arrange • compose • conduct
As we enter the last few weeks of the school year, this question always emerges: taper, coast, or accelerate? There are situations for each one. We can brake on learning new music after the last concert, focusing on other music endeavors to wrap up the year. I brake on new […]
I never want to put my ensembles in this position. So much of our students’ lives are in “It all comes down to this” situations. It could be the big football game, auditions for the musical, the SAT, term papers and final exams, GPA, Prom, college acceptance letters, or any […]
Do you balance looking backward and looking around with looking forward? “Just keep moving onAnything you doLet it come from youThen it will be newGive us more to see” from “Move On” in Sunday In The Park With George (music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim) “When I say ‘what’s next?’ […]
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 […]