The name Sondra Tucker is very familiar to handbell directors and ringers. She is in demand as a conductor and clinician, has served on the faculty of numerous HMA events, is a working church musician and remains active in Memphis, Tennessee music circles, all while composing not only handbell pieces, but also choral octavos, organ music and flute ensemble arrangements.

  Sondra’s music is published by most major church music publishing houses, but recently, she began publishing some of her more innovative handbell compositions through her own company, Casa Publications. Exclusively distributed by Jeffers Handbell Supply, these titles run the gamut from original compositions like “Thorncrown Chapel Portrait” to classical transcriptions such as Louis Vierne's “Toccata from Organ Symphony No. 1”, to traditional songs like “Home on the Range”.

  Over the years, Sondra has created a lot of music that for various reasons would be more difficult a mainstream publisher to promote and sell. These compositions included original pieces; novelty pieces; extremely difficult, upper level pieces; and pieces that require 5 octaves of handbells and up. She also had some personal favorites for which she wanted to retain the copyrights.

  The idea of creating her own handbell publishing division was born from her flutist background. The music that she wrote for flute ensemble and flute choir to play at weddings, parties and holidays was being distributed by a specialty music store and she often thought that she’d like to do the same with her handbell music; however the marketing part of the equation was more than she was able to do as an individual.

  A few of the more familiar tunes were a natural fit to have Jeffers sell – songs like “Deep in the Heart of Texas”, “The Chicken Dance”, and “Classical Gas”. It was a logical progression for Jeffers to partner with Sondra for marketing and distribution of her Casa Publications. She is now able to include original works and classical transcriptions that otherwise wouldn’t be available to the handbell community. We are looking forward to where this venture will lead.

  When asked about the concept behind her music, Sondra replied, “My hope is that all Casa Publications will be well-crafted, interesting, and expressive compositions that will fill a niche-within-a-niche of upper-level repertoire for performing ensembles. My Casa music is mostly original, classical, or secular right now, because I feel that the sacred market is fairly well represented these days elsewhere.”

  Her main goal for the upcoming year is to compose and add titles to the catalog that will complement the existing selections. The ultimate goal is to become one of the go-to publishers for directors/clinicians when they are planning concerts or Bronze-level events.

  Visit Handbell World to view Casa Publications’ Fall 2016 and Fall 2015 catalogs. Videos of various groups performing Sondra’s works can be found on her webpage at http://www.sondratucker.com/media.html. Follow her on Facebook and/or Twitter or contact her via email at sondratucker@gmail.com.