Greetings for the new week.  Did you know that this week is NAIDOC Week (3-10 July 2016)? If not, here is a glimpse taken from the official NAIDOC Week site at http://www.naidoc.org.au/. You can find out much more by…

Greetings for the new week. The arts have been in the news again over the last week.  In last weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald ‘Spectrum’ (25-26 June 2016) the author Frank Moorhouse writes an open letter to the Prime Minister, Malcolm…

Greetings for the new week.

Some key Australian musicians were awarded honours in the recent Queen’s Birthday honours.   Conductor, artistic director and advisor, and passionate advocate for music education, Richard Gill, composer and radio presenter Andrew Ford, and singer-songwriter  Kate…

Blog 13 June 2016

Greetings for the new week. I don’t always write music specifically for people, but there are times when the people in my life and what is happening for them stimulates a creative music thought, and I…

In my blog of 23 May 2016 (‘Not resting’), I ranted and wailed about the cuts to the arts in Australia (see http://www.petawilliams.com.au/petas_blog/not_resting/), and in particular some really wonderful and deserving music organisations, by the current Australian Government.  As…

What’s in a name?  Or, Do the titles of pieces matter?

Well, they do to me.  And I’ve always been interested in the beautiful work of Australian composer, Graeme Koehne, whose titles are so evocative. (Some of these titles are…

Not Resting

Welcome to this week’s blog.   I have been wrestling (and certainly not resting) about whether to write about the recent cuts by the Australia Council, the Federal Government’s arts funding and advisory body, to a range of arts…

Welcome to this week’s blog.   Today is the birthday of my dear friend Maureen, who has travelled with me on our respective musical journeys and careers since we met as students of the Music Department at the University of Sydney…

Welcome to this week’s blog.  In contrast to last week’s featured music (‘Hymn to the Mountains – 2’), this week’s featured music is without piano (my goodness!) – called ‘Blessings for the newborn’. 

Its history lies…

Welcome to this week’s blog.  Today is the birthday of two dear friends – Michael, who is celebrating his 60^th birthday with friends in Brisbane this evening, and Tony, who lives in Boston, works for the Boston Symphony, and…

Welcome to this week’s blog.  This week’s featured music is ‘Lullaby for Alina’, written for my friends Maria and Francesco Placanica on the birth of their second daughter, Alina.  Originally written for voices and piano, I have re-arranged it…

This week’s featured work, from my most recent album, ‘Places with high levels of natural beauty’, is the first of two pieces called ‘Hymn to the Mountains’.  I thought I might share with you this week how this…