical Blue Planet. The victors send a final fatal salvo towards the satellite: all watch the missiles’ slow approach....all wait for impact…

The missiles hit their target and the satellite explodes like a supernova into billions of fiery pieces, hurtling outward through space. The empire falls.

A victorious Jane, master in war, falls before the charms of her beloved, known only as K, on the garden of paradise which is the Blue Planet.

The final scene shows Jane and her fighters welcomed home as heroes in a triumphal procession. Accompanied by K (the love theme returns majestically), Jupiter Jane closes her soldierly career and embarks on new, entirely private, pathways.

Jupiter Jane was commissioned by the Maryland Classic Youth Orchestras for premiere by the MYCO Symphony, Simeone Tartaglione, Music Director.

—Andrew Earle Simpson