Tom Holmes has studied music composition at the University of Michigan and Ohio University.  After getting his masters degree, Thomas spent a few years as a dance accompanist for various studios across Chicago including the Oak Park Academy for the Arts, the Chicago Academy for the Arts, Visceral Dance Center, and Loyola University.  In this same period, he began playing for Silent Movies on the Porch at Pleasant Home in Oak Park.  His music has been performed at dance recitals at Loyola University as well as by the Momenta dance company.  Additionally, the Salt Creek Music Teacher’s Association commissioned Thomas Holmes to write a composition, and the resulting“Astronaut Express” was performed at Glorious Grands - A Piano Extravaganza by 16 young musicians on 8 pianos. 

Eventually, Tom's career led away from music as a main job and he now works as an actuary in Chicago while composing and playing music in his spare time.  His current goals are to write pieces for solo piano and high school level concert band. 

Thomas’ recent solo piano works require the pianist to focus on solid voicing technique.  His work “Seraph” often has three simultaneous melodies, while “Grace” requires the pianist to bring out the upper notes of arpeggios to create a melody.  His newest work [yet to be titled] features a section in the middle where eight measures are repeated with the only difference being to feature the inner voice as the foreground instead of the upper voice. 

Casually, Tom is writing songs to sing with piano or banjo accompaniment for small groups and open mics.  These will not be featured on this website.  The joy of creating music can be diminished when creating music becomes a job.  This joy has been hard to preserve when creativity needs to be marketed to be deemed valuable.  Tom has no illusions that he will be the next singer/songwriter - he will never put out an album, never share this work with the world at large.  Despite this, casual composing is extremely rewarding. Tom believes that what makes art valuable does not depend on measures of outward success - it depends on how it makes you feel. He would encourage everyone to create art where they can and support art where they are able. The best performances aren’t the ones that are technically precise - the best performances are full of emotion.