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

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EDUCATION AND RESEARCH
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COLLABORATIVE PIANO
Accompaniment and solo performance

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Featured content

Fresh ideas of building arts communities
"Music is its own language, and, while that language is universal, it is also intensely personal. There are many ways of building communities around the arts. Sometimes you just do it very quietly – with a few people at a time." This blog outlines a touching correspondence between a family and pianist Andre Watts. "Creative […]
Nick Cave on the creative process
What makes a great song great is not its close resemblance to a recognizable work. Writing a good song is not mimicry, or replication, or pastiche, it is the opposite. It is an act of self-murder that destroys all one has strived to produce in the past. It is those dangerous, heart-stopping departures that catapult […]
Ode to Music and Moonlight
We are the music-makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams, Wandering by lone sea-breakers, And sitting by desolate streams; World-losers and world-forsakers, On whom the pale moon gleams: Yet we are the movers and shakers Of the world for ever, it seems. With wonderful deathless ditties We build up the world’s great cities, And […]
The meaning of American Pie
When questioned about the meaning of American Pie, Don McLean would quip. “It means I’ll never have to work again.” Rob Walker, “Don McLean on the tragedy behind American Pie: ‘I cried for two years’”, The Guardian, 22 October 2020, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/oct/22/don-mclean-american-pie-its-meaning-family-deaths-tragedy-60s?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
The effect of audience reception on Stravinsky’s compositional process
Stravinksy on the public not particularly liking his music: Their attitude certainly cannot make me deviate from my path. I shall assuredly not sacrifice my predilections and my aspirations to the demands of those who, in their blindness, do not realize that they are simply asking me to go backwards … I could not follow […]
Encouraging progress
“I have yet to find the man, however exalted his station, who did not do better work and put forth greater effort under a spirit of approval than under a spirit of criticism.” – Charles M. Schwab, American businessman Cited at Quotd.
How caffeine can cramp creativity
(250, 308, ‘How Caffeine Can Cramp Creativity’, ‘how-caffeine-can-cramp-creativity’, ‘ Caffeine can boost energy, reduce fatigue, and increase short term concentration and problem solving skills. However, creativity is haboured in a less focused mind: Creative insights and imaginative solutions often occur when we stop working on a particular problem and let our mind move on to […]
Harmony
“You don’t get harmony when everybody sings the same note.” Doug Floyd, editorial editor of The Spokesman Review
To be a good player
Bach was once complemented on his organ playing: “There is nothing remarkable about it.  All one has to do is hit the right notes at the right time, and the instrument plays itself.” Quoted by Johann Friedrich Köhler, Leipzig, after 1776.  Hans-Joachim Schulze, ed. Dokumente zum Nachwirken Johann Sebastian Bachs, 1750-1800. Bach-Dokumente, III. 1972, no. […]
Prayer of Thanksgiving to the Trinity
Title: Prayer of Thanksgiving to the Trinity Text: St. Catherine’s Dialogue on Divine Providence Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Concert band (Flt. 1 & 2, Cl. 1 & 2, Alt. Sax., Ten. Sax., Bar. Sax., Trpt 1 & 2, trb, tub., perc.) Product medium: PDF score and parts     Related products:     – Prayer of Thanksgiving to the […]