SKU: LV.12423

James G. Blaine Grand March. By G.A. Henry. Published 1884 by M.D. Swisher, 123 S.10th Street in Philadelphia. Composition of sectional with piano instrumentation. Subject headings for this piece include Portraits--James Gillespie Blaine, White House, United States Capitol.

About The Lester S. Levy Collection

The Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music consists of over 29,000 pieces of American popular music. Donated to Johns Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries, the collection's strength is its thorough documentation of nineteenth-century American through popular music. This sheet music has been provided by Project Gado, a San Francisco Bay Area startup whose mission is to digitize and share the world's visual history.

WARNING: These titles are provided as historical documents. Language and concepts within reflect the opinions and values of the time and may be offensive to some.

SKU: A0.982072

In 1988 my wife and I were sent by our church to take part in the World Conference on Liturgical Music in Rome at the Vatican.  It was so exciting for us to go on our first trip to the Eternal City!!  We took a taxi to the Vatican and it let us off right within walking distance of St. Peter's Basilica!  It was so overwhelming, exciting, and beautiful all at once; it was almost too much to take in!  After that wonderful week when I returned I set down and began to improvise at the piano to see what I might be able to express about the experience.  What came to me almost immediately was the memory of the sound of chant in that great space!  I came up with a very contemporary combination of old and new in a jazz framework.

SKU: A0.1062169

This is my personal performance and interpretation of Chopin's Prelude in E Minor performed in my home April 10, 2020.

SKU: A0.1283969

For James: a kind of lullaby (1993)

Built in 1898 the James Monaghan Mansion--now, and since 1942 the home of Gonzaga University's music department--was for many years believed to be haunted. In addition to reports of disembodied footsteps, doors dramatically opening themselves, and sudden appearances of hostile presences, there was also reports of the organ playing itself...

...which is where I, primarily an organ student at the time, spent a majority of my time. This piece was written entirely at the organ, on that organ while an organ and piano student at Gonzaga. Written in four layers as if for organ, in the end I found that it sounded much better on the piano. It has never been performed or recorded on organ.

The working title was Excorsising Monaghan.  The finished piece sounded less ghostly and more like a lullaby. Whether or not it was James doing the haunting, I thought it best to offer the lullaby to him.

--Bill Whitley, 2023.