John S. Hilliard

Who is John S. Hilliard?

John Stanley Hilliard is an American composer.

Born 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, 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, was an amateur accordionist and pianist. Hilliard’s grandfather, John Milton Hilliard, had also been well known as a congregational song leader 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.