arrange • compose • conduct
My strength may not be your strength. If you are interested in fitness as a hobby or as a path to wellness, you likely find that there are many kinds of fitness. You might be focused on cardio, as I did when I was running every day. Or you might […]
You can’t be a professional if you’re waiting for the creative mood to strike. You have to plan for it. Indeed, you have to plan a lot, because opportunities to do creative work are often time-limited. There are days of the week I know I won’t have the opportunity to […]
How do you decide level of difficulty for your repertoire? I’m of eight minds (at least). Mind One: Program easier repertoire that students can be successful at while learning and growing. Mind Two: Program Goldilocks repertoire that challenges students without wiping them out. Mind Three: Program tough, tough repertoire that […]
Just stay the right amount ahead. I like to stay ahead in preparing for things. But if you get too far ahead in your preparations, there are several hazards that can pop up. First, your advanced preparations can be unusable, because situations evolve over time. If I’m prepared twelve weeks […]
Teaching is an adventure. It should be. If you aren’t finding every day different – every hour different, even with the same lesson plan! – you have lost what is essential about teaching. Teaching is not about conveying information. That is done more efficiently by books, by Wikipedia, by educational […]
I love the magic of a piece before we sight read it. But it can’t last. Especially when it’s a new commission, the time between having the piece in hand and passing it out to students is particularly magical. First, because I’m the only person in the world who knows […]
If there’s one thing I think you must do to be a good teacher, it’s this. Leave them more curious than you find them. In music, science, literature, mathematics, and every other subject you can name, there are two basic attitudes we can adopt as teachers. Fostering curiosity is harder, […]
Leadership is an earned skill. You can only possibly get better at leading by doing it more. And to really experience it, that means no-net leadership. As a Scoutmaster, I am in the position of being encouraged by the organization to let the leaders do their best, and fail, in […]
Here’s a story of trying to give back by paying forward. I can’t possibly repay my mentors for the way they shaped me. But I can celebrate them, tell them what they mean to me, try to honor them with my own teaching, and when the opportunity presents itself, I […]
How can you not? It’s so often what happens, though. How many students you know who have poured time and effort into activities they clearly don’t love? There can be so many other factors that drive us to do things besides love, but there’s also the complicating factor that sometimes, […]