I rarely delve into aesthetics on my blog, but I can’t resist posting this. If you have time, and want to think about art and beauty, I recommend reading this, and then thinking about the comparisons to musical art. The applications are obvious, numerous, and profound.

I also recommend reading Joe Carter’s comment, below it, posted on June 23, where he echoes sentiments I’ve learned from Julian Johnson.

Click HERE to read the article and the comment.

My four pieces newly published by C. Alan are now available. (Basque Lullaby for Band, Grafenburg Variations for Band, Sonata for Violin and Piano, and Sonata for Trombone and Piano). I got my complimentary copies today.

Also, C. Alan has a feature about the pieces on the front page of their website- click here.

Now that I’m back from my Pennsylvania trip (which was a great time!), I’m looking ahead to some future things. I’ll be at the Hinshaw Celebration in August, where the gala concert will feature some of my music, and I’ll also be one of the guest clinicians at the Pine Lake Church Music Leadership Symposium, doing some reading sessions there.

Meanwhile, I’m working on finishing up my Te Deum, which is making progress but not as quickly as I had hoped. Once that’s done, I have several other things in the works:

• Three church anthems that have been requested that I’ll probably do- we’ll see.
• A collaboration with Anthony Silvestri on a piece for Tracy Resseguie- it will honor his Norwegian ancestry, and he plans to take it on tour to Norway- really cool!
• Amidst several other personal writing projects, I have a few other church commission projects in the works- one in Texas, one locally in Greenville, and one in California. More on those as they’re finalized.
• Lastly, I’m pleased to announce a commission from the Greenville Chorale for a piece that will honor their 50th anniversary next year. It’ll be a piece for the Greenville Chorale, and the winds and brass of the Greenville Symphony, to be performed next fall at the Peace Center for the Performing Arts. I’m excited to be making this local “hometown” connection, and honored to help the Greenville Chorale celebrate!

I came home from our recent trip to two surprises:

First, my main computer that I use for *everything* was dead…and I found out today it’s the logic board, not just the power supply. Ouch! Thankfully it’s under warranty, so I’ll be without it for a few days (hopefully only 1-2?!) but it’ll be a free fix.

Second, I got a letter in the mail from the John Ness Beck Foundation- this was a year that I wasn’t judging, so my pieces could be considered- and apparently someone put in A Cradle Carol (Beckenhorst Press)- and it won second prize. What a nice surprise- and I won’t have to use any of the prize money towards fixing my computer.

Here’s a low quality mp3 of it:

I didn’t find out until tonight, that I had a performance at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC tonight, on a “Fresh Currents- Songs of the New Millenium” concert, featuring new composers…check out the link here.

Wow, there’s a lot going on- trying to keep things updated here, so here’s the list, all at once:

1. See my previous blog post for info on the upcoming Composer Weekend in Philadelphia…
2. I’ve updated my Concert Choral, Church Choral, and Instrumental pages with new links, publisher info, etc. I hadn’t realized how outdated they were!
3. For JW Pepper’s offerings of my 2009 output, click here. For JW Pepper’s Editors Choice list (6 pieces thus far in 2009…yeah!) click here.
4. For all of you who have asked me for SSA music, I’m pleased to say that There Is Faint Music is now available in SSA!
5.  C. Alan is my new instrumental music publisher. They’re publishing almost 45 minutes of my music: Basque Lullaby for band, Grafenburg Variations, Sonata for Violin, and Sonata for Trombone. Basque Lullaby is currently one of five band pieces mentioned on their main page, here.
6. None less than Simon Carrington is using Basque Lullaby (choral version, mind you!) in a summer workshop in Italy this summer. It’s one of the repertoire pieces for his afternoon conducting sessions at the Sarteano Chamber Choral Conducting Workshop.
7. The Hinshaw Celebration Gala Concert this year will include John Rutter and Mark Hayes conducting music of their own, as well works by Howard Helvey and Dan Forrest. Click here for the flyer.
8. Currently, I’m working slowly but surely on my Te Deum, and there are currently four requested pieces and five other commissions lined up. It’s a daunting list, but I’m thankful for it! More specifics about the commissions will be forthcoming.
9. Lastly, here’s a video of the Vanguard University Concert Choir singing You Are The Music in Trinity Church in New York City, last week! Click here.

