John Stanley Hilliard (October 29, 1947 – November 15, 2019) was an American composer.
Born in Hot Springs, Arkansas, United states, into a family of musical amateurs, John Hilliard began his musical training by studying piano at the age of 6 from his cousin, Barbara Dodson, a local piano teacher and composer. His father, Sherlon Hilliard (of Irish and Anglo-Saxon descent), possessed a fine tenor voice and was a popular gospel-style singer with their county Protestant Church of the Nazarene congregations. While his mother, Laurine H. Hilliard (of Scottish descent), was an amateur accordionist and pianist. Hilliard’s grandfather, John Milton Hilliard, had also been well known as a congregational song leader (shaped-note tradition) for the rural areas of central Arkansas in the 1930s and 1940s. By age 11 Hilliard showed an interest in composing. At the age of 8, he had begun playing trumpet in the elementary band and was taught by the same elementary music teacher as President Bill Clinton, who was a childhood friend. They later both shared another influential music teacher, Virgil Spurlin, during their years together in the Hot Springs High School Band. In 1964 Hilliard played at all-state band under W. Francis McBeth, who would later become his first composition teacher for four years at Ouachita Baptist University, Arkadelphia, Arkansas. Hilliard would earn his Bachelor of Music degree there in 1969 in horn performance, education and theory-composition. He studied piano, horn, trumpet, cello and conducting during these years at Ouachita. Hilliard later, in 1972, received his Masters of Music degree in composition and conducting at Virginia Commonwealth University. During his years at VCU, Hilliard studied briefly with famed African-American composer William Grant Still.
Hilliard's music has had performances in Austria, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands, South America, the United Kingdom and the United States including performances at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Merkin Concert Hall and at numerous new music festivals. His orchestral works have been performed by the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra and the Richmond Symphony Orchestra. His piano concerto No. 1, "Okeanos", was premiered in 2000 by pianist Eric Ruple with the James Madison University Wind Symphony at the College Band Directors National Association Conference. Hilliard's second piano concerto was commissioned by the Staunton Music Festival (Virginia) and had its premiere there at the Blackfriars Playhouse in 2004, with the composer conducting. In 2006, the James Madison University Wind Symphony premiered his "Variations on a Theme from 'L'oiseau de feu'".
Hilliard had composed four symphonies; three piano concerti; a trumpet concerto; sonatas for piano, violin, and cello; works for wind ensemble; and various other chamber works, including two song cycles. In 1973 he studied composition with George B. Wilson, University of Michigan at Interlochen. Hilliard received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. in 1983. From 1981 to 1985 he did four years post-doctoral composition study at Southern Methodist University with Donald Erb, and one year of study at the University of Texas, Austin with the American expatriate French composer, Eugene Kurtz, of Jobert publications, Paris, France.
In 1973, during his years working at the Interlochen Arts Academy, Interlochen, Michigan, Hilliard was encouraged by Thor Johnson, then conductor of the Nashville Symphony, by his requesting him to compose a work for the Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra. This was Hilliard's "The Grand Traverse: Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra", which was premiered at Interlochen's Corson Auditorium by the orchestra in 1975 with Byron Hanson conducting and John Lindenau on solo trumpet.
In 1981 Hilliard was awarded a summer residency position and commission from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. His first symphony was chosen in an American Orchestra League competition for premiere by Leonard Slatkin for the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra in 1989. Hilliard has won annual ASCAP Awards, a commission from the International Horn Society and the first-place award in the Virginia Music Teachers Association's commissioned composer contest for 1992.
President Bill Clinton requested Hilliard to compose a fanfare for his first inauguration in 1993.