Hello, How Are You? Hope The Playing Session In The Last Week Was Good!

Hello, how are you? Hope the playing session in the last week was good!

So, for the question for this weekend since I got to listen to Jon's composition... What are you top 5 of his solo compositions and why?

Heyyyy my dear and welcome❤️ finally finished school, waiting for the final exam :)

Actually I didnt get to play on last sunday bc our teacher got sick like 30 mins before the show😭😭 hopefully hes good now and tomorrow we might play again, crazy story😵‍💫

Lets start (its always so difficult to do a good placing but lets try🥲):

5) Before I Forget

A good mix of pure rock 'n' roll, ballads and english folk/medieval music. Also his arrangement of the Bach Toccata and Fugue "Bach onto this" with Cozy Powell on drums (fantastic work of his) is so nice to listen to.

4) Gemini Suite

The "sequel" of the Concerto, with each movement based on a different member of the deeps. You can clearly see his interest in the zodiac (Gemini being his sign, and every musician that participated had their sign and birthday too!). This work stands out from the previous one obv bc Its orchestral, but also because you can feel that his music is mostly not melodic or follows an harmony, but it's "organized noise", bizarre jingles, sound effects (like percussion parts) and sound walls that are so fascinating and unconventional to me. Also his collaboration on the 3rd movement with Yvonne Elliman (really nice singer, you should check her work!). My favourite movements are Piano, Drums and Organs.

3) Sarabande

Another tribute of his love to Bach and Baroque dances (every piece maintains the name of the specific dance) where he kept the original time signatures but experimented more with the electric-acoustic interaction between instruments. Sarabande (track) is hypnotic and captivating, and Gigue has a beautiful continuous piano part that sets the rythm :)

2) Boom Of The Tingling Strings

One of his later and first orchestral-only works. If I remember correctly he got this title from a poem about a childs experience with being under a grand piano, and the thing that stands out for him is that "unexpectedly violent" sound, recalling his childhood (so cute☺️). He wrote a piano part so complex compared to his skills that got played only by a concert pianist (Nelson Goerner), so I consider this work to be also one of his most challenging, both in technique and expression; very atmospheric piece, with melancholic inspirations from the 900' revolutionary composers (take this personal view with a grain of salt: im no professional in judging correctly this kind of music😭 but the piano solo part in the middle of Allegro Giusto reminds me of the Prokofiev's War Sonatas, more precisely the 6° in A Major: again this was composed during the middle of a the 2° world war and the sovietic dictatorship, and the music perfectly shows the chaos that took place in people's minds: I've got the same "out of place" feeling with Jons music and its mindblowing for me). Altough I wrote an essay here its still too little to describe this incredible piano concerto 😌

1) Concerto For Group And Orchestra

I want to put the Concerto still on no. 1 bc of the huge impact it had both musically and socially aswell. A first approach of combining popular and élite music in 1969, a revolutionary period where the younger generations wanted to change the old post-war sistem that moved everything, so the union of young-old was visionary enough. He made this work with a strict deadline and in basically no time, probably going burnout after burnout: but he still managed to kick asses and showed his early genius to the world, making Ritchie mad enough (I bet to this very day) ❤️❤️❤️

This was a bit long, ooops🤣 but you gave me the right occasion to talk about it in a free manner, so thanksss dear💋 (I know that I have to still make a review abt your fic gal, I wish to find the proper time soon😭)