Mysterious and macabre and reflective of mortality that’s the type of music for this edition of Brass, Reeds, and Percussion because it’s the Halloween edition.In 1936, before a concert to be broadcast on radio, Artie Shaw needed a theme tune. Theme tunes were important because they helped to indentify a big band. In short, having a theme tune was part of big-band marketing. Many big bands simply chose a song from Tin Pan Alley, but Shaw decided to write his own and to make it truly unique and therefore vastly more memorable. The name of the tune is \“Nightmare\” and its unique sound is a great way to begin the Halloween edition. This theme tune became a hit in its own right in 1938.