Category: Classical music

The Little Room Under the Stairs

We lived in an old, rambling two-storied* parsonage (my father was a Methodist minister) and we lived in the house owned by the church. I was in the first year or two of elementary school. Our house was big enough that there were front stairs descending into the hallway just inside the mudroom and stairs in the back emptying directly from my bedroom (!), down into the kitchen and continuing directly on down into the the basement (but that’s another story ).

Underneath of the angle of the front stairs was a triangular shaped little room with its own little triangular door.

I don’t remember if I ever actually ever even entered that room, or if I simply wanted to and fantasized about doing so. Memory is a very malleable thing. My emotional association with that room was not at all like the frightening little room under the stairs that Harry Potter was confined to. For me, the association with our little room under the stairs is warmth, comfort, books, a place to be away from the world and close the door behind me, a place all my own…emotional privacy.

I suspect that’s a false memory, built entirely of wishful fantasy.

Here’s a picture of me on the front porch of that old house, at that exact age, 8. You can probably intuit all there is to know about me just from that photo!

Sweet Rivers (solo piano)

Hal Leonard, the world’s largest sheet music publisher, runs a site called ArrangeMe which gives composers & arrangers a vehicle to self publish their arrangements of pop tunes–Hal Leonard owns the rights to a vast number of pops songs all of which are available to arrange through ArrangeMe–and of tunes in the public domain. As well, it provides a self-publishing platform for composers of their original works. When there’s a sale, the composer or arranger make a percentage and Hal Leonard gets a percentage.

If you go to the Compositions page of my website, you’ll links to those two sites for almost all of my compositions that are for instrumental solos, piano solos, organ solos, and choral/vocal music. (I don’t bother trying to sell scores of my symphonic music and concerti since those are not really something people are shopping for.)

Pianists seem to buy my folk song and hymn tune arrangements and organists my original music although that’s not always the case. It’s not gonna pay my mortgage, but I do make steady sales. My videos on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@hiltonkeanjones) are my main channel for promoting my music. There’s probably other ways that would increase sales, but I’m not business savvy. Suggestions always welcome!

I love this tune: Sweet Rivers. The composer of the tune is anonymous and the tune is found in William Walker’s 1835 Souther Harmony, and Musical Coompanion. I could play it over and over again. It makes me happy and makes me smile. Check out the words and various instances of the tune in different hymnals at https://hymnary.org/text/sweet_rivers_of_redeeming_love. This is real old-timey music at its best.

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.

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

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.

Cervantes – Andante & Allegretto (for solo piano)

This is a two movement piece. Both movements, Andante & Allegretto, are in this video. I’ve been working on this piece for a veeeeerrry long time (couple decades). There’s pieces like that that seem to take forever to fully materialize as you’d like. I think it’s done.

I’m an octogenarian. Not having achieved great fame and fortune as a classical composer, and probably never will, I continue to write and make these videos. I know why actually: composing is an activity that makes me completely lose track to time. I forget to eat. I don’t notice it’s way past my normal bedtime.

Activities that do that mustn’t be ignored. That’s something that matters to one. That’s why I continue to do this. I’m not tilting at windmills (sorry, not sorry), I’m doing this because I have a great, great, marvelously great time doing it.

The videos are just a marker for myself, that the pieces are as finished as they’re going to get. Same with publishing them on sheetmusidirect and sheetmusicplus. It’s a way of putting a pin in them.

HKJ Pipe Organ Playlist

I’m in the process of tidying up my social media. I’ve written pieces I’ve even forgotten I’ve written, let alone posted anywhere.

I’ve also done some analysis of who buys what of my sheet music. Pianists seem to mainly buy my arrangements of songs, mainly folk songs. Organists mainly buy my original stuff! I would have guessed it would have been exactly the opposite.

Trying to build on what I’ve learned from my sales stats, I’m try to assemble all the pieces of mine on YouTube that use pipe organ (solo organ pieces and pieces for solo melody instrument and organ). Another thing I would have never guessed is the (free!) promotional power videos have on sheet music sales. Far more than purely audio sites.

Here’s a link to a playlist of videos of pieces of mine that use pipe organ: Organ Playlist

I’ll continue to add to that list as I find pieces I’ve forgotten, so if you like organ music you might check back from time to time.