Category: music video

Score and video for “The Geography of Dreams”

6 programmatic pieces for symphony orchestra

The Geography of Dreams consists of six programmatic character pieces scored for symphony orchestra. The dreams portrayed have stuck in my memory and occured over a number of years and all 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.

This video is all six movements combined. It’s not a “real” video…just images to have on the screen. But, YouTube has been my most productive social media in terms of prompting people to buy my scores. No other platform even comes close. Digital album available at https://hiltonjones.bandcamp.com/album/the-geography-of-dreams-2.

The score is available at https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en-US/se/ID_No/2169549/Product.aspx and
https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/en/product/the-geography-of-dreams-score-only-23935874.html. BUT, I’m happy to email a free copy of a PDF of it to any of my online social media Friends who’d want it. (Not making that offer on the sites open to the public. Who knows, some unknown someone would want to actually what to buy an orchestral score. With 8.3 billion people on the planet, accidents do happen.)

The River Strong (on bandcamp)

https://hiltonjones.bandcamp.com/album/the-river-strong

Sheet music for all the titles avabile at sheetmusicdirect and sheetmusicplus. As I remember all the links also have videos. There’s a limited number of free screenings (3?) for all titles for both the audio and the videos.

Two EZ Advent Anthems!

Church music directors chaff at the bit to do Christmas things during Advent, but of course one is not supposed to do that, and for good reason: Advent is a season of spiritual preparation. It’s penitential and introspective. It’s even colloquially referred to as the “little Lent” and its anthems and texts are often somber…unlike Christmas music, which is fun!

That’s why I wrote these two anthems. The texts are 100% Advent, biblically and theologically, but instead of stressing the reflective nature of Advent, the texts stress joyful anticipation of the coming Christ. Musically, they have lilting tempi and both the words and the music are emotionally positive.

The Songs of Mary and Hannah pairs the song of Hannah from the book of Samuel with Mary’s Magnificat (parallel narrative themes are often linked between the Jewish Bible and the Gospels). The text of The Dream of Love was inspired by a sermon by The Revered Kim Wells, pastor of Lakewood UCC, St. Petersburg, FL. (Note: The Dream of Love starts briefly in minor but almost immediately transitions to resolute, sunny E major!)

Here are the two anthems as videos: first, the St. Petersburg, FL Lakewood UCC Choir doing The Songs of Mary and Hannah followed by a score video of The Dream of Love.

These anthems are available online at the following sites:
The Songs of Mary and Hannah: Sheet Music Direct and Sheet Music Plus
The Dream of Love: Sheet Music Direct and Sheet Music Plus

Fantasy for Harp and Chamber Orchestra

Way, way back pre-1999…I don’t even remember the exact date, probably early 90s, maybe late 80s, I wrote a piece call Caprice for Piano and Chamber Orchestra. It was performed at USF, Teresa Rose, pianist. In discussing the composition’s future with my friend and USF faculty colleague, Robert Helps, he wisely said that short concerti for piano are seldom performed for a variety of reasons.

So, the piece lay dormant in the proverbial drawer and I didn’t pursue it. But sometime around 2016 I decided to resurrect it as a piece for harp and chamber orchestra. That resulted in this computer generated performance.

Now in my 80s, I’m tidying up the musical efforts of my life. Hence posting that here.

Most of the YouTube stuff I’ve done recently has been my short piano pieces and arrangements. They’ve sold a bit on the Hal Leonard self-publishing sites. For at least a decade I’ve not written for anything that wasn’t “useful,” short pieces playable by mere mortals and choral music for the choir at Lakewood UCC where I’m the music director.

Listening to this old computer generated orchestral piece has encouraged me to start writing “useless” music again—music that’s unlikely to ever be performed. I will probably start with orchestrating some of my piano pieces. Orchestration is fun.

Sitting in One Kitchen Amid Echoes of Others

This is the final movement of a short, 4-movement piece, entitled A Random Day, that starts with The Little Room Under the Stairs followed by A Memory Discovered in the Pocket of a Coat Long Unworn. There’ll be one more movement between Coat Long Unworn and this piece, Sitting in One Kitchen Amid Echoes of Others.

A Random Day along with two other short multiple movement pieces are intended for another BandCamp digital album that I’ll discuss in a later post.

I’ve sat in so many kitchens. Seemingly countless others. It’s the heart of any home.

A Memory Discovered in the Pocket of a Coat Long Unworn

As an undergraduate at the University of the Pacific Conservatory of Music, my composition teacher was Stanworth Beckler. I learned so much from him. As with all real learning it’s not the information that’s presented in lessons and lectures, it’s the off-hand comment, almost in passing that sticks with you and guides and comforts you decades later. Several of his stick with me to this day.

