arrange • compose • conduct
How much of a contingency plan do you have as an educator/conductor? I think a lot about this – usually when I get sick shortly before a concert. And what I come up with is always the same: plan on a snow day. In other words, assume that your penultimate […]
Traditions happen fast. Sometimes faster than they should. Do something once, it’s a nascent tradition. Do something twice and it’s a bona fide tradition – not to be messed with! Of course, you can mess with traditions, change things over time, revise and even cancel things that have been traditions. […]
To climb a higher mountain, you might have to look somewhere else. When you’re thinking about next school year, maybe you think, “A lot like this year, but I’ll make improvements and aim even higher.” That’s an admirable motivation. But it might be futile. In mathematics, the idea of local […]
Some pieces just…resist memorization. In my experience, the toughest pieces to memorize are not necessarily the most complex, or longest, or difficult. Indeed, it tends to surprise me when an ensemble struggles to put down their music. For the piece that my ensemble is dueling with at the moment, I […]
Part of experience is knowing what’s coming more often. The stress of novelty – even good novelty – can be overwhelming. For example, today I am taking 43 high school students to Spain. Some of them have never left our state before, let alone the country. I have little doubt […]
What will rehearsal be like if I’m not there? I consider it my goal to teach myself out of a job by the end of the school year. (Never worrying, of course, because a new group with new needs will be with me soon.) That means that my ensemble should […]
Communication is key. It’s easy to choose the shortest necessary communication. We’re all overworked, we’re all stressed. But for the sake of long-term relationships, we have to choose surplus communication. Extra words show respect, show collegiality. They tell the people we’re working with that we value them. This could look […]
This is where we start. I think the best educators, leaders, and collaborators have love in common. Above any skill, above any vision is love. The best educators combine a love for their subject matter with a love for each student who comes into their classroom. They love each student […]
Students can learn from watching their teachers try, fail, and try again. You’d think that consistency in one place would imply consistency in another. But even though I write every day here, with no gaps in close to 9 years, I am utterly unreliable in my weekly notes to my […]
Know how to recognize that. Sometimes I’m talking to the whole ensemble. Sometimes I’m talking to one person through the ensemble, so they don’t feel singled out. Sometimes it’s in between. To know whether I’m talking to you, you have to be engaged in the rehearsal. You have to have […]