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Our profession is a little bit crazy. When you hear stories of schools that are so flooded in the spring that carp are swimming in the basement – but the school district can’t convince their community to support improvements. When legislators are repeatedly–repeatedly–eviscerating school policy at the state and national level, all the […]

Peter Shaffer, the playwright best known for his Tony and Oscar Award-Winning Amadeus died this week. I was lucky enough to be in the audience at a talkback about the play that he presented in the mid-nineties at the Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada. They had mounted a truly outstanding production, featuring Brian […]

Enjoy this lovely new work from Michael McGlynn and Anúna. It’s on their new album “Sunshine | Shadows” out this week. Michael has the compositional skill to sound so fresh and so timeless all at once – combining elements of jazz, choral, folk, and more into his writing. It’s a tricky needle […]

How did this happen? I’m here at my least favorite day in having a select choir. Auditions are a necessary evil, but they are an inevitable source of disappointment. This year,  I moved my audition day for my ensemble from the first week of school to the last week, so  this is […]

Choir directors have to have both: you have to be in the moment, reacting immediately to everything from kids falling off risers to emotional breakdowns to out-of-tune final chords to fire drills. But you also have to have the arc in mind, always. The arc to the concert, the arc […]

“Graduation is a beginning, not an ending,” I found myself saying to a senior student yesterday. It sounds a little trite, but it’s absolutely the truth. It’s the beginning of more freedom, more choice, more direction, more passion. Now, how you handle those things can very quickly make it seem […]

This is a follow up to my post about the current Michigan bill that would profoundly alter the Michigan high school curriculum and eliminate the fine arts requirement entirely. My father took my advice and wrote to his state congressman. In his handwritten response, the congressman makes two arguments that I have to […]

Life shifts can all at once: kids starting kindergarten (or college), retirement, even the first day of summer break. One day your life is consistent; suddenly, profoundly different. There is a certain amount of preparation you can take for these tectonic shifts, but beyond a certain point, you have to commit to what I’ve come […]

A final concert is a chance to reflect on the journey of the year, and here’s the thought I keep having after last night’s Rockford Aces Concert. It’s not where you start, it’s where you end up. The 13 guys will tell you that their first rehearsal would not be an accurate predictor […]

Tonight I get to try something totally new: the premiere of a new ensemble. When we created the idea of RAMChoir, it was to give an extra opportunity for more tenor/bass singers, and to attempt to positively affect the culture of the school. I think we’ve achieved that: tonight we’ll have 40 singers on stage, including 2 […]