I’ll be doing a composer weekend in a couple weeks, at Bible Baptist Church of Westchester, PA. Saturday the 13th will involve three choral reading sessions, and a question-and-answer session, and Sunday the 14th will include performances of 4-5 choral anthems with various instrumental groups in the morning, and a small sacred piano concert in the evening. If you’re in the Philly area and want to come, you can call them to register, at 610.692.4492.

Registration is $20, I believe, which includes lunch. Several of my publishers have very kindly provided free reading copies of my choral pieces for the reading sessions- 20 pieces in all.

I’m looking forward to it!

Had a wonderful time in NYC- see my Twitter posts for a few pictures, etc, if you like. It was great to see and hear Avery Fisher Hall- home of the New York Philharmonic. Some amazing history in that hall…if only the walls and stage could speak of names like Copland, Toscanini, Bernstein, etc. It’s also the hall where John Adams’ stunning “On the Transmigration of Souls” was premiered- so even more recent history has been made there.

The Vanguard University choir was wonderful- the kind of choir you usually hope to hear, but don’t often get to. They’re excellent musicians, conducted by an excellent conductor who is an exceptionally kind and generous man. It was a great time. They gave fine renditions of both You Are The Music and Arise Shine, filling the hall very well.

The DCINY Honors Wind Ensemble (auditioned) included my friend Evan Duke- I knew he was going up to NYC for a week but I didn’t realize we were on the same concert! They gave the NY premiere of a fabulous piece by John Mackey, a wind band composer who I met in Kansas. I talked to him afterward, and I think he actually remembered me (or else pulled the wool over my eyes about it!) You can read his blog post about his dual-NYC performances this weekend, here.

Lastly, I got to meet Ola Gjeilo, a wonderful young (well, 4 months younger than me!) composer. I recognized his name, and his picture, from the Walton Music advertisements. We chatted outside the backstage door after I introduced myself, and spent some time together at the reception afterwards, as well. He’s got some really great stuff on his website. I hope our paths will cross again soon, and they may, as Hinshaw and Walton are pretty closely allied in the choral music publishing world.

Lastly, I assure you, dear reader, that neither I nor my wife are exhibiting any symptoms of swine flu…just yet.

I’ll be headed to the Lincoln Center this weekend, to hear Arise Shine and You Are The Music performed in my Lincoln Center debut. (Technically, Hosanna from Words From Paradise was broadcast once, there, at the ASCAP Morton Gould Awards, where they played excerpts from the winning pieces- but that was in the Walter Reade Theater, and was only an mp3 playback…whereas this is live, and real, and in Avery Fisher Hall!)

I’ve decided to use Twitter instead of my blog, for updates, which will be a new experience. So if anyone is holding their breath and just dying for quick up-to-the-minute updates of my experiences, you can follow me on Twitter at DanForrestMusic.

In the rest of my time, thus far this summer, I’ve been keeping very busy with BJU theory department business, working out details for a couple appearances this summer, lining up commissions, and also working on my Te Deum, which is supposed to be completed in only 45 days! (Yikes!) I’ve had three commissions work out in the last few weeks, with a fourth one almost set as well. Three are for churches, and one is for a large venue here in Greenville- more details about that, after this week!

Here are audio files of three soon-to-be-released choral anthems:

The First Noel (Beckenhorst Press):

Good Shepherd (Hal Leonard):

There Is Faint Music (Hal Leonard):

Click here to go to Hal Leonard’s page…click on “Closer Look” for sample pages and an audio excerpt.