John Milne
Composer
/ Villa Park, Illinois
Member since July 2019
e-mail: johnmilne@sprynet.com
Born in the US to British immigrant parents, John grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and has lived in Chicago for the past 25 years. After a long career writing, arranging and singing pop (The Toons, two-time Gold Cabaret Award winners and early MTV act), alt-country (Long Gone Lonesome Boys with over one million I-Tunes and Spotify downloads) and a cappella (with three-time Harmony Sweepstakes winners Chicago Voice Exchange), he has turned to composing more serious choral music in recent years, becoming a published composer and winning numerous national and international composition contests
My Style
Neo-classical, 80% Bach, 10% jazz, 10% Swedish folk music
Featured Compositions
Listen to works by John Milne
now playing
Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead
SATB
A setting of a beautiful Tennyson poem
now playing
The Cloak, the Boat, and the Shoes
SATB
Composed at the height of the Covid pandemic, this is a setting of a Yeats poem about one of the best purposes of art: to transmute sorrow into something useful and beautiful.
now playing
The Virgin's Lullaby Lament
a cappella (SSAA)
A setting of the saddest carol lyric I've ever heard, a good change of pace in a Christmas concert
now playing
When All the World's Asleep
SATB
A setting of an wonderful Irish Christmas poem. This is available from Pavane/Hal Leonard/J W Pepper
now playing
Do You Know the Song that the Angels Sang?
SATB
A nice "gloria" for Christmas. This is available from Pavane/Hal Leonard/J W Pepper
now playing
Soft and Safe to Thee
SATB
A setting of a poem read at funerals
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Bird Song
SATB with soprano solo
An animal rights anthem (no, it's beautiful, really!)
now playing
Per Crucem ad Lucem
SSATB
A setting of the Latin phrase meaning "Through the Cross to the Light" as a five part fugue
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Soldier Boy
SATB with tenor solo
A setting of a heart-breaking WWI poem called "Suicide in the Trenches"
now playing
The Falcon (Corpus Christi Carol)
SATB
A setting of a mystic medieval poem about an astral trip!
now playing
The Winter It is Past
SATB
A setting of a lovely Robert Burns poem
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Everyone Suddenly Burst Out Singing
SSATB
A setting of a Siegfried Sassoon poem inspired by Christmas Eve 1918, when German and English troops heard one another singing carols a declared an improtu truce, came together and sang together to celebrate Christmas.
now playing
Come, Little Leaves
SATB
A setting of a lovely George Cooper poem, perfect for non-religious funerals or fall concerts
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The Jesus Prayer
SSATB
A setting of the Jesus Prayer, which is very important in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, together a quote that often appears on the tombs of Templar Knights in Malta. A hymn of deep repentance and hope.
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In Dead of Night, When All Is Still
SATB
Lovely Christmas carol
now playing
Melchior's Carol
SATB
A carol about the Wise Man who brought myrrh, with a "Gloria in Excelsis" chorus.
now playing
Still Falls the Rain
SSATB
A setting of an Edith Sitwell poem, written during the Blitz of London in 1940, one of the most powerful affirmations of faith in the face of human evil ever written.