arrange • compose • conduct
Life comes in fits and bursts – you don’t know what yesterday’s success will lead to (if anything) and tomorrow’s failure might blast open an unexpected door. The best thing to do is to keep going. It’s the only way to find out what’s going to happen. If you feel […]
“I forgot how to write.” Sometimes, when it’s been a while since I’ve written any music, I can enter a period of feeling like I don’t know how to do it anymore. I feel as if any skills I had built over twenty years had vanished in the week or […]
Spring is here, I hear. Part of the artistry of Rodgers & Hart – alongside Lorenz Hart’s clever, wry, heartfelt lyrics and Richard Rodgers’ beautifully crafted melodies – stems from the fact that their songs are endlessly malleable. Tempo, mood, feel, form, harmony – all can be stretched in service […]
Here’s the mantra that keeps me going through many of life’s daily challenges. I love that I can emphasize virtually any word in the story and find new variations of meaning. Absolutely everything you do is a chance to give love. Absolutely everything you do is a chance to […]
A long time ago, I created a mnemonic for teaching the order of whole-steps and half-steps in a major scale. We Were Happy When We Were Here. (I usually couple it with a joke along the lines of, “Hopefully you’ll say this about your time in this class…”) When, last […]
A prepared, but not perfect, performance early in the year can be a great springboard. Nothing gets passionate music-makers committed to the cause like success coupled with failure. They want to fix their mistakes, they want to move forward from their success. Program early performances just for that reason: to generate […]
Show respect for your singers in every way you can. One great small way to show respect: always start and end on time. Respect their time as a way to show how you respect them.
A choral conductor might joke, “learn to read my mind” when an ensemble is a little slow catching up to them. But the truth is, every ensemble learns to read their conductor’s mind. They know where you’re going back to, they know what piece you’re going to rehearse next, they […]
As you begin to build a new skill, you often hit a point where you feel like you’re getting worse. You feel as if things you once could do well, you no longer can. New materials take longer to learn, and you don’t seem to be able to reach the level of […]
Do you remember the term “limiting reagent” from high school chemistry class? When you were calculating the output of a chemical reaction, the amount of substance formed would be determined by the limiting reagent. Every chemical reaction has at least one limiting reagent. So does every group. In every group […]