Clifton Williams

The following is a partial list of Clifton Williams's band compositions. Works marked with an asterisk are unpublished. • Academic Processional (1960) • Air Force Band of the West (1964) • Arioso (1958) • Ballade (1944) • Band of the Hour (1968)* • Border Festival (1966) • Caccia and Chorale (1976) • Cadets on Parade (1965) • Caprice Americana (1944) • Castle Gap (1964) • Concertino for Percussion and Band (1958) • Dedicatory Overture (1964) • Dramatic Essay (1958) • Dramatic Variations (1975) • Fanfare and Allegro (1954, rev 1956) • Festival (1961) • Future Music Leaders of America March (1974) • Hall of Fame March (1940) • Henderson Festival (1967) • Hermitage (1975) • Hero March, The (1938) • Hill Country Ballad (1956) • Killian (1968) • Laredo (1963) • Louisiana Tech Band March, The (1940) • Lyric Psalm (1957)* • March Lamar (1964) • Pandean Fable (1965) • Pastorale (1958) • Patriots (1970) • Postwar Prelude (1943) • Ramparts (1965) • Regal Procession (1957) • Roll of Honor March (1939) • Show Tune (1944) • The Sinfonians (1960) • Solemn Fugue (1960) • Sonata Allegro (1949) • Songs of Heritage (1975, completed by W. Francis McBeth in 1978 at the request of the composer's widow) • Strategic Air Command March (1965) • Symphonic Dances (1963–1965; Nrs. 2 and 3 published) • Nr. 1: "Comanche Ritual" • Nr. 2: "Military Ball: The Maskers" • Nr. 3: "Fiesta" • Nr. 4: "Square Dance" • Nr. 5: "New Generation" • Symphonic Essays (1953) • Symphonic Suite (1957) • I: Intrada • II: Chorale • III: March • IV: Antique Dance • V: Jubilee • Texas Bands (1969)* • Toccata (1953)* • Trail Scenes (1968) • I: Round Up • II: Nighthawk • III. Railhead • Tribute to Barney Chance (ms, 1973)* • Trilogy for Band (1964) • I: Declamation • II: Elegy • III: Quickstep March • Variation Overture (1962)

Williams' early compositions were for orchestra, but he would later achieve his greatest success writing for concert band. One of his earliest works, Fanfare and Allegro, was completed in 1954 but was considered, at the time, exceptionally difficult by the bands (including some military bands) that attempted to perform it. In particular, a military band struggled mightily with the work at a performance at the 1954 Brownsville, Texas Music Festival. Thus, Williams laid the work aside for some time. The American Bandmasters Association then announced its first Ostwald Composition Prize in the winter of 1955. Williams slightly revised Fanfare and Allegro and entered it into this contest. Fanfare and Allegro won the inaugural American Bandmasters Association's Ostwald Award for original band literature in 1956. The first performance of the revised work, at the 1956 ABA convention, won rave reviews and the work moved rapidly to the forefront of serious wind literature. Williams won the award again in 1957 for his Symphonic Suite. Williams entered the competition for a third time in 1958 with an earlier work, his Symphonic Essays of 1953, but withdrew from the competition the day before the winner was to be announced, feeling that winning a new competition a third consecutive time would discourage other equally worthy composers. It was not revealed until several years later that Symphonic Essays was, in fact, set to be the winner of the 1958 ABA prize. The Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation commissioned Williams to compose a work celebrating the 25th anniversary of the San Antonio Symphony Orchestra (circa its 1964–1965 season). He composed a set of five symphonic dances, of which he would later transcribe two for concert band: Nr. 2, "The Maskers", and Nr. 3, "Fiesta". His protégé W. Francis McBeth, in 2000, recast the first dance ("Comanche Ritual") for band; the parts for it remain in manuscript in the possession of Williams' daughter, Michelle Williams Hanzlik. Dances 4 and 5 ("Square Dance" and "New Generation") also have been adapted for band, so that since 2007 a few performances of the entire set of five dances have been given. The primary publishers of Williams's wind music have included Southern Music, Summy Birchard, Piedmont, C. L. Barnhouse, and University of Miami Music Publications. As of 2011, ten more of his band compositions have been published by Maestro & Fox Music by arrangement with the composer's estate. These previously unknown works include Dramatic Variations, Sonata Allegro, Show Tune, Caprice Americana, Postwar Prelude, Louisiana Tech Band's March, Roll of Honor March, "Symphonic Essays", Hall of Fame March, Ballade, "Pandean Fable", and The Hero March. More first-time publications were slated for the 2010s, some four decades after the composer's death. The New Jersey City University's Symphony of Winds and Percussion revived Williams's unpublished Symphonic Essays in the spring of 2013. Clifton Williams considered The Ramparts his favorite work. Commissioned by the United States Air Force Academy, the work contains an a cappella hymn, "What Greater Thing", that has become the unofficial alma mater song and has been performed at every USAFA commencement ceremony since 1965. Williams's wife, Maxine, wore a charm bracelet adorned with six charms, each one representing a significant band work by her husband; the charm for The Ramparts made up the central piece.