Applause, with variations

Applause changes with the times and the situation.

30 Obscure Scholarships That Actually Exist

Many thanks to Jasmine Hall of http://onlinecolleges.net for sharing this post! by Staff Writers November 28, 2011 If you’ve been doing lots of searching for a scholarship, it’s probably no surprise to you that weird prizes exist. You can win money for college by duck calling, being a Star Trek fan, and even just for [...]

Concert postponed: the continuing saga

Church events can affect concert scheduling more than you know.

What Irene can teach us about learning music

How prepared were you for Hurricane Irene? How do you prepare for the unexpected when you practice?

Sometimes it’s the little things

My ancestors were Dutch.  As a people, the Dutch are known for finding joy in little things, and for their expertise in collaborating with others. They are also known to excel at water sports.  I can claim that, too! Since I often notice little things that other people don’t, necessarily, I thought that especially in this weak [...]

Piano Class Moments

Teaching piano classes was part of my undergraduate and graduate assistantships.  Later on, the School of Continuing Education at UMass/Amherst offered piano classes for no credit, which I was hired to teach.  Typically, 8 of 1o students in each class were from outside the U.S. Every group of students was, of course, different.  Stuff happened! [...]

8 Pros and a Chorus

This post is dedicated to the memory of Gil* and Mary Robbins, and in honor of their children,  Adele, Gabrielle, Tim, and David. While living in New York, I was the accompanist for the Occasional Singers, a chorus conducted by Gil Robbins that performed avante-garde music. Gil’s wife, Mary, sang second alto, and daughters Adele [...]

Call in the Cavalry!

All of us have received last-minute phone calls from people who sound absolutely desperate.  We need you!  The earth will stop turning if you don’t play! So you drop everything, cancel appointments and dinner/movie arrangements, get ahold of the music somehow (usually by calling every other accompanist you know ~ the call came so late, the [...]

The funnies

Now that school is out in many places, I thought it might be a good time for a few laughs.  Here goes! Worst possible high school moment One day in chorus rehearsal, we worked on a piece where the conductor made a big deal out of the Grand Pause about half way through.  We then [...]

Teaching the individual

Teaching is a fascinating thing.  For me, tapping into the unique way in which each person learns produces the best possible results. Most of my students are age 16 and older.  Because they are taking lessons for one reason ~ they want to ~ they have no juries, exams, grades, or requirements. So there is no list [...]