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Works for Piano

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I. Early Piano Music

1986-1997

(All dates refer to the composition completion day, most have since been updated or revised)

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 Invention No. 1 - Homage to Scarlatti - 5-1-1986 

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 John's first musical piece dates from May 1, 1986, the day he completed his first piano composition. Studying a Domenico  Scarlatti sonata influenced this piece and was the inspirational basis that sparked his career as a composer. 

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  • A Courtly Dance - 5-6-1986

  • Waltz - 5-12-1986

  • Invention No. 2 - Do You Know Who You Are? - 5-19-1986 

  • Janny’s Dance - 5-23-1986

  • Lament No. 1 - 5-26-1986

  • Invention No. 3 - Victim of His Constructs - 5-28-1986

  • A Piece in Two Movements - 6-9-1986

  • Minuet No. 1 - 6-15-1986

  • Graceland - 6-19-1986

  • It's All in the Genes - 3-2001 (themes based on Graceland) 

  • Invention No. 4 - Elusive Truth - 6-24-1986 

  • Lullaby - 6-25-1986

  • A Fantasy No. 1 - Dance - 8-5-1986

  • A Piece in Three Movements - 11-25-1986

  • 4 eyeballs went to the beach and met 4 penguins - 1-14-1987

  • For Bill - 2-5-1987

  • Follow The Leader - 2-28-1987

  • Bagatelle No. 1 - 3-2-1987

  • Cascade - 3-4-1987

  • Mary’s Hymn - 3-7-1987

  • Lament No. 2 - 3-10-1987

  • Tweedy’s Last Dance - 3-12-1987

  • Pastorale No. 1 - 3-19-1987

  • Bagatelle No. 2 - 3-24-1987

  • Spring Sketches - 4-2-1987

  • Birthday Piece - 4-3-1987

  • For No One - 5-15-1987

  • Lament No. 3 - 7-28-1987

  • Fantasy No. 2 - Sandy's Fantasy - 9-24-1987

  • Invention No. 5 - English Lavender with Sweet Overtones - 10-14-1987

  • Bagatelle No. 3 - 10-31-1987

  • Snakefinger's Romantic Evening Among Stars - 1-20-1988

  • Ten Little Tunes for Children - 2-24-1988

  • Fantasy No. 3 - Themes for El Centro (Turning Back the Dials of Time) - 5-13-1988

  • Japanese Landscape (In Eno's Garden of Possibilities) - 6-2-1988 - Francesco Attesti, concert pianist, premiered this work in Cortona, Italy, S. Domenico Church on the 13th of August, 2015.

  • Lament No. 4 - 6-6-1988

  • Minuet No. 2 - 6-11-1988

  • Full Moon Over Diamond Head - 7-10-1988

  • Lament No. 5 - 7-14-1988

  • Bagatelle No. 4 (John's Bagatelle) - 7-19-1988

  • Dance of the Butterflies (Waltz No. 2) - 8-6-1988

  • John's Bagatelle (Bagatelle No. 5) - 8-11-1988

  • Lament No. 6 (in memory of Isabel Baratta) - 8-13-1988

  • Queen's Suite I-V - 9-16-1988

  • Fantasy No. 4 - Themes for Honolulu - 11-13-1988

  • John's Bagatelle (Bagatelle No. 6) - 11-27-1988 (Originally conceived on guitar, this tune was played during adolescence)

  • Lament No. 7 - Oh Mama - 12-3-1988

  • Bells for Saint Mary - (Christmas Melody) - 12-7-1988

  • Fantasy Dances for Innocents - I-XXIV - 6-4-1989

  • Folk Dance Variations - 11-12-1989

  • Semplici Danze - 11-22-1989

  • Lament No. 8 (Longing for Comfort in a Sea of Pain) - 12-10-1989

  • Tony's Hymn - 12-17-1989

  • Christmas Melody No. 2 - 12-25-1989

  • Waltz (Goodbye to the 1980's) - 12-29-1989

  • Dance for the New Year - 1-6-1990

  • Requiem for Mary (for Mother) I-IX - 4-3-1990

  • Bagatelle No. 7 - Homage to Scarlatti - 4-13-1990

  • Invention No. 7 - 4-29-1990

  • Summer Sketches - 5-15 -1990

  • Lament No. 9 - 5-28-1990

  • Silent Timbres - 6-2-1990

  • Lament No. 10 - 10-14-1990

  • Know The Infinite Moment of Now - (previously titled Fantasy No. 5) - 3-19-1991

