SKU: A0.891191

An ideal SATB choice for Middle School/early High School changing voice and developing ensembles of all ages, this boy-friendly accompanied concert arrangement explores the cambiata voice, male vocal registers, and encourages enthusiastic use of the falsetto and upper range through the use of an appealing yodel. Ask your choristers to bring their guitars, ukuleles, mandolins, and banjos and strum along!

SKU: A0.891219

This advent piece is based on the events that set the scene for the birth of Christ. The first verse focuses on prophecy, the second on the fulfillment of it, and the third is a personal invitation to participate in it. The child who sings this story may grow up to need it, and need to verify it for him or herself.

SKU: A0.891196

Movement four of four Cowboy Songs of the American Southwest

This fun-to sing TTBB a cappella concert arrangement set of regional folksongs are evocative of barbershop, concert, and a cappella styles and utilize some fun extended techniques in the second movement.  Also appropriate for a versatile barbershop or men's quartet, upper HS level or above.

These four cowboy songs that make up the song cycle Cowboy Songs of the American Southwest are among the nearly 3,000 field recordings recorded in the U.S. Southwest, Mexico and Spain collected by John Donald Robb over 40 year while at the University of New Mexico.  These recordings preserve many of the musical traditions of these areas, especially New Mexico and Southern Colorado, and include Native American, Hispano, Mexican and African American music, as well as railroad and cowboy songs, fiddle music and the music of festivals and fiestas.

I.  The Call of the Range- Evocative of a carefree, lone cowboy singing while strumming his ukulele.  Barbershop harmonies, similar to ukulele harmonies, suggest a personification of both the ukulele and the rangeland itself as a character in the unfolding drama of the seemingly solitary cowboy.
II. I'm Sad and I'm Lonely- Whispered syllables and whistles evoke percussion and a bowed saw in this despondent tale of unrequited love and solitude.
III. Wild Horse of the Desert- The melody fights with the downbeat to mimic the wild horse fighting against land rights and fencing.
IV. When Cockle Shells Turn Silver Bells- An overly carefree, lighthearted shrug at lost love to embrace the lone cowboy lifestyle.

Due to current restrictions of the John Donald Robb field recordings housed at the University of New Mexico, movements I. The Call of the Range and III. Wild Horse of the Desert are offered with permission and without charge with the purchase of public domain arrangements of II. I'm Sad and I'm Lonely and IV. When Cockle Shells Turn Silver Bells forming an entire song cycle.  Movements II. and IV. are also available for purchase individually.

2017 Choral Contest Entry

SKU: A0.891214

A good choice for a pop-fusion harmonic language that will speak to your young adult choir, and possible open some meaningful dialogue about relationships.

The composer writes: In the wisdom or fog of High School, I would daydream about what love truly was. I pined away from summer camp for the boy back home, imagining that I had found the Real Thing.  It is now several decades later, and after a few bumps and bruises suffered from trying to figure out just what true love actually is, I have discovered that this text is more about the journey of love and not about the destination.  This poem, like great Art, shifts and changes in meaning as the reader grows in understanding and changes.  I imagine that Love is like Art in this way- shifting in meaning over a lifetime of maturity and growth.

Included in Project : Encore, 2017, Quarter 2

2017 Choral Contest Entry

SKU: A0.891205

The first of three movements, here is a great opportunity to collaborate with a children's or youth choir and Irish instrumentalists, or to freely substitute any treble solo and Western instrumental equivalent.

Included in Project : Encore 2017

Lost Songs of Ancient Ireland, for Mixed Choir with Treble Descant, Piano or Harp, Bodhran, Irish Flute, and Violin, is a three-movement song cycle that focuses on the shifting relationships over the scope of a lifetime from the differing perspective of each person involved.

I.  Old Beggarman- Two interwoven jigs, It Was an Old Beggarman, Weary and Wet and Ag an mBóithrín Buí (At the Yellow Little Road), of both a young lady's observation of a wandering beggarman and his unrequited, possibly unexpressed, love for her.  They are offered together as alternate perspectives from potential romantic partners, and  features lilting, mouth music, or portaireacht bhéil (port a'bhéil, mouth-singing) as it is known in Irish Gaelic.

II.  I Would Rock My Child to Sleep- A sentimental Irish lullaby Irish lullaby Do Chuirfinnse Féin Mo Leanbh a Chodladh (I Would Put My Own Child to Sleep) highlights the shifting roles of a caregiver: the parent full of hopes of the parent for the child morphing over a lifetime into a blessing from the grown child to the aged parent. Each verse is progressively based upon an overall narrative:
   1. hopes of the parent for the child
   2. an easy, natural rhythm to family life, possibly the child is older now, and there is a dream of family continuance
   3. uncertainty over who is nurturing who: does the child now sing to comfort the parent?  
   4. a closing blessing for peace and rest that hearkens back to the successful sleep of a tired infant

III.  The Drummer- An energetic reel,  a combination of Maidin Fhómhair, nó Cailín Péacach (The Harvest Maiden, or Sprouting Maiden) and Cormac Spáinneach, nó An Drumadóir (Cormac Spaineach, or The Drummer), alternating between romantic partners encased by a nostalgic love song, suggesting the passing of a lifetime.

Commissioned by Cora Voce; Tacoma, WA

Set of three and single movements available for purchase.

2017 Choral Contest Entry

SKU: A0.891208

If you are looking to lighten your concert, to program real music, or a piece with rapid text delivery satisfying to mid-level HS choirs and community choirs with adult choral beginners, bring this hilarious 3 minute piece to your outstanding accompanist-pianist and your developing ensemble.  Debuted for choir during an educational outreach concert for children with families, Mozart's At the Window is also an effective selection or encore for a Mozart concert, or standing on its own.  Piece features lots of vocal doubling and is fully supported by a pianistic reduction-- this piece shines with an amazing accompanist.

The choral arranger writes: After getting absolutely sick of the inane music I'd been playing for my young children in the car, I was elated to discover Gunnar Madsen's CD I'm Growing featuring Mozart's At the Window.  The kids were delighted with this funny song about some naughty kid, and my husband and I were delighted with the enormous improvement of musical quality in our vehicle.  It was shortly thereafter that this choral arrangement was born.

Gunnar writes: In my first music theory class in college, the teacher and the students were recalling the silly ways they'd been taught to remember classical melodies when they were young.  One of them was for Mozart's 40th symphony (which I'd never heard) which consisted of Now Mozart's at the window - Let him in, Let him in, Let him in.  What an ear-worm!  For 25 years now I've dreamt of expanding that ditty into something more substantial, and now I'm proud to present the finished piece.  I'm really going to get a kick of sending this one to my teacher!

Also available in Two-Part Treble voicing.

Music abridged from W. A. Mozart's Symphony No.40 in G minor, K.550 IV. Allegro assai

2017 Choral Contest Entry