End of the Roadhouse - jazz band This one is published by Waterfall Music and is available for your jazz band or ensemble. It's scored within limited ranges so that most intermediate and high school bands can play it, so it certainly works for 2 and 4 year college and university bands and professional or community bands. A very good introduction to jazz melodic patterns and fragments, rhythm and chords in a retro style with familiar sounds from the 1950s through 1980s - listeners enjoy this one. Contact me for the score and parts at the Guide page.
If you read a page or listen to music at this web site, you have gained something. For many years all the time and work to build this site has been given away for free. Please give something back - keep free music online and support the teachers, composers, arrangers and performers who make music online.
You can take the link above to midi music files from the old Lamplight Music website - a popular site from the mid 1990s to around 2005, known for creative, musically accurate and realistic-sounding original music midi files and arrangements for midi.
Only a small percentage of musicians get paid for their compositions, arrangements and performance work. Many are not seeking to be paid but believe in the concept of free music. All musicians are influenced by what they hear and by the work of other musicians. MIDI files were famous for small file size while being easily converted to sheet music. Many midi sites were shut down because they did not seek permission to post midi files of music under copyright or they did not seek permission for performance rights of that music. As the internet became more popular, composers/arrangers, copyright owners, publishers, recording companies and their representatives - performance rights organizations - decided that they were losing revenue. No doubt, there is much greed in the music business. But, two wrongs don't make a right. It's one thing to advocate free music and reform of the copyright laws but another to profit or otherwise benefit from another person's work without paying for it. Let's give credit and reward those to whom it is due - please read the Originality page.
These zips have MIDI files for listening to the music listed on the learning pages. These .mid files are zipped for convenience in downloading them all at once.
If you want to learn how to play or read music without paying for lessons, going to school or buying books - this page is for you.
The music, for many years freely available on Lamplight Music and Waterfall Music pages, is being revised and re-recorded and will be uploaded as it's finished.
Some of the music was recorded with digital or analog technology from live performances. Some of the older music was created with a MIDI sequencer and imported into another program to improve the sound quality before saving as an audio file.
The sound files are CD quality (128 kbps) except for the longest music which is medium-low (64 kbps) for storage requirements and faster download speeds.
High-quality CD recordings from AIFF or 320 kbps master files are available of live performances of the original music from the Waterfall Music and Lamplight Music catalogs. For sheet music, scores, parts, performance clearance and other requests, click the Guide page for contact information.
The links below are to pages about how music works, how to listen to and appreciate music and, hopefully, some entertaining pages about composers and music history. You may find the tonal music
page helpful if you want to learn the basics of how to hear and play music at a piano or keyboard instrument. You can then use that knowledge to learn to play other instruments. The tutorial starts off very simply and gradually reveals more about how to learn to play music after hearing it and to learn how to read music. These pages are based on years of personal experience listening to, studying, performing, composing and arranging music.
The commentary and analysis is about the music from a musician's point of view and from a personal point of view. You may find some interesting stories and learn new facts about music.
This is by no means a complete study of music history or of music theory. There are many books and websites dedicated to those purposes that a search will reveal. This commentary is about learning by experiencing music in many forms and even learning to play music if you want to. Hopefully, you will learn something that you do not know about the composers and their music or, perhaps, see it in a different light or in a new way. The goal is not to impress you but to make music more accessible to everyone, including those who have no musical training or knowledge other than a desire to learn.
The "Music History - additional topics" page lists composers, musical periods and topics not commented on or only briefly discussed on these web pages.
These topics would make an excellent start for research and study. Parents are encouraged to review these materials for home study or home schooling - some material may not be suitable for or understood by younger children but should be acceptable for older children and adult students. The Tonal music page may be very helpful for parents to teach younger children about the building blocks of music. And any student or teacher, regardless of age, can benefit from the materials presented on that page.
.mp3 and .mid files of the music discussed on these pages are available for listening and download at many websites, including those listed on the LINKS page at this site. Of course, a search of the composer or music title will reveal a number of links. You may also find some of the music mentioned on these pages here.
A search on "sheet music" will reveal a number of sites where scores and sheet music in the public domain may be found. No visual files of the music discussed on these pages are posted here.
References consulted for biographies, historical period headings and to clarify/verify historical information include:
Harvard Dictionary of Music - 2nd Edition, Willi Apel, Belknap/Harvard
A History of Western Music - Revised Edition by Donald Jay Grout,
Published by W. W. Norton and Co., Inc.
20th Century Music - An Introduction by Eric Salzman,
from the Prentice-Hall History of Music Series and various web sites on the internet.
All materials at this web site are for educational, non-commercial use only. All of the written pages at this website are the property of the author and copyright owner(s) and represent personal beliefs, experiences and opinions as well as a consensus of facts and opinions gathered from research and scholarly study. There has been no attempt to footnote because any information from other sources has been used only to verify or to clarify the written statements of the author. There are no direct quotations here except where clearly indicated and those quotes represent a general consensus among music historians and musicologists. The goal is to make the pages accurate and entertaining. Every attempt has been made to obtain historical verification from multiple sources. Where statements of personal belief, opinion and speculation occur, they are obviously that and the source of the statement, where known, is given.
