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Show NATIVE MUSICIAN DEVOTES EFFORTS TO BAND MUSIC COMPOSITION ' , .,r-i,N f)r ' ' vj I I ' i & :- .;'r ?"& I "1 . ' i ! . I , ,,' , J hv. s , - I. i v ; - Clair Johnson, former music in- structor at the Springville high school, has just received his doctor's doc-tor's degree from the University of Southern California, and plans to spend the remainder of the summer composing band music and working as a staff arranger , for eastern music publishers, ac- cording to word received here. Dr. Johnson, a native of Springville, Spring-ville, son of Mr. and Mrs. Wayne Johnson, has more than fifty published pub-lished compositions to his credit, among them such numbers as, "Legend of the Rockies," used in Idaho and other states as the required re-quired contest selection, and "Spring Festival Overture", also selected this year as national contest con-test material. His "Wasatcha Suite," more difficult work in modern mod-ern idiom, was given its first performance per-formance in Los Angeles this spring and will soon be published by Boosy and Hawkes. Dr. Johnson resides in Ogden and the summer recreation band of that city, directed by, Jesse Lil-lywhite Lil-lywhite has prepared two of his arrangements for concerts, a selection selec-tion of Foster melodies and "Children's "Child-ren's Prayer," from Humper-i Humper-i dinck's opera, "Hansel and Gretel." An instructor in Weber College, : Dr. Johnson expects to develop courses in harmony, orchestration, and solfeggio, which will aid students- in acquiring the fundamental fundamen-tal knowledge and skill necessary in creative music. According to a statement from the college in which Dr. Johnson teaches, some interesting sidelights on composition for band are found in the time required to complete a selection. "A piece of music with a per-( per-( Continued on Page 10) CLAIR JOHNSON Native Musician Devotes Efforts To Band Composition (Continued from Page One) formance time of about five minutes min-utes requires at least seventy-five hours of work on the part of the composer, in the composition, arranging ar-ranging and copying of parts for conductor and players," it was said. "The composing is the enjoyable enjoy-able part, the arranging and copying copy-ing are the drudgery. Composers must hear everything they write, and must be able to hear all the parts and harmonies at once; most of them working without the aid of a piano." "Composing must be a part of one's daily work, not depending on inspiration or getting in the mood and ideas come with work-, ing and writing. A finished composition com-position must be a combination of melody writing, master of form and harmony and skill in scoring and arranging." Dr. Johnson states there is great opportunity in the field of band writing, as our modern band is a young organization and most of its literature is borrowed and transcribed from the orchestra. Publishers are anxious to get new material. He added, however, that he was referring to highly trained musicians musi-cians who deal with established firms not the firms that solicit words and music from the untrained un-trained public. The professional houses never ask the public to send in manuscripts, he added. |