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 […]

When Spanish cellist Pablo Casals was in his seventies, he retired from the concert stage and lived in Prades, Southern France. Casals began each day by playing from Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier on the piano (1), then heading out for a walk with his German shepherd, cocking an ear for birdsong and saluting the snow-capped peak […]

Lou Dorfsman, design chief for CBS Radio and later the CBS Television Network for over 40 years, once said, “In reality, creativity is the ability to reach inside yourself and drag forth from your very soul an idea.” However, nothing comes from nothing. You must continuously feed the inner beast that sparks and inspires. I […]

Vaughan Williams wrote a series of articles for the Royal College of Music magazine entitled “Who Wants the English Composer?”. In these, he expresses his advocacy for an exploration of the English musical style: We English composers are always saying, “Here are Wagner, Brahms, Grieg, Tchaikovsky, what fine fellows they are, let us try and […]

Title: A Child is Born in Bethlehem. Five Christmastide arrangements for piano by Greg Smith Arranger: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Piano Product medium: PDF score Contents: A child is born in Bethlehem (Danish melody) High from the tree's green top (E. Horneman) In a basement black as coal (C. M. Bellman) Lovely is the blue sky […]

“Never compose anything unless the not composing of it becomes a positive nuisance to you.” Gustav Holst Cited in: Classic FM, May 2011

You know what I think about metronome marks: they’re right for a single bar, like “roses, with a morning life”. Only there are “those” who don’t hear music and who take these marks as authority to hear it still less! But do what you please. — Debussy, Letter to Jacques Durand of 9 October 1915 […]

Andrew Lloyd Webber originally composed the melody that is now known as “Memory” from Cats for a miniature opera about Puccini and his wife. The opera was never performed, but the melody was brought out of retirement as possible song for Juan Peron in Webber’s Evita.  That show was certainly performed but the melody in […]

In 1995, Bjork released a big band jazz cover of Betty Hutton’s 1948 hit “Blow a Fuse”. This was a cover of an Austrian song “Und jetzt ist es still” by Hans Lang and Erich Meder. Bjork said of the song: Isn’t that the best song you’ve heard for five years? In a way it […]