Thomas Clark – composer / digital artist

Tag: brass music

  • Mocha’s Rag

    My mind is always silently playing music of some kind in my head. Constantly . . . including first thing every morning while I’m walking with the dog.

    To focus this mental playback loop into something constructive, I’ve started humming tunes to myself on the walk. The dog seems to like it, thinks I’m singing for her.

    Sometimes this new habit escalates from humming familiar jazz and Broadway classics to composing new tunes. A while ago I started composing in my head a Scott Joplin style rag. (I have always loved and admired Graceful Ghost Rag by Michigan prof Bill Bolcom.)

    Back at the computer, here is what eventually came of this mind game:

    The dog’s name is Mocha.

  • Kladno Sketches

    2019      duration: 10 minutes

    1. Zámek – peaceful gardens      2. Poldi – ironworks      3. Svobody – Freedom plaza

    Kladno is a Czech city in the Central Bohemian Region 25 kilometers northwest of Prague. In the middle of the 19th century, the discovery of coal there led to the establishment of one of the great ironworks and then steel mills in all of Europe.

    Kladno is near Lidice, the village destroyed by the Gestapo in 1942. Of the Lidice men who were all shot in the atrocity, many had walked to Kladno each day to work in the coal mine or the Poldi steel works.

    Poldi has thrived and survived for more than 100 years, through two world wars and occupations of the country, but the factory finally closed and most of the buildings are now abandoned.

    The city remains a thriving place with a population of 70,000, a large church, municipal building, state library and archives, monuments, theaters, museums, and beautiful parks. The Czech people have always been hard working, they love gardens, especially roses, and they love beer in the fine pilsner style they created.

    Suffering under so much occupation and oppression throughout their history in the center of Europe, Czechs especially value “svobody” – freedom.

    To request performance materials and permission, email the composer, tc24@txstate.edu.