Author: Hilton Kean Jones

Composer and performer, retired college music professor, lyricist.

look up

My dear friend, William Lindsay, who died November of ’24 after a long, progressive battle with dementia and Parkinson’s, used to tell me whenever I was in the clutches of melancholy, “look up.” He mean it literally as well as figuratively. It worked every time, and still does. Somehow just the physical act of looking up at whatever there is to see, the mind is diverted from the unwanted thoughts. Clouds, tops of trees, birds flying, tall buildings, stars, the sun, sunrise colors, sunsets, the cerulean sky…doesn’t matter, even a telephone pole will do.

That’s what this album of piano pieces is all about, and it’s dedicated to Bill.

You can buy the mp3 album at https://hiltonjones.bandcamp.com/album/look-up. You can also listen to it for free, up to three times I believe.

While you’re there, check out the other mp3 albums at https://hiltonjones.bandcamp.com/!

The gorgeous album covers are all by Nathan Jones, my son, who is a successful designer in Atlanta, GA.

And finally, “Always try to keep a patch of sky above your life.” ~ Marcel Proust

Hosanna (for pipe organ)

The problem for most working pipe organists is that most interesting organ repertoire is too hard to work up new pieces on a weekly basis and usually too long for a service. In short, the interesting literature is suitable for recital but not church service use. Add to that is the fact that (notice I kept saying “interesting” in the forgoing paragraph) most stuff that’s the right length and difficulty for weekly use is beige arrangements of boring hymn tunes. Nothing wrong with hymn tune arrangements–I’ve written my share–just don’t make them beige and boring.

Anyway, two friends are getting married and they asked me to play organ at their coming wedding. I haven’t gone near an organ in quite a while. In fact, at 81 (this month) I’ve managed to live long enough to have two pairs of pipe organ shoes literally rot and fall apart. So, I ordered a fancy new pair of organ shoes (fancy: suede soles and built up heels) and to motivate myself to practice, I’m in the process of writing a bunch of new organ music that’s (hopefully) interesting and the right length and difficulty for weekly service use.

Any former students who want to perform one of them, just write me and I’ll send you a free PDF. Otherwise, they’re available at https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en-US/se/ID_No/1906100/Product.aspx and https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/en/product/hosanna-23610675.html.

Lavender Skies

Each geography has its own sky. Florida’s skies are unique and amazing. There are many roadside artist paintings for tourists with purple skies. There’s a reason for that. The purple you often see at dusk is real. People want to take a little of that home with them. Sometimes, at dawn, there’s a border of lavender against the soft rose sky. It’s fleeting. Like the colors of the ocean or the Gulf, the color of the sky is constantly changing. At my age, I don’t see dusk all that often, but I see many a dawn. A lavender sky is one of my favorites.

Christmas arrangements available

Here are my Christmas arrangements. Notice that all of them have a link where you can listen to the arrangement and some have videos of my playing them so you know they can be performed by a mere mortal. Most of the pieces are for solo piano but a fair number are for trumpet and a few for cello.

Piano

Trumpet

2025 – 4 sets of Christmas trumpet descants (C & Bb tpt copies) — complete groups [arrangement], 1 movement, trumpet & any keyboard (work with most hymnal settings
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

2024 – Curoo, Curoo (Carol of the Birds) [arrangement], 1 movement, trumpet & pipe organ
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

2024 – Puer Nobis Nascitur (Unto Us Is Born a Son/Joy Dawned Again on Easter Day) [arrangement], 1 movement, trumpet & pipe organ (or piano)
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

Cello

2024 – Puer Nobis Nascitur (Unto Us Is Born a Son/Joy Dawned Again on Easter Day) [arrangement], 1 movement, cello & piano
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

2024 – The Babe of Bethlehem [arrangement], 1 movement, cello & piano
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

2024 – Curoo, Curoo (Carol of the Birds) [arrangement], 1 movement, cello & piano
VIDEO – AUDIO – Sheet Music Direct – Sheet Music Plus

Hilton, play us some tunes…something Irish

I’m kind of feeling my way right now. All I know is I feel the urge to make music as folks might have done it in my grandparents’ day, as a informal playing of music on the home piano and while folks sat around and kind of humed along. Or…maybe if i could be a busker I would. This is an assemblage of a bunch of Irish tunes, with almost no editing, just paying one after another, all under 90 seonds (except the very last one would is 120 seconds I think). I might peel these apart and make them seperate Instagram posts, or YouTube Shorts, or not…I really don’t know. Maybe I’m feeling the need to have a gig like Eric Satie did, playing in a bar, and Debussy and Ravel (separately) would come and listen to him. So, anyway, there’s the above video which is only by means of an experiment, that I don’t quite know where it leads.

Nebula Waltz (solo piano)

Newest piece. Not a perfect performance, but the best of 6+ takes. As a video, that’s as good as I’m going to get it. But, I like this piece and I wanted it as a video. People don’t seem to like recorded music as much as they do videos. I don’t quite understand, I accept that that seems to be true. I’m SO HAPPY with my new music stand light! I have to increase my music to 150% enlargementany more and I need LOTS of light on the score. Much better conditions now. 🙂

#music

#piano

4 Sets of Trumpet Descants on Familiar Christmas Carols

Sheet music should be online at sheetmusicdirect and sheetmsicplus by 10/6/25. These four sets can be played, a different descant for every verse, or the performer is welcome to pick and chose which to do and for which verses. This recordings shows them all in an order that works if all are done in a set.

Twilight Peal

My old faithful music notation software will no longer work on new OS so having to convert, literally, hundreds of pieces to the new software. I don’t dare listen to any of them or I’ll never get done (there’s hours and hours of my music). But, I made the mistake of listening to this one. Couldn’t resist throwing this video together. I dressed up like this a number of years back to play the organ for a Halloween concert at the Palladium (I don’t even know if that organ there still exists). #halloween #pipeorgan #music

The Geography of Dreams (complete in 6 movements)

Composed: 2014-2015
These are all real dreams that have stuck with me over the years and that take place in a world that reoccurs very often in my dreams, ever since I was a kid. This dream world has a complete geography that is quite consistent and which I’ve explored over the decades. It’s a peculiar feeling to know that this other world exists. It seems to exist outside of this time stream…but it is very real.
Score available at hiltonkeanjones.com/music.

This is first time I’ve assembled them all in one video. I’d done some, but not all of the movements in spearate movements. It was kind of fun watching this complete video on the living room TV via the Roku YouTube app. Here’s the YouTube link: https://youtu.be/lQubEagvM3s. There’s a bit of compression applied by YouTube itself, but it’s not nearly as bad as Apple Music or some of the other streaming services apply. To my ear, the streaming service which has the least offensive compression is Amazon Music.

Compression is electronic treatment of the sound that basically makes louder spots in the music a bit softer and softer spots a bit louder so you can listen to the music over the roar of the traffic when you’re driving. I’m being a bit facetious…that’s not the real reason. The real reason is that the sound coming through speakers doesn’t deal with the complete dynamic range as well as live music in a room and the human ear. The difference between acoustic music in the flesh and recorded sound is so vast that when you a hear a piece like Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, live for the first time after having heard it only in recordings you blown away by all the things happening in the music you were completely unaware of.

Have This Love (SATB recording)

This was recorded by the Bayshore Baptist Choir, Tampa, FL, Dr. John Richmond, conducting, back in 1993. I composed it around that time, maybe a year or two earlier. It’s one of my choir’s favorites to sing. It’s so simple, it practically sings itself.