arrange • compose • conduct
The most we can achieve together in an ensemble are the lowest aspirations of any one member. I refuse to use the phrase the “only as strong as the weakest link” because someone with low aspirations isn’t weaker than anyone else. It’s just that their aims are different. It’s okay […]
I attended a virtual session through Sing! The Toronto Vocal Arts Festival yesterday. They, like everyone else, have pivoted to virtual offerings. I admit I didn’t desperately need Anders Edenroth’s session Recording From Home. I’ve done a lot of recording, both in the home and in the studio, and I’m […]
I attended a great Zoom masterclass led by the great Anders Edenroth, of The Real Group, today. He spent the hour talking about his philosophies of recording, and especially about how to adapt to the new normal and make quality recordings in the home. But I also wrote down this […]
I am preternaturally comfortable with silence as a teacher. But remote teaching is challenging me. I like almost nothing better than the 10-12 seconds of absolute silence that it sometimes requires for students to move past the fight-or-flight reaction to a question, think about it, and come to an answer. […]
When I experience the sensation of writer’s block, a good strategy for me is to make it meta. I write about the writer’s block. I write about strategies that have worked in the past to get me through it. I write about the circumstances that might have led to the […]
At a certain point, we all tend to become accustomed to even the most radical changes in our life. The novelty wears off and we have “adjusted.” Usually. I don’t know about you, but in my experience of 2020, the novelty doesn’t wear off. Perhaps it’s because the novelty of […]
The evenings for the past few weeks in my house have been filled with our first read-aloud of The Hobbit. Our oldest had read it last year as a free choice book in English class, but for the other two kids it’s the first exposure to Middle Earth. The interesting […]
A teacher’s motto should be, “Please surpass me.” Write better than me. Sing and perform better than me. Teach better than me. Surpass me in all ways. My 11-year-old just came back to chess after a few months off. (He was enjoying daily Yahtzee matches in the meantime.) He is […]
I think the reason it took me so long to try out the new software was because I was afraid. I’ve been a Finale user for 25+ years – enough to learn shortcuts for virtually everything I want to do, and solid workarounds for everything it doesn’t do well. I’ve […]
I am watching a Zoom rehearsal led by one of my mentors and remembering the moment I first wanted to arrange music. April had written an arrangement of “Route 66” for my high school vocal jazz group on a flight home from Europe. It was mostly an extended solo feature […]