Category: Finale demo

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Church Congregational Songs Contests Finale demo Hymn tunes

CHARMING FOURTH

Update 12/14/21: Sheet music for this song is now available at gregscheer.com.

I don’t enter hymn contests as obsessively as I used to, but when I do, I usually lose. My entry into the Eastman School of Music’s hymn tune contest battled with 131 other contestants and fell to fellow Grand Rapids composer, Larry Visser.

My tune is called CHARMING FOURTH, because I wrote and rejected three other tunes; they say the third time’s the charm, but I was hoping for an exception to that rule. The tune went with a text called “Out of Silence, Music Rises” by Carl Daw. It’s really lovely and I hope he reads this blog post, falls in love with my tune, and declares me the unofficial winner. I’d like that.

If you’d like to play through the tune at the keyboard, you can get it at the link above.

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Art Music FAWM 2019 Finale demo

#3 (piano miniature)

This third piano miniature is–not surprisingly–in 3/4 time. It reminds me a bit of Erik Satie’s whimsical compositions. While the meter is the “straight man,” remaining in an elegant waltz tempo, the harmonies never seem to land quite where you expect and the melody leaps as if over-stepping its goal. I expect I’ll return to this sketch in the future to expand on these themes.

Want to play it for yourself? Here you go: PDF

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Art Music FAWM 2019 Finale demo

#2 (piano miniatures)

I was telling my son tonight that I feel like I’m working out my harmonic demons. Perhaps “demons” is too strong, but I do feel that I’ve been exploring a particular harmonic palette in depth lately. It’s not clear to me yet whether this is something I’m refining for use over the long haul or if it’s just something I need to get out of my system. In either case, a series of diminutive piano compositions is the perfect vehicle to develop some of these ideas.

I guess my recent harmonic language could be considered pandiatonicism, that is, the free use of the diatonic scale (as opposed to chromatic) stacked into harmonies without implying tonality. (Non-music-theorists: from this point, on feel free to let your eyes glaze over while nodding your head knowingly.) I’m trying to create a satisfying “musical gravity” without using any of the traditional trappings of I, IV, V chords, etc. I avoid tritones and dominant sevenths–intervals that would imply tonal movement. And I find myself using pentatonic scales for my melodic material.

Blah, blah, blah. You can also just listen to the piece and enjoy it (or not) without understanding the music theory behind it. Sometimes it’s better not to know how the sausage is made…

But if you do want to see the sausage, here’s the PDF.

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Art Music Demos Finale demo

Crepuscular Ray

And the final sketch that lost to “Swampzilla”?: It’s called “Crepuscular Ray,” and is something of a minimalist piece for young players. The music sounded to me like shafts of light coming through the clouds at sunset. It turns out there’s a word for that: crepuscular ray. I couldn’t resist choosing a title that featured a word most people would need to look up.

Interestingly, director Erin De Young was already familiar with the term. Her young boys had been reading a book on animals one night and it explained that rabbits and deer are called “crepuscular” animals because they come out to feed at twilight. As fate would have it, the next day they visited a nature center where the guide asked what kind of an animal a rabbit is. She was probably looking for “mammal” or something simple, but Erin’s 5-year-old piped up without hesitation: “It’s a crepuscular animal!”

Even though this sketch lost to “Swampzilla,” I still think it has lots of potential for a high school orchestra. Feel free to contact me about a commission.

Browse the PDF score.

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Art Music Demos Finale demo

Amber Waves

I mentioned previously that the Rockford orchestras read through three sketches before choosing “Swampzilla.” You’re probably wondering which sketches lost to “Swampzilla” in the initial round of voting, right? Wonder no more!

“Amber Waves” is a sprightly, festive piece that felt hopeful, American, and…Coplandesque. I love the title “Amber Waves” because it’s lifted from “American the Beautiful” (“amber waves of grain”) but could also mean a girl named Amber waving.

Don’t judge me on how the Finale demo sounds! If you want to take a look at the draft, click here. If you want to turn this into a completed piece for orchestra, let’s talk.

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Art Music Commissions Finale demo Live

A Million Miles Away

I had the good fortune of receiving two commissions from school orchestras last year. “A Million Miles Away” was written for the St. Cecilia Concert Orchestra with Patricia Wunder conducting. As Maestra Wunder and I began brainstorming about what type of piece might fit her group, she explained that the rest of her program would be pieces based on stories–Telemann’s Don Quixote Suite, for example.

