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

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Featured content

The James Bond theme
John Barry did not get the chance to see any footage and he had not read any of Ian Fleming’s books when he was called in to work on the music for the first James Bond film, Dr No (1962), for which Monty Norman had originally been commissioned to write the score.  “I was just […]
Hans Zimmer on writing pop songs
Ask him to write a song, though, and he’ll likely turn you down on the basis that he has a problem with “any form of authority, and the authority that is put upon you of writing a song”. “Verse, chorus, verse, chorus, middle eight…” he says. “It’s always the same bloody structure. I end up […]
Playing by the mood of the audience
Rachmaninoff sent fellow composer/pianist Medtner his Corelli Variations.  He wrote: I played them here about fifteen times, but of these fifteen performances, only one was good.  The others were sloppy.  I can't play my own compositions!  And it's so boring! Not once have I played these all in continuity.  I was guided by the coughing […]
I live in a world of my imagination
I confess that I live only in my surroundings and in myself. I can conceive of no greater pleasure than sitting in my chair at this desk and looking at the walls around me day by day and night after night. In these pictures I do not see what you see; in the trees outside […]
Knowledge and Wisdom
“Knowledge is a process of piling up facts; wisdom lies in their simplification.” Martin H. Fischer, German born American physician and author. Encore : A Continuing Anthology‬ (March 1945) edited by Smith Dent, “Fischerisms” p. 309.
Tchaikovsky’s compositional process
“You ask if in composing this symphony I had a special programme in view. To such questions regarding my symphonic works I generally answer: nothing of the kind. In reality it is very difficult to answer this question. How interpret those vague feelings which pass through one during the composition of an instrumental work, without […]
Sibelius’ punch recipe
“Punch recipe (for Satu’s christening party) 1 l water + sugar + jam + brandy or spirit. Add 2 bottles of wine when everything is completely cold. Add a few drops of Bergamot oil in a lump of sugar, which must be melted in the water. (N.B. All mineral waters make the punch black.” Jean […]
The sole purpose of art is infinite
E. T. A. Hoffmann wrote in 1813 that instrumental music is the most romantic of all the arts  – one might almost say, the only genuinely romantic one – for its sole subject is the infinite.  The lyre of Orpheus opened the portals of Orcus – music discloses to man an unknown realm, a world […]
The pros and cons of imagination
“My imagination makes me human and makes me a fool; it gives me all the world and exiles me from it.” Ursula Kroeber Le Guin, American author. Cited at: Quotationsbook
Happiness
“Very little indeed is necessary for living a happy life” — Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor from 161-180 Marcus Aurelius (translated by George Long) The Thoughts of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, Book VII, 67.  Digitally archived at: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Thoughts_of_the_Emperor_Marcus_Aurelius_Antoninus/Book_VII, accessed 10 September 2021.