The McIntyre Ranch was founded in 1894 by Billy McIntyre of Utah. On the Milk River Ridge on the Great Divide in Alberta, just North of the Montana border, it is 56,000 acres and considered to be the largest tract of undisturbed grassland in North America. The Thrall family now owns the ranch and commissioned this composition (for 4 trumpets, 4 horns, 3 trombones, euphonium, tuba and percussion), asking that the work incorporate some favourite songs of the West and that the finale be a celebration of the Blackfoot Confederacy.