Our Hilltop woods are now in their slowly creeping seasonal decline, somewhere between the green of summer and the frost of winter, which is to say accumulating with dead and soggy brown leaves that I’m too busy or lazy (so far) to rake or clean from the gutters, at least till the rest of the […]

On my bi-weekly posting schedule, I’m two days late posting this and without much excuse. I just forgot that it was due!  Or I could argue that I was distracted by traveling and Halloween. I had a lovely and smooth airplane trip (for once) to Philadelphia and back last weekend for a wedding ceremony of […]

Once more, I’ve been working like a dog to finish the third movement of my symphony, and behold! I have finally finished it and mixed the demo, which I am happy to share below. The real orchestra CD will come after the fourth and final movement is composed – that’s later. But first . . […]

It seems October’s Bustin’ Out All Over! Suddenly one of our rose bushes in the back garden and a potted geranium both just decided to pop out more blooms at once than they have had all summer. I snapped these photos on October 1st and 2nd. At least our dark woods in the distance (in […]

Welcome back to the Hilltop, where the deer are jumping, the flowers (at least some of them) are still blooming, and the kitty cats meowing. On Monday, I was sitting on the back patio reading through the mail that just came, and a skunk walks up to me, not six feet away, then waddles out […]

Hilltop Diary, September 6, 2023 This entry will be short!  Every day for the last two weeks I have been listening to great music and looking at great art and tinkering with notes to find the right path forward on my third movement of the new “English” Symphony No. 3, the movement titled “The Lady […]

Crystal update: I’m happy to be able at last to say what show Crystal is rehearsing, now that the cast has been announced; she’s in the ensemble, but has a nice vocal solo and lots of beautiful dancing. It will be the musical Anastasia, at the Watershed theater in Columbia, TN, running September 15 – […]

Work has continued on my new Symphony No. 3: “English,” including a couple of writer’s block moments and a couple of breakthrough moments. I previously completed and posted the first movement here (see July 14), subtitled “Upon a Walk in the English Countryside,” Now I have been working on movement two, “The Lady of Shalott.” […]

Since I last wrote, it has been a quiet couple of weeks, so this will be short. I’ve spent many moons laboring in the salt mines of Gondor, which is what I call tediously editing the conductor’s score for the first movement of my new Symphony No. 3, posted here last time. That movement was […]

I have been taking a little hiatus from my ballet project but just got the great news that the distinguished principal dancer of the New York City Ballet, Isabella LaFreniere, has agreed to dance our lead role, the title character, Raffaella. I look forward to getting back to the ballet soon, but have not been […]