Ravel’s influence on Vaughan WilliamsIn 1908, after a period of intense period of immersion in English music due to his role as editor of Hymns Ancient and Modern, Vaughan Williams “came to the conclusion that I was lumpy and stodgy, had come to a dead-end, and that a little French polish would be of use to me.” (1) He […]
Wie melodien zieht es mir (Brahms)Composer: Johannes Brahms Text: Klaus Groth Title: Wie melodien zieht es mir (Like melodies it pulls me), op. 105, no. 1 Instrumentation: Cello and piano Product medium: PDF score and part Sample:
Prayer of Thanksgiving to the TrinityTitle: Prayer of Thanksgiving to the Trinity Text: St. Catherine’s Dialogue on Divine Providence Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: SATB Related products: – Prayer of Thanksgiving to the Trinity – Easy piano (PDF score) – Prayer of Thanksgiving to the Trinity – Concert band (PDF score) Product medium: PDF score Sample:
The need for booksWe wouldn’t need books quite so much if everyone around us understood us well. But they don’t. Even those who love us get us wrong. They tell us who we are but miss things out. They claim to know what we need, but forget to ask us properly first. They can’t understand what we feel […]
Proportion“The traditional sense of proportion is a hang-up. The usual Mozartean concept of how long an idea lasts becomes too predictable. Some of the composers who talk the most about avoiding predictability are the ones most victimized by this predictable traditional sense of proportion.” – Morton Feldman, American composer. Cited in: Tom Johnson, Remembrance, September […]
Some curious devicesIn the late nineteenth-century, some quite curious mechanical inventions were created to deal with the body with relation to pianists and conductors. The following is an account of a presentation by T. L. Southgate on The Physiology of Pianoforte Piano. The paper presented was written by W. Macdonald Smith. This account appeared in the […]
Accessibility for kidsBenjamin Britten wrote the score to Instruments of the Orchestra, which would become the concert work, Young Persons Guide to the Orchestra. The theme to the score was based on a hornpipe from Purcell’s Abdelzer. Britten commented to the producer, Basil Wright, that “I was never really worried that it was too sophisticated for kids […]
Be a work of art“One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art.” Oscar Wilde, Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young
1.1: The Fundamental Vibration of Nature1In 1994, Dr. Masaru Emoto began taking photos of ice crystals. What he found was that environmental surroundings had different effects on the nature of the crystals. The crystals formed at Mt. Fuji, for example, had a different structure to those found at the Rocky Mountains. He then extended this study to include a study […]
FocusConcentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus. – Alexander Graham Bell Orison Swett Marden, (1901) “Bell Telephone Talk”, How They Succeeded. Boston: Lothrop Publishing Company, p. 38. Digitally archived at https://archive.org/details/howtheysucceeded00mardrich/mode/2up, accessed 11 September 2021.