arrange • compose • conduct
Can you say this to your students? “Everything we do has a reason” is a message I remember hearing many times from Steve Zegree during my time in Gold Company. He followed it by saying, “If you don’t know, just ask.” It’s not essential that we always share the reasons […]
What are your goals for a performance? Goals? Obviously, the goal is to perform your music well! What else? Actually, there are a lot of different and overlapping goals you can have as a performer; some are audience-facing and some are performer-facing. Audience-Facing Performer-Facing All of these and many more […]
A recent request from the brilliant composer/conductor David Von Kampen in the Facebook Vocal Jazz Educators group sent me down a rabbit hole, so I’m sharing the request and my answer here. I ended up with two playlists. One from the pros and one from academic groups. Enjoy! (Note: I […]
The more discrete and actionable you can make the steps of an educational goal, the better. After graduate school, I had to decide to call myself a musician. It took getting used to, and I think the reason is that I was used to calling myself a music major or […]
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 […]
An overlooked part of the a commissioning party’s job comes after the premiere. So many wonderful commissioned works disappear into filing cabinets after their premieres. And whether a piece has a life depends a lot on it finding a second performance, a second performing ensemble, after that premiere. So I […]
A brand new arrangement from Gene Puerling dropped today, courtesy of Chanticleer! Gene Puerling is a towering presence in the world of jazz and choral arranging. Having passed away just over 15 years ago, I wouldn’t have expected to hear brand new Puerling arrangements today; but a discovery in the […]
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 […]
How do you help students take a Cabaret/Lounge-style solo to the next level? I watched a student rehearse with a big band yesterday, and offered these three tips. I share them because I find them to be near-universal in applicability.
When did you learn the songs that you know cold? There are songs I sang 25 years ago that I could probably perform competently tomorrow. Maybe even without the music between now and the performance. Some of them are intricate arrangement by Darmon Meader or Gene Puerling. But if I […]