  • Character Pieces No.1 - Cleo's Dilemma - 5-16-1992

  • Character Pieces No. 2 - Soothing waters - 5-17-1992

  • Character Pieces No. 3 - Moonlight Glance - 5-17-1992

  • Character Pieces No. 4 - If Only By Circumstances - 3/18/1996

  • Catwalk Petite Suite - 5-12-1996

  • Lament No. 11 - 8-4-1996

  • Happy to be Back - 3/5/1996

  • Remembrance or Mother's Memory - 7-15-1996

  • The Dance - 9-22-1996

  • Themes for Edward Gorey - 9-23-1996

  • 80th Birthday Jingles - 81 tonal miniatures - composed between 6-3-1997 and 8-9-1997

  • Antoinette - for a patient at Hawaii State Hospital - 8/26/1997.  This is the last early piano score before beginning composition lessons. 

 

 

II. Piano Suites

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 Piano Suite No. 1 for Solo Piano - 1997 

  • Robert at the Easel

  • Sophie's Characters

  • Maxon's Poe

  • Sketch for Aline

  • Jesse's Beat Portraits

  • Finale

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  This work began on the day the composer had his first composition lesson.

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 Piano Suite No. 2 for Two Pianos - 2002

  • Thore and Runa

  • Whirlwind Tryst

  • Delicately Sensual

  • The Mysterious Beyond

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 Piano Suite No. 3 for Piano Solo - 2002

  I-V

 Nathanael May premiered this work in Cortona, Italy at the Teatro Signorelli Loggia on June 24, 2005.

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 Piano Suite No. 4 For Three Pianos - 2005

  • Giovanni Baudino's Cleft Hand

  • Anguish in Every Household

  • Do You Have an E.R. For Music?

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 Piano Suite No. 5 for Solo Piano - 2007

  • Free from Fashion

  • The Virtual Liaison

  • Impressions of Sampson

  • Let Thy Mind Be Still (Red Dust Affairs)

  • The Cruel Black Swan Effect

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 Piano Suite No. 6 for Solo Piano - 2008

  • Silent Night

  • Starry Night

  • Transfigured Night

  • Flight of the Nine Reindeers

  • The Dark Night

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 Piano Suite No. 7 for Solo Piano - (Every Version of You) - 2011

  • I See Your Face in Every Flower

  • In Thunder

  • Your Radiant Splendor

  • And in the Singing of the Birds We Discover Beauty

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 Piano Suite No. 8 for Solo Piano - 2011 

  • The Greatest Worth is Self-Mastery

  • The Greatest Meditation is a Mind that Lets Go

  • The Greatest Magic is Transmuting the Passions

  • The Greatest Goodness is a Peaceful Mind (Om Mani Padme Hum, Part I)

  • The Greatest Wisdom is Seeing Through Appearances

  • The Greatest Action is not Conforming with the World’s Ways

  • The Greatest Medicine is the Emptiness of Everything (Om Mani Padme Hum, Part II)

  • The Greatest Generosity is Non-Attachment

  • The Greatest Effort is not Concerned with Results

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 Petite Suite for Solo Piano - 2012

  • Savor The Moment

  • The Hobgoblin (inspired by the art work of Alex Gross http://www.alexgross.com/)

  • Your Beauty Radiates Through Me on this Fine Spring Day

  • The Riddler (inspired by the art work of Alex Gross)

  • Day’s End

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 Piano Suite No. 9 for Piano Solo - (Memories of Liszt) - 2012 

  • Memories of Liszt

  • The Exuberant Guest

  • Peace is on the Other Side of the Horizon

  • Do We Have Time in Common?

  • Transcendental Incantations

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 Piano Suite No. 10 for Solo Piano - (A Lamentation) - 2014

  • Now That You Are Gone

  • Your Soul Travels The Cosmic Waves

  • In the Interval

  • A Sharp Dagger Pierced My Grief-Stricken Heart

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 Piano Suite No. 11 for Solo Piano (Dialectical Dictums) - 2015

  • When the Door of Opportunity Knocks, Walk Through

  • The Artist was Sequestered but not Vanquished

  • What Do You Do with the Time Given You?

  • Free Markets Make Fools of All of Us

  • The Cruel Emasculator Goes Down in Defeat

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 Piano Suite No. 12 for Solo Piano - 2016

  • Arditamente - Drammatico - Delicato - (The Rule Breaker)

  • Grave - Intenso (This is Not Normal)

  • Allegro - (This Too Shall Pass)

  • Briskly - With Dark Certainty (The World Revolves Around Him)

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 Piano Suite No. 13 for Solo Piano - 2017 (Homage to Goethe)

  • Your Sweet Felicity

  • The Burdened Man's Anguish

  • The Frightened Man's Tears

  • Not All The Blossoms of Dream Grew Ripe

  • Who Rides By Night in the Wind So Wild?