Beckler taught a course one semester that was the result of his own in-depth study and analysis of ALL of the compositions of Igor Stravinsky. What a course! For the longest time I carefully kept his handouts. But…life. I no longer have them. If there’s any Beckler students out there who have those notes I will happily pay for their duplication and postage. They’re priceless.

Anyway…After listening to the complete works of Stravinsky over a semester and hearing Beckler’s analyses, one day I had the distinct impression that Stravinsky’s oeuvre is his own self-instruction in how to write music. That may seem like a peculiar observation for someone who wrote The Rite of Spring; he knew how to write music! But, alas, you have to learn all over again, every piece, no matter how long you’ve been doing it, ever since we entered the non-common-practice period (pretty much post Wagner to the present day).

I too am still trying to figure out how to compose and each piece I try to chip away at a new skill a little bit. (No, I won’t tell which skill it is for this piece.)

Resignation (solo piano, live 2021)

I’m finishing up posting a digital album on BandCamp of piano solo arrangements of some of my favorite Appalachian/British/Irish folk hymns. I’m able to able to post videos of my playing the tunes on BandCamp that are also available there as well as mp3 files/albums for download and streaming.

This video is from 2021, we were in the latter stages of the pandemic. I was 55 pounds heavier than I am now, but I love this particular performance so much, it’s the one I wanted to use for this new digital album (The River Strong). More about that album soon.

Holy Manna (solo piano)

You may have noticed an acoustic piano in the background of my recordings. A couple years ago I bought what’s called a “studio upright” from the Clearwater Steinway Gallery. It’s a Boston, which is made in Asia but designed by Steinway, and a model with no plastic parts. The entire action is wood. I’m very happy with it.

I mention this because people may wonder why I don’t use that for my videos. Aside from not being a good enough pianist to record flawless videos head to tail without needing to splice together different video takes (keyboard recording permits occasional error correction…more on that in a moment), recording an acoustic piano is to my ear one of the hardest things to do well, especially for a classical sound.

The best of that I’ve ever experience was the audio engineer, John Stephan, when I recorded some of my pieces at his studio, Springs Theatre Arts & Recording, before he retired. I’ve worked in a lot of studios across the US, none compared to his technique, microphone placement, and audio environment. There’s no way I could duplicate that sound at home. I’ve got a few things I’m snobish about: authentic key lime pie, New York style cheesecake, fried fish, banana pudding, grits, and recorded piano sound.

As I mentioned above, recording tracks from a keyboard allows for a certain amount of editing without having to edit the video itself. If you look at about 00:42 from the beginning of the track, you’ll see my right hand momentarily “panic!” I had a momentary lapse of concentration. I mention this because non-musicians (unfortunately some musicians LOL) don’t know what’s going on in a performer’s head when performing.

When a musician (singers especially, but also brass instruments, pianists, conductor, everyone actually) plays/sings a note s/he must literally, mentally hear–in advance of actually playing the note–the note they’re going to play a moment later.

And if it’s a polyphonic instrumentalist like a pianist or organist or conductor all the notes being player together at that moment must be “pre-heard.” This is true even for solo instrumentalists in an orchestra. My favorite trumpet player, Don Own, talked to me once about playing in an orchestra, how an orchestra player hears their part as if they were in the audience, not from just their chair.

As you might imagine. That’s all quite a task. More than anything as I’ve aged, it’s the momentary lapses of concentration that get to me as a performer. I do silent meditation a lot. The focus required for performing music is like that. It’s why being a musician is so addictive. Few things match the rush.

Wendeyaho (solo piano) 2026

This Native-American melody is so awesome. It’s indelible. I hope my arrangement does it justice.

The solo piano sheet music (that I’m playing from in the above video) is available at https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en-US/se/ID_No/1084679/Product.aspx and https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/wendeyaho-for-solo-piano-digital-sheet-music/22102384 .

The description there reads: I’ve given this Native-American morning song a reverential treat, with four statements, each with a different musical texture corresponding to the directions east, west, north, and south. For the student learning this piece, the issues to be confronted are controlling the interpretive dynamic and tempo arch of each of the four statements and of the four as a unit. The third statement also presents the opportunity to learn how to distribute the notes of the melodic line between to two hands in order to have three contrapuntal lines.

I also published a choral version of this published May 12, 2023, available at https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en-US/se/ID_No/1327199/Product.aspx and https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/wendeyaho-digital-sheet-music/22502871. It’s for 2-part mixed choir (treble voices and baritone voices) with keyboard accompaniment. It’s extremely easy, to be filed under “Emergency Anthem for when less than half the choir shows up on Sunday morning.”

My first release of this was 12/7/21, on the digital album, simple songs (https://open.spotify.com/track/6OVBCYsivHznjvMnNZ0CQ3?si=f3e58d42d1d447e1) as a solo piano with orchestrated background. (Please let me know if that link doesn’t work! LOL)

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!