Uncle John's Nocturne (from Uncle John's Notebook) by John Pitts Piano Solo - Digital Sheet Music

A short nocturne using fragments of musical material written by John Edwin Yate Pitts (1929-2003), composed by his nephew, John Pitts.Composed by John Pitts (1976-). 21st Century, Romantic Period, Post-Romantic. 3 pages. Published by Intensely Pleasant Music (S0.307381). https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/uncle-john-s-nocturne-digital-sheet-music/20688191"Nocturne" from UNCLE JOHN'S NOTEBOOK - available shortly from https://www.amazon.co.uk/l/B07GX535RR Nocturne https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsMVxmKlQ5sMarch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0g5M38vVZABallade https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEOgLul-2Gs This collection of three pieces for solo piano started life, probably, in a notebook belonging to my late uncle John Edwin Yate Pitts. Uncle John was from Liverpool, studied briefly at the Royal Manchester College of Music, and lived most of his life in North Wales. He was an accomplished amateur pianist (as was his mother), and a great music lover – especially of the late romantic period. The notebook was passed on to me in the early 1990s, and although largely empty, it contained three short sketches of musical ideas, two untitled, and one labelled "March". The notebook had almost certainly belonged to John’s father before him, but the style of the musical ideas seems to suggest that they were John’s.  NOCTURNE (pages 5-9)In the summer of 2011 I decided to flesh out the first page of ideas, in a style I hope may well have been the kind of thing Uncle John could have been imagining. The page contains a few simple 4-bar phrases in D major with rather thick and low left hand chords which require careful handling to avoid sounding muddy. The phrases lent themselves to a gentle but passionate and lush treatment that resulted in "Nocturne". The first phrase became an introduction; the second phrase became the main melody which I’ve used most and developed from; the third phrase I’ve only used once as written, although there are echoes of it later on.MARCH (pages 10-15)In early 2019 I began work on the second sketch – 16 bars labelled simply as "March" that has definite echoes of Elgar or Walton. It was mostly just the melody and bass line, with occasional inner movement – just crying out to be filled out. The 16 bars comprise two sections, each with phrases of various lengths – 3 bars, then 2 and 4, and 2, 3, 2. I fleshed out the sketch, extended it and repeated with slightly amended harmony, added a trio section typical of marches of the era, and rounded it off with a richer and more thickly scored recap.BALLADE (pages 16-23)The third sketch in the notebook (other than a four bar introduction to what was probably going to be a song) was the shortest, but the most complete in terms of harmony – a 4-bar phrase in 6/8, then a developed and extended 5-bar version – with some rather nice chromatic harmony. To help me extend these nine bars in an appropriate style, I took inspiration from the structure of Chopin’s Ballade no.2 in F major (also in 6/8) – the opening of which uses phrases A B A B C B1 A B. I also followed Chopin’s use of a dark and stormy contrasting middle section, before returning to an adapted form of the opening 41 bars.