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 Piano Suite No. 14 for Two Pianos - 2021

  • Saved From Extravagance and Incoherence I-IV

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 Piano Suite No. 15 for Solo Piano - 2022

  • From Here to There Or Here To Go - I-IV

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III. Works for Solo Piano

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 Metamorphosis N° 6, 7 and 8 – 2002 

 

 Your Beauty Transcends Tiime - 2006

 

 Lament - (The Passing) - 2007 

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 Dino's Dilemma – 2008 

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 Jade Ponds – 2008

 

 Completely Clothed in Sound for Piano, for Three Players – 2011

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 Lament No. 14 - “The Death of Michael Alexander Snow” – 2011 

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 No. 99 – 2012 

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 Miniatures - 2013

   I-IX

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 Imaginations - 2013 

  • An Imagined Future Audience

  • Like the Whispering Wind 

  • You Are a Mirror, I See Myself in You

  • Stimulating Inventive Dreams

  • Conceptualize the Infinite

  • Flight of Fancy

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 Piano Elegies – 2013-14

  • Till Death Do Us Part

  • Reform by The Grim Reaper

  • Theatre of the Absurd

  • Lament for the Ghost of Blind Joe Death

  • Lost Memories

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 A Fronte Praecipitium a Tergo Lupi - 2015 

  • A Precipice Awaits You

  • Always Look Back for Wolves Approaching

  • Running to the Edge of the Precipice Can Only Do You Harm

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 The Iron Cage of Reason - 2017

     I. Con Brio, Delicatamente, Presto

     II. Drammatico

     III. Animato, Arditamente

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 A circular Jingle - 2017

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 In Supine Terror of a Tweet - 2018

   Parts I-II

 

 Americans in Fantasyland (Truth Does Not Lie in the Gut) - 2018

 

 Music for Children (Children in Fantasyland) - 2018

     1. Lullaby

     II. The Playground

     III. The Fanfare

     IV. The Jolly Tinkerman

     V. Musical Chairs

     VI. Depp and Marlon

     VII. Nonchalantly Suave

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 Phantasmamusica (An ongoing series of inventive musical creations) 

      Book I. - 2019  

  • Musica Moderna

  • Converted to a Talking Book (in memory of Philip K. Dick)

  • Mindless Repetition and Constant Plagiarism

  • Figures of Thought

  • Figures of Speech

  • The Decay of Rhetoric

  • Frequency Hopping (Move Over J.S. Bach)

  • Your Words Can't Take Away the Joy of Creation

  • The Last Nine Steps of Thor

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 Phantasmamusica Book II. - 2020

  • Spooky Entanglements

  • Waves of Probability

  • Entangled Qubits

  • Spooky Actions at a Distance

  • Groups of Qubits

  • Entangled by Reality

  • Collapsing to One Reality

  • The Uncertainty Principle

  • Every Version of Me (A Quantum dance)

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 Phantasmamusica Book III - 2021

  • Musical Reflections at 66

  • Resistance to the Herd Spirit

  • Fads and Affections

  • Original Thoughts in Obscurity

  • Working in a Vacuum

  • Abandon Yourself to Your Instinct

  • Reshuffling What Already Exists

  • Menaced By Herd Compulsions

  • The Muse Has Never Left

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 Phantasmamusica Book IV - 2023​

  • Loitering on the Fringes

  • The Art of Interpretation

  • Unfolding With Infinite Leisure

  • The Virtues Seem Quite Stunning

  • Fighting Against the Grain

  • Sacrificing Nuances and Refinements

  • To a Piddling Whine

  • Finding Your Way Again

  • The Perils of Middle Age

 

 Phantasmamusica Book V - 2024​  (From 365 Tao Daily Meditations by Deng Ming-Dao)

  • The Void is Fundamental for four hands (there is no separation between void and phenomena)

  • The Single Point (abide in utter tranquility)

  • The Infinite Continuation (even death is not a true ending)

  • Movement in Stillness (the deepest sound is silence)

  • Rinse Away Dreams (purification starts all practice)

  • With No Thought of Gain (hold no expectations)

  • The Degree of Elegance (let us make it as beautifully as we can)

  • Beyond all Descriptions (some experiences are impossible to conceptualize)

  • Expression Becomes Formless (the form will emerge with fluidity, grace, originality and beauty)

