Work
Suite from "Mister Bones and Mister Jones"
for chamber orchestra
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About
In 1985 Epsom Girls Grammar and Auckland Grammar Schools presented a double bill of two New Zealand plays. Under the overall title of Family Benefits, the plays were Anyway Sweet Christmas by Gordon Dryland, and Mister Bones and Mister Jones by Eve Hughes. Both plays dealt with the family unit and the search for success and recognition. The latter play also demanded a certain amount of incidental music.
Since the production the music has remained unused. At times I have considered extracting a suite of pieces from it, and in early 1991 five pieces were arranged as piano duets. These orchestral arrangements were made in 2004 as part of an on-going to project to give a new life to some of my incidental music written over the years for school productions.
The first and third pieces were originally purely instrumental, whereas the other three were songs. The scoring is a basic classical chamber orchestra (without timpani) including relatively simple percussion parts.
Contents note
Five movements:
1. Rag
2. The Song of Johnny and Gillian
3. Graduation March
4. Mister Bones' Song
5. What More Can You Ask of Life?
Text note
Text from a play by Eve Hughes and lyrics by Michael Evershed