arrange • compose • conduct
It’s not that professionals don’t make mistakes, and beginners do. It’s that professionals make idiomatic mistakes. They make mistakes that make internal sense – mistakes that are still in the right tonality, that are still in the right metric feel, that are still in tune and articulated in the right […]
Some conducting jobs are a matter of measured growth over a number of rehearsals, towards an eventual artistic performance. You collaborate to discover the perfect performance for this ensemble, in this moment, on this piece. Other conducting jobs are essentially parachuting in, quickly and effectively teaching notes and rhythms while ensuring that […]
I’ll never forget the prep for a recording session in April, 2000. My ensemble had finished nearly 48-hours of nonstop (and largely improvised) intercontinental travel with a 2-hour homecoming concert. The next morning, my director and mentor joined me in the recording studio early to record some pitch and tempo […]
At the very busiest times of the year, when you’re running from rehearsal to gig to rehearsal to gig (with a little sleep thrown in when possible), you need to go on autopilot to cover some of your responsibilities. You can’t possibly give full attention to everything. This is why […]
“Real Talk: we will only sing this piece, top-to-bottom, a dozen or fewer times before our performance in six weeks. We’ll do more partial runs, rehearsals on sections, etc. But complete runs? Probably closer to six than twelve.” It’s good to have real perspective, and to internalize that time singing […]
I received my first print copy of Downbeat Magazine in over a decade this week – thanks to my new membership in the Jazz Education Network. It got me thinking – there was a time in my life when I devoured Downbeat monthly, cover to cover. I read the features, […]
We’ve tried a little bit of blitz chess around here – 3 minutes total per player. Go. The thing is, it’s really a completely different game. With the massive time restraints, your advance planning must be simple at best, and generally you’re mostly reacting, not acting. Compare that to a […]
The appliances you rely on daily – stove, refrigerator, dishwasher, furnace, water heater, etc. – don’t break often. They are reliable for long stretches of time, because they are (generally) built to last. When it’s time to replace one of them, though, two things are true. It needs to happen […]
In a memorable TED Talk, Apollo Robbins describes pickpocketing as the art of focusing attention. He says, I have to play with techniques to exploit this,to play with your attention as a limited resource. So if I could control how you spend your attention, if I could maybe steal your […]
What motivates busy adults with lives, families, and too many commitments (we all have too many commitments) to spend 10 hours in rehearsal, plus three performances, all in the space of two weeks? They do it for the love of music. Because they feel better, even if more tired, when […]