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Over time I have written a number of songs. I will continue to add them to this blog so, please, keep coming back to see what's new.

Terri


Monday, July 23, 2012

Emotions

Straight out of high school I headed for Brigham Young University.  My first semester, fall of 1980, I took a composition class with Murray Boren.  I remember him telling me that when I write music I need to stay with just one theme.  He could take one of my compositions and divide it into three separate pieces.  My justification at the time was that I didn’t want the listener to get bored.  He was probably scrutinizing this piece when he made that observation. 

Emotions is one of my earliest writings – high school days, in fact.  Back then I wasn’t too concerned with musical form.  Nowadays I do try to keep the structure of the piece in the back of my mind as I’m writing, but I must admit that sometimes I fall back into old habits and just let the music carry me away.


                    If the song (above) won't play, try clicking on the word/logo SOUNDCLOUD just above this sentence on the right.

To download free SHEET MUSIC click HERE.

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Musical Engineering

A few years back Chuck was wrapping up a major project when he provided me with a golden opportunity.  He invited me to write the musical score as the background to the narration for his video documentary.  The show tells about the construction of the Crooked River bridges here in Central Oregon.   I had never written for orchestra before, but that didn’t stop me. 

For this piece I took a simple eight-note musical phrase and applied mathematical principles to create the harmonies.  Basically, I took a short sequence of notes and added layers of the same melody but applied different time values to the notes. Each layer is a multiple or division of the original phrase – twice as fast, twice as slow, etc.  It can get a little busy, but I like the dreamlike quality it seems to create. 

You’ll have to forgive my unorthodox notation.  As I was pressed for time, rather than write for specific string instruments, I took shortcuts and transcribed it as I wrote it on my Yamaha Motif.       

This video clip is an excerpt/chapter from the movie A Story of Three Bridges.  A highlight in the Hutchings household last year was having the show air on Oregon Public Broadcasting and on other local television stations.  How fun is that!?!



To download free SHEET MUSIC click HERE
To download an mp3 FILE of just the music (without the narration) click HERE