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New Music for Orchestra

A year ago, I launched a new line of orchestra arrangements – for the “Modern Orchestra,” separating these new charts from the more symphonic arrangements that had preceded them. It seemed time that I should add to that little line
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Ending Your Anthem: Go Big or Go Home?

Every composer/arranger’s dilemma (at one point or another): How do I end this anthem??? I’ve run out of ideas!After all, how many ways can one finish an SATB choral piece? If you write for choirs long enough, and do as many
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Finale’s Finale

The End of an Era and What It Means to Music Geeks A bomb dropped on the music industry yesterday when it was announced that the venerated music notation program, Finale, the software users loved to hate, would cease to
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Adventures in Rewriting – “Turning My Steps”

“Writing is rewriting.” I wasn’t the first to say it. I wouldn’t be surprised if that quip pre-dates Shakespeare. But it’s an important truth for writers to accept as a crucial part of their creative efforts.  It’s a (sometimes brutal) reality
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Life Its Own Self

I may have outdone myself this time… going a full seven months between blog posts.  That may well be a new record for the World’s Laziest Blogger.  Alert the folks at Guinness! It’s not like I’ve not written anything in
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Zagging in a Zigging World

I think it’s safe to say that I can be something of a contrarian. (Duhh!)  So – when I decided it was time to introduce a new line of orchestra arrangements (after considering it for years), it should come as
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The Kindness of Strangers

This is embarrassing on two levels. First – I find myself once again trying conjure up an excuse for blogging soooo infrequently.  But it always boils down to the same thing: I get so wrapped up in composing, or editing
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News of the Day

Seeing as how I’m the world’s most inconsistent blogger, I thought I might oughta post a little update blog. So here are some truly Random Neural Firings that might be of passing interest. Thanks to all the sympathetic responses I
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James Randolph Smith

Looking back on more than four decades of a career in music, there are people who made a crucial difference along the way. Yesterday, I lost one of those people, and too soon. James Randolph Smith, Randy to everyone who
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Showing – the (Mostly) Finished Stage of Creativity

I recently I finished a new choral composition. When I say “finished,” I don’t mean “finished” finished. I mean more like “mostly” finished. In my catalogue, I’m not so sure anything is ever “finished” finished. But I digress. (Look! A
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Changes

Wow. Has it really been some five months since I last posted??? Truly – I am the World’s Most Inconsistent Blogger. Where is my award for this great distinction? Somebody call the folks at Guinness! So – what have I
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For the Children

Anytime a government huckster (and they are ALL hucksters) want to grab more money for something, one of the standard appeals is – it’s “for the children.” Now this is a blatant, emotional approach. But it works  – because grown-ups
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