I decided to maintain that theme, composing a programmatic piece with a yet-as-undetermined story. Here’s how I described it in the concert’s program notes:

A Million Miles Away is a phrase that dropped into my mind as I began composing this commission for St. Cecilia. It certainly describes the desolate, open harmonies that were emerging in the early stages of the first draft. Knowing that my piece would be part of a concert of compositions based on stories, “A Million Miles Away” sounded like the title of a novel or movie without providing a full story. In fact, I’d love it if you would listen to the music and create your own story based on what you hear.

The piece is arranged in three sections–stars, sea, and sand. You can almost hear the pinpricks of light appearing in a black sky as the piece opens. Then waves begin to well up and break, splashing from one side of the orchestra to the next. Finally, the sounds become bone dry and blow away into nothing. The first and last sections are “aleatoric” sections that allow the performers a certain amount of freedom. For example, play the sequence of notes, but in any rhythm you want. It was challenging for the students to have that much freedom!

The above MP3 is a mock-up of the piece I created in Logic Pro. Below is a video of the concert.

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Arrangement Art Music Church Commissions Finale demo Production music

Savior of the Nations, Come (String Orchestra)

Carlos and I being served drinks by a statue in Indianapolis.

Update 10/28/21: Sheet music for this piece can now be purchased at gregscheer.com.

My friend Carlos Colón directs worship at Baylor University. He recently asked if I had anything for string quintet that might work as an interlude for an upcoming Advent service. And he needed it quickly. I sent him a few ideas, including this fugal intro to the Advent hymn, “Savior of the Nations, Come.” I thought I was going to be able to simply adapt what I had written before, but once I got started it was clear that I needed to rewrite it from the ground up. Two days from inquiry to completed score. That’s how I roll.

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Choir Church Commissions Congregational Songs Finale demo Live

Make Us One within Your Spirit – choir, brass, and organ

Update 10/1/20: Sheet music for this song (including this arrangement) can be downloaded here.

“Make Us One within Your Spirit” has a history that includes rejection, revision, and revival. But then, don’t we all?

https://www.facebook.com/ken.hitchens.3/videos/10211667814882778/

It began its life in Fall of 2008 as a tune for another person’s hymn text. After my musical gift was ignored, scorned, and forsaken (Seriously? How many more hymn texts need to be paired with NETTLETON?) I wrote the text, “Make Us One within Your Spirit” to go with the tune. I submitted it to a contest. I lost. After a number of revisions I still believed in its potential, and two years ago wrote on this blog, “Maybe someday someone will commission me to turn this into a regal choral anthem with brass and timpani.”

That day has come!

Last Sunday, it was premiered at River Road Presbyterian Church, commissioned for their 60th anniversary and in honor of their retiring music minister, Larry Heath. Though it didn’t include timpani, it did include choir, brass, and organ.

You can enjoy the MP3 (played by Finale) or video (in which I conduct the musicians of River Road Presbyterian Church) above. If you want to go to the next level, you can download the one-page hymn version or the full score (see link above).

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Church Congregational Songs Contests Finale demo Hymn tunes Production music

WCRC Take 2: God of All Creation

My second attempt at a theme song for the World Communion of Reformed Churches 2017 General Council was inspired by their meeting place: Leipzig. Leipzig, of course, is famous as the city in which Bach worked for almost three decades and the where he is laid to rest. My second draft, then, is an homage to Bach: a four-part chorale with as many Bach-isms as I could muster.

It is a sturdy tune with all the harmonic twists you’d expect of imitation Bach. The text was also a step in the right direction. Instead of getting at the theme, “Living God Renew and Transform Us,” in slogan form as I did in my first draft, this time I approached it in strophic form. The three verses address the three persons of the Trinity and explore the ways they lead us to renewal. Check it out: PDF.

In the end, though, it felt too backward-looking for this assembly. They have thousands of historic hymns to choose from when planning worship–including chorales by the actual Bach–and likely don’t need any historic sounding hymns in the mix. So I decided, once again, to move on.

Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion of Greg writes a theme song for the WCRC 2017 General Council!

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Art Music Church FAWM 2016 Finale demo

Tenebrae: The Shadow of the Tomb

It is finished. This is the last of the 7 movements. In this solo movement, I recapitulate many of the themes that have appeared in previous movements, hopefully in a way that is suggestive of what’s gone on before rather than an overbearing repetition.

Once again, the Finale playback leaves much to be desired, so feel free to fire up your musical imagination and read it directly from the score: PDF. I’m sure I’ll post a recording of the service itself. We had our first rehearsal today, and even though there were lots of rough spots, it had the seeds of something really wonderful.

tenebraeThe Shadow of the Tomb: Matthew 27:57-60
57 When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who was also a disciple of Jesus. 58 He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus; then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. 59 So Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen cloth 60 and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn in the rock. He then rolled a great stone to the door of the tomb and went away.