jedscott

Milestones aren’t destinations. The ancient Romans built them so travelers would know how far they had come, and how far still to go to their goal. When you treat a concert as a destination, you are ignoring the real destination (yearlong goals of artistry, knowledge, teamwork). So I ask my students to think of concerts as […]

Let’s face it: you only do this job if you love it. Here are seven things I love about teaching choir (for Valentine’s Day). Transcendent musical experiences. Helping students make beautiful music that they’ll never forget. Teaching theory. I admit it: I love it when I see a student finally get a music concept. Modes, scales, chords, […]

Nate Silver, the celebrated statistics maven, is above all a brilliant pattern-noticer. As his site has evolved into an organization with employees he is managing, he’s broken down the code for leadership into three strategies. You have three fundamental strategies you can use as a manager, right? Let’s say you think […]

Yesterday I published my post late by several hours. I like to be posted by six, and have been a little late all week thanks to not having the opportunity to write before the morning. Yesterday, I didn’t write because my six-year-old asked to play a game. At 6. A. M. As […]

In college, I loved the soundproofing in the practice rooms, because I wanted to make mistakes only in front of myself. (I didn’t really want to do that, even…) The last week or so has found me working on Mozart’s Twinkle Twinkle Variations, just for fun. I have found myself generally practicing […]

Imagine you are blindfolded in an open area. Your guide tells you that somewhere in front of you, there is a cliff edge, and whoever gets closest to the edge in 4 minutes is the winner. You move foot by painstaking foot, feeling the ground in front of you to ensure […]

There are few people as lucky as I in the parent lottery – and one of my goals as an educator is to teach the lessons I learned in my home. With that in mind, here are three lessons I learned from my mom. Give as much as you can. Whether it was […]

Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do. – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe I try to read that quote every year to my students before a performance where they have the potential to raise their personal and group bars. This year, that was District Solo & […]

Yesterday my son asked, “Who invented math?” I explained that math isn’t invented – it’s discovered. Having 2+2=4 is a symbolic representation of something real in the world: say, picking apples. The symbols were invented and evolved over time in various cultures, but the core of mathematics is true whether you can represent it or not. Pi […]

Artistry is an endless journey, and District Solo & Ensemble Festival is never going to be an endpoint. It is, however, a rest stop along the way. So I do have benchmarks for what I want my ensemble’s performance to reach at this point in the year: Accurate notes, rhythms, and attention to score markings. The sine […]