Playing With Wolfgang: Stories, Images, Colors, & Characters
"What is going on in this passage?", asked my new teacher. I responded by giving him what I thought was a crackerjack harmonic analysis. "Yes, he said but why?" I…
We Don’t Need No Stinking Board Games
“We don’t play board games in my studio.” I’ve been told this many times over the years. The reasons have varied. Piano learning is serious business. I don’t have time…
PA Shorts: Finding Waldo
“You need to find Waldo,” I said. It was true. Maggie was working on polishing the Bartok Sonatina and it needed character, action, detail, and nuance to truly come to…
PA Shorts: On Forging A Personal Musical Connection
I'm always encouraging students to find something personal in their music—something from their own lives and experience. Often, they look at me like I have lobsters crawling out of my…
The Anti-Masterclass
Antimatter: Any substance that, when combined with an equal amount of matter, results in the complete and direct conversion of all substance to energy. () Anti-Masterclass: Any masterclass that, when…
PA Shorts: Sound Images
It’s that time of year again—time for the college fall recital. We always try to do something unique and different (put on a show) so that the audience is glad…
PA Shorts: 42
Years ago, I was giving a workshop on encouraging musicality and creativity in elementary students. The teachers were interested and very eager to learn. It was a great group, but…
Creativity, Luck, and Inventional Wisdom
There was a super post on creativity by Wendy Stevens at Compose Create this week. In it, she linked to the article, 10 Creativity Tips by Donald Miller and highlighted the…