N Alabama choral student gets piece published

Date: August 30, 2012

By Pace Holdbrooks

FLORENCE, AL -- What began as a school project has now made Drew Mills, a senior at UNA, a published composer. Mills now owns the rights to “All Blessings Flow,” a choral arrangement he had published through St. James Music Press.The song is Mills’ adaption of the familiar hymn “Old Hundredth,” commonly used as a doxology in church services. Along with being published, the arrangement was recorded by members of the Grammy-winning male vocal ensemble Chanticleer.

The arrangement began as part of a weeklong project assigned in a choral techniques class taught by Ian Loeppky, associate professor of music. The project was to arrange a popular melody into a choral piece for 16 bars of music, Loeppky said. He intended to challenge students to think on their feet to prepare them for a career in music education.

Mills said he chose to adapt the “Old Hundredth” melody because he was familiar with the song and said it was easy to work with for the assignment. While Mills considered the project to be an experiment, his professor was impressed with the results.

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