- Wedgebill Music

Welcome to Wedgebill Music, the home page of Greg Smith, Australian composer and pianist.

PUBLICATIONS
– Sheet music
– Recordings

COMPOSITION SERVICES
– Composition
– Arrangement & Orchestration
– Transcription

EDUCATION AND RESEARCH
– Tuition (piano, aural, harmony, analysis, music history)
– Analysis
– Anecdotes
– Articles, papers, and program notes
– Quotes
– Research services

COLLABORATIVE PIANO
– Accompaniment and solo performance

Latest Scores

Latest recordings

Latest anecodotes

A duet under the bed
It was in the eventful year, then, of 1813—the year of “Il Figlio per Azzardo”, with its obbligato accompaniment for lamp-shades of “Tancredi” and of “L’Italiana in Algeri”—that Rossini was… Read more: A duet under the bed
Imogen Cooper on a lesson with Alfred Brendel
He was a wonderful teacher. He is extremely articulate and very demanding. He made no concessions to my age. In my first lesson, I was playing a Schubert piano sonata,… Read more: Imogen Cooper on a lesson with Alfred Brendel
A typical recital in England in 1897
John E. Borland described in a paper of June 1897: It was customary to commence with a Bach prelude and fugue (usually perverted from one intended for the organ), a… Read more: A typical recital in England in 1897
A party piece
Irish pianist and composer George Alexander Osburn (1806-93) was a professor at the Royal Academy of Music and a director of the Philharmonic Society. One of his most popular compositions… Read more: A party piece
Rachmaninoff as a young student
From 1882, nine-year-old Rachmaninoff moved to St Petersburg to study at the conservatoire. In the comfortable knowledge that, even if he did not practice, his efforts were more successful than… Read more: Rachmaninoff as a young student

Latest Quotes

Julius Asal on interpretation
On the one hand, I believe that to connect tradition and innovation is the most important thing to me personally. On the other hand, to explore the score and be… Read more: Julius Asal on interpretation
Julius Asal on pairing Scriabin with Scarlatti
In 2024, Julius Asal released an album that interwove works of Scriabin and Scarlatti. He stated: …in finding a composer from another era who is totally different in style and… Read more: Julius Asal on pairing Scriabin with Scarlatti
Julius Asal on the exploring darker emotions
When I was younger I read a lot of Kafka and Büchner: I’ve always been drawn to the darker side of things, and I think that part of the beauty… Read more: Julius Asal on the exploring darker emotions
To burn with desire
“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.” — Federico García Lorca, Blood Wedding and Yerma A. Flores (ed.), Great… Read more: To burn with desire
Habit is stronger than willpower or inspiration
In writing, habit seems to be a stronger force than either willpower or inspiration. Consequently there must be some little quality of fierceness until the habit pattern of a certain… Read more: Habit is stronger than willpower or inspiration

Featured content

Dress regulations for Handel’s Messiah

In the eighteenth century, hooped skirts were a popular choice of ladies dress attire as they enabled a dramatic entrance, and also flattered the figure when pregnant. They did take up considerable space though. For the performance of the Messiah Handel instructed the ladies to come without hooped skirts, and gentlemen without their swords. The […]

Love Came Down At Christmas (piano)

Title: Love came down at Christmas Text: Christina Rossetti Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Piano solo Product medium: PDF score Related products: – Love came down at Christmas – SATB and piano – Love came down at Christmas – Piano solo (MP3) hase_link id=”1673″ text=”Purchase” style=”button” color=”blue”] Samples:

It is imperative to learn music

The philosopher Nietzsche noted: “Our emotional life is least clear to ourselves.” For this reason, it is imperative to listen to music, because music makes the strings of our inner life resonate. Even if the result is not complete self-realization, at least we can still feel our essence in the “resonance”. Safranski, Rüdiger (2002) Nietzsche: […]

Ravel’s fashion sense

Ravel was always particular about his sense of fashion. As Léon-Paul Fargue recalled: Even when he was wasted by illness, Ravel never appeared unkept even among his closest friends. All his life he kept the perfect, discriminating taste which led him to match his braces to his blue or pink silk shirts, much to the […]

It’s my apartment and I’ll play if I want to

Prokofiev and his family moved into a small top floor-apartments in Paris. Prokofiev spent much time practicing a revised version of his second piano concerto (which was to be premiered 8 May 1924). The apartment manager demanded that Prokofiev cease playing. His wife Lina recalled Prokofiev’s response: All right then, you don’t want to hear […]

There’s one way to get him to play

People often begged him to play a little air on the violin, but he refused great lords and his fellow de-bauchers alike. The only person who succeeded in making him play was the Marshal de Grammont. He had a footman called La Lande who later became one of the best violinists in Europe. After a […]

Our modernized world needs music

“Our modernized minds need to be musicalized. We have defied the intellect … and developed only half of man’s possibilities. There is no other human activity that asks for such a harmonious cooperation of “intellect” and “soul” as artistic creation, especially music.” Ernst Levy, Swiss composer, musicologist, pianist and conductor. Cited in: Kimball, K., Petersen, […]

Mozart on melody

“Melody is the essence of music”, continued he; “I compare a good melodist to a fine racer, and counterpointists to hack post-horses; therefore be advised, let well alone, and remember the old Italian proverb – ‘Chi sa piu, meno sa – Who knows most, knows least’.” The Reminiscences of Michael Kelly, 1826. Cited in: Marshal, […]

To fool, or be fooled, by a name

One of Tchaikovsky’s favorite anecdotes resulted from his nearly losing the sketches for the Little Russian on the way back to Moscow. To persuade a recalcitrant postmaster to hitch the horses to the coach in which he and his brother Modest had been travelling, Tchaikovsky presented himself as “Prince Volkonsky, gentleman of the Emperor’s bedchamber.” […]

A mystery instrument created

Mozart’s Magic Flute uses a glass harmonica or keyed glockenspiel to represent a set of magic bells. “Mozart’s original score for the 1791 opera The Magic Flute called for a glass harmonica or keyed glockenspiel to represent a set of magic bells. The instruments were obscure even in Mozart’s day but more than 200 years after his […]