Richard Willmer

I am a pianist and one time recorder player and I have some experience with the violin.

I began composing even before I knew anything about composition and actually made a real composer smile at my efforts. None of these early works survive.

As time went on and I changed from the contralto recorder to the piano, and began studying harmony and counterpoint, I took up composition in a more serious manner. I wrote several original works for the piano, as well as some arrangements of folk and popular songs. these survived and will be published shortly.

I gave up composition because at the time, the early 90s, it seemed to me there was no place for my style of music. It was only two or three years ago that I began listening to contemporary music that is actually pleasant to hear. That was the moment I said to myself, "but I was writing music like that!"

My daughter's learning of the violin at a prestigious music school also helped. I began again to compose, arranging and composing music that she and I could play together. The first fruit of this new phase was the sonata for violin and piano in D major, which has now been published.

Having recently learnt how to use computer programmes to "engrave" music, I have revised most of my oeuvre and have written new pieces, some educational, for violin and piano, and other works of greater complexity.

I hope you enjoy my site.