The more eagle-eyed of you may have noticed that, on the right-hand side of this weblog, the number of handbell pieces I currently have in print has ominously dropped from four to two. (I've also updated the expected release date of the four pieces I've signed contracts on, added some more submissions, etc., but even the most eagle-eyed of you has not noticed that.) The thing about the thing is that the publisher of those two pieces has, for financial reasons, folded -- meaning, of course, that those two pieces are no longer in print.
It's depressing. But it's probably — in the long run — a positive. This publisher was small, but more importantly, they didn't have a distributor in the handbell world (meaning that none of the major handbell retailers, such as Jeffers Handbell Supply, carried the pieces. (I didn't bother to check things like that out — or much of anything — when I was originally submitting these pieces. Now my research time, both on what hymns to arrange and who to send them to, is probably equal to a third of the time I spend sitting in front of Finale, and I think it's worth it.) The rights of these two pieces revert back to me, thankfully, and I'm pretty confident I can find publishers for them both that have the connections to do a better job in the handbell world than the former publisher could. But. Still.
On a similar but unrelated topic, I'm trying to decide what two pieces to do this month. Pick two of the following so I don't have to. (Do I really think you're going to help? No. But it helps me to write it down.)
a) A handbell arrangement of Marty Haugen's "Return to God." (Rights are owned by GIA, so it gets difficult if they don't pick it up; on the other hand, I think there's a good chance they'll accept it.)
b) A handbell arrangement of Johann Cruger's "Lord, to Thee I Make Confession." (Public domain, no handbell arrangement done of the hymn, but relatively obscure.)
c) Do some work on my biggish handbell project that I've done virtually no work on, "15 Christmas Hymn Introductions for Handbells." (Hymn introduction books are done all the time for organ, but rarely for handbells; I think it's an underserved market.)
i sincerely do not know what you are doing here. are you lost? were you
looking for your delicate calico cat, and did you follow her up two flights of stairs
to this room? she is not here. she was here, yes. we gave her a warm bowl of milk, we talked with her about campaign finance reform for a time, and then she bid us good day. i believe she was
going to the post office two blocks down, but i don't quite recall.
for surely you did
not find your way from prinsiana, the least traveled site on
the internet. if you did, though, perhaps you are looking for humor. perhaps you are looking for profundity. perhaps you are looking for answers.
i'm sorry, but you shall go naught-for-three.
