Tunes with a Difference Part 1

I have spent many productive hours over the years writing melodies, mainly for country dance, and often to mark a significant life moment. These tunes, and many arrangements, can be downloaded as PDF files from my website. Please help yourself.

My tunes are normally constructed to match the movements of our traditional dance style. It is rooted in English Country Dance, but has many international derivative dances such as Scottish Country Dance, Irish social dance and American Square and Contra Dance. The music typically has 2 main phrases (A and B) of 8 bars each, which are repeated, making 32 bars in total.

In this blog post I wish to present two recordings and introduce 3 tunes.

1. Patience (Patience = tune 2: Listen here)

CD Cover for GingerBread and Moonshine

In 1998, Patience and I were married in Worcestershire, England and, after the return from our Honeymoon (which involved taking 61 children skiing to the Austrian Alps!), I recorded a solo CD called “Gingerbread and Moonshine”.

For that CD I recorded a tune which I had written for her two years before called (unsurprisingly), Patience. I think it’s a lovely waltz tune and I really enjoy playing it whenever I get the chance.

Woollas Hall, Worcestershire – Home on the Hill

On the CD track you can listen to here, I recorded two tunes together. The first is another favourite tune of mine “Home on the Hill“. The tune reflects the tranquility of the old manor house in which I was living before our marriage. It is followed by the tune Patience. (More musical readers will, hopefully, appreciate the key change between the two tunes.)

You can listen to the CD track by clicking on this link. 🎶PLAY

Home on the Hill (Ref: 132 ©Dave Brown 1996 ) 

Patience (Ref: 133 ©Dave Brown Jan 1996) pub DLBMUSIC

2. Romance

On the same CD I recorded a tune which is not in my usual style. I chose to record “Romance”, a piano solo piece.

I’ve always imagined this piece of music being a “Big Movie” theme and have often thought about how it would sound with a full string orchestra.

You can Listen to me playing Romance by playing the sound file below. To download a copy, so that you can play this yourself, please visit the end of this post.

Romance (©Dave Brown 1980 Ref:A076) pub DLBMUSIC

All music recorded and printed is ©Dave Brown. See individual pieces for copyright information.

The music is free to play – reproduction by licence – public performances please complete the appropriate Performing rights notification including the copyright information.