Title: Forgive ( Прости!) (opus 60, no. 11] Composer: Pytor Il'yich Tchaikovsky (arr. Greg Smith) Instrumentation: Cello and piano Product medium: PDF score and part Sample:

Chopin had a free sense of rhythm.  In 1842, Chopin was giving a lessen to Wilhem von Lenz when Meyerbeer walked in.  The Mazurka (op. 33 no. 3) was being played.  von Lenz recounts: Meyerbeer had seated himself; Chopin let me play on. “That is two-four time,” said Meyerbeer. For reply, Chopin made me repeat, […]

Title: The Ruffled Knights Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Piano Product medium: PDF score

Beethoven once gave a performance of a new piano concerto in which he forgot he was the soloist and began to conduct instead.  At the first sforzando he threw out his arms so vehemently that he knocked both candlesticks off the piano.  The audience burst out laughing, which enraged Beethoven.  He made the orchestra start […]

“We’re seeing a big evolution of production, of recording techniques, and of the actual sounds. Everything’s getting sampled and synthesized…. When we do have an acoustic instrument like a saxophone, it tends to get processed to where [it’s] almost unrecognizable.” Jeff Harrington, saxophonist. Cited in, Kelsey McKinney, “Where Did All the Saxophones Go?”,        https://getpocket.com/explore/item/where-did-all-the-saxophones-go?utm_source=pocket-app&utm_medium=share, accessed 29 […]

John Holmes “reiterates that only with a large group can you get a truly soft sound. Sure, a solo fiddle can hold its own against a hundred fiddles: a hundred fiddles are never a hundred times louder than a solo at the same dynamic, since there’s no such animal as “a same dynamic,” or even […]

Some conductors put all the emphasis on the melodic line, while others are fanatics about rhythm, but there are very few conductors who are uniquely able to look at the score and hear every part before it actually happens. With the very best of conductors, it’s as though there are two performances going on simultaneously. […]

So creativity helps us to be seen, expressed, and healed. This is fantastic! But I just recently had a bit of an epiphany and tapped into a deeper truth while talking with my old love. Being expressed, healed, and seen is actually a service to humanity. A gift to the world. When we are expressed, […]

Like so many Russians, he was a madly keen collector of mushrooms and could indulge his passion freely at Klin; the woods and fields around his house were filled with them.  However, as anyone will know who has taken to the sport, there are mushroom collectors and mushroom collectors; some have the eye for it, […]

When Mozart was writing his opera Idomeno, his father warned him to make sure it was accessible to all the audience. Mozart replied: As far as the so-called Popular style is concerned, don’t worry about it; in my Opera you’ll find Musick for every kind of listener = except for those with the long ears […]