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V. Piano Etudes

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 Book One (Maladies) - 2005 

  1. - The Repeated Spasm 

  2. - Sightless 

  3. - The Ruptured Disc 

  4. - The Umbilical Hernia 

  5. - Sciatica (for Pierre Grill)

  6. - Incystence (for Nathanael May)

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 Book Two (Philosophies) - 2006 

  1. - A Recording is the Antithesis of his Aesthetic (in memory of John Cage)

  2. - No One Has an Idea 

  3. - Everything is 9

  4. - At The Tomb of Liszt

  5. - Recombination

  6. - Riding Potatoes to Maryland

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 Book Three (Histories) - 2007 

  1. - To Honor the Past is to Honor the Future (for the past is the great teacher from which our constructs are built) 

  2. - Passing on Ancient Skills 

  3. - Unmasking the Past 

  4. - Ancestral Dreams 

  5. - Ancestral Desires 

  6. - Ancestral Devotions

 

Piano Etudes Books 1, 2 and 3 are to be performed in sets of three.

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IV. Piano Preludes

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 Book One – 2000 (revised 2014)

  • Watery Abstractions (Premiered by Hugh Sung, staff pianist at the Curtis Institute, at Cabrini College, November 9, 2005 in Philadelphia, PA.)

  • B Bach

  • Gamme de Bertha

  • Don't Give Me Grief

  • Amorphous Structures

  • Edward's Polymath (Premiered by Hugh Sung at Cabrini College, November 9, 2005 in Philadelphia, PA.)

  • The Emperor's Gestures in His Majestic Garden (Premiered by Hugh Sung at Cabrini College, November 9, 2005 in Philadelphia, PA.)

  • The Unexpected

  • The Ocean That Divides Us

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 Book Two - 2001 (revised 2014) 

  • Be Nothing

  • Pensive Leanings

  • Power Games (Premiered on 3/23/07 by Brent Nitta at Hawaii Music Awards 2006 where "Ampersand" was recognized as best Classical release)

  • The Path Is Ambiguous

  • Un Prelude e'tonnant

  • Appease Me

  • A Falling Leaf

  • Twice The Speed of Stitches

  • The Dexterous Toss

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 Book Three – 2009-11 

  • Dollars for Prague

  • Stillness in Motion, Swimming in Air

  • For Mary Ann

  • Magical Incantations 

  • Humility Over Hubris

  • Better Than Herding Donkeys

  • Crosshairs

  • A Wealth of Sorrow

  • Sheep & Chickens

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 Book Four – 2013-14 

  • Arcane Gestures

  • 21st Century Abominations

  • Grateful for The Privilege

  • Cleo's Curiosity

  • The Charmer 

  • Velocity

  • Methodically Speaking

  • The Loner

  • The Mad Genius

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 Book Five – 2018

  • Eric's Walk Through Town

  • From Precision to Decay

  • The Needy and The Greedy

  • Debt Carnivore

  • From Luxury to Landfill

  • Gold in My Pocket, Pain in My Heart

  • No Donuts for James

  • Accidental Music

  • Stick a Pin in That Story

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V. Works for Two Pianos

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 Piano Suite No. 2 for Two Pianos - 2002

  • Thore and Runa

  • Whirlwind Tryst

  • Delicately Sensual

  • The Mysterious Beyond

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 Transcendence in the Age of War - 2003

 (in memory of 9-11)

 

 Broken Promises (Another Disappointment) – 2007 

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 Sobering Indignities (Another Sad Commentary) - 2008

 (for the disappointed)

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 The Bells - 2011

 (Celebrating a 35-year love affair and journey)

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 Music for Piano Duo (Seminal Constructs) - 2013 

  • Exquisite (In stillness there is intensity as well as in the slowest of movements and the softness of utterances)

  • Pi (He saw himself in every transcendental number and in every lotus flower)

  • Seminal Constructs (You have to erase sections of previous constructs to build new ones)

  • The Mirror (I look at myself in you)

  • Beneath the Surface of a Memory (Securing our desires is a rarity)

  • In Search of Truth, Beauty and Justice (The search leads to nothing, but it's the search that counts)

  • Agreements Rule Our Dreams (Our construct system is the rule of law that governs our behaviors and dreams)

  • We Keep Searching and Dancing (The Traveling Dancer) (Our personal journeys take us to destinations known and unknown, while the search itself becomes the diary of our lives)

  • Taking the Risk of Being Alive (The Dreamer) (We live in a dream that has no beginning or ending)

 

  To be played in any order.

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 Piano Suite No. 14 for Two Pianos - 2021

  • Saved From Extravagance and Incoherence I-IV

 

 

 

 

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