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Gretchen Saathoff

~ Collaborative Pianist/Vocal Coach ~ forging partnerships, making memorable music together

Tag Archives: New York Times

How much does practice factor into elite performance?

28 Monday Jul 2014

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, career, determination, directed practice, focus, goals, learning, music, performing, practice, preparation, process, repetition, tools, variety

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Tags

New York Times, Practice (learning method), Psychological Science

 

Carnegie Hall

According to a July 14, 2014 article in The New York Times, practice may contribute only 20-25% of the edge needed to reach an elite level of performance.  A 1993 study, by contrast, places that factor at 80%.

I have to say that I still think 20-25% is a significant percentage.

Read the article and see how you react.  

The last paragraph, in my opinion, says it all:

But in the end, the most important factor over which people have control — whether juggling, jogging or memorizing a script — may be not how much they practice, but how effectively they use that time.

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Humility, self-centeredness, and a discovery

25 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, choosing program, collaboration, integrity, links, music, NY Times, organ

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Frank Bruni, John Boda, Maine Maritime Museum, New York Times

Shipwrights from Francisco de Orellana's exped...

Shipwrights from Francisco de Orellana’s expedition building a small brigantine, the San Pedro. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On Tuesday evening, I had the pleasure of watching this television show about Bath and Camden, Maine.  

Dave Garrison, of maritimeme.org, provided the above link to the entire video on YouTube.  Length:  00:28:22.  Thanks so much, Dave!

The environs are truly gorgeous.  Building a replica of Maine’s First Ship appears to involve an entire town.  The seafood looks wonderful.  The Maine Maritime Museum looks intriguing!  Lighthouses are everywhere!

My interest in nautical subjects must be related to my Friesian ancestry.  I am an excellent swimmer, former lifeguard and Red Cross swimming instructor for children with cerebral palsy.  In addition, I worked at a maritime law firm in New York for two years.  Especially compared to corporate law, it was quite interesting.

A discovery

Last Sunday, a chance discovery started me thinking about how to write this blog post.  In choosing music for the service, there seemed to be less to go on than usual.  How to proceed?  I decided to look for a prelude and postlude to coordinate with the hymns.

The postlude I found was “He Who Would Valiant Be” by John Boda, based on a hymn with the same text.  (There is more than one musical setting.)  In order to ensure that there was a connection with my line of thinking concerning the service, I had to search for the hymn, which was unfamiliar to me.

Two versions are included in the “Lutheran Service Book and Hymnal,” 1958.

Two friends tell me they grew up singing the second version.

The conclusion I reached from the text is this:  no matter where you are in life, you did not arrive there solely under your own power.  Even if you think you had  little help, the obstacles standing in your way provided challenges to overcome.  You have never existed in a vacuum.

So why would you promote your own agenda in isolation?

Two essays in The New York Times caught my attention.  They focus on similar themes.  Both are by Frank Bruni:

  • Ted Cruz’s Flinty Path   9/24/13
  • The Pope’s Radical Whisper   9/22/13

How do these themes relate to each other?

My train of thought here is centered around the antithesis of egotism.  This does not mean denying one’s own talent or self-worth.  But if egotism is all there is, collaboration is impossible.

Can one be very self-confident and have humility?  I would cite two examples that say “yes.”

  • Rafael Nadal certainly knows how talented he is.  If he constantly denied that, how many titles would he win?
  • The ship building project in Bath provides a wonderful opportunity to observe collaboration on display.
    • The master shipbuilder who is leading the project is a volunteer.
    • When a huge beam needed to be placed, taking up the length of the ship, a large number of men worked together, making sure it was straight.  When they had finished, each pair of men shook hands, reaching over the beam.
    • The project features a training program, starting with children as young as middle school.  12-year-olds were shown working on the ship, completely focused on their tasks and doing exemplary work.

We have all encountered situations where collaboration would have been helpful.  From time to time, someone’s ego will get in the way, making the surrounding atmosphere uncomfortable for everyone involved.

My plan is to remain aware of how my own ego might interfere when working with others.  This has been an ongoing focus of mine for over a year.  I’m happy to say I’m improving!

What do you think?  Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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Legends

01 Friday Jun 2012

Posted by GretchensPianos in a tribute, article, choosing program, collaboration, concert, inspiration, integrity, music

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Tags

Doc Watson, John & Bucky Pizzarelli, legendary musicians, New York Times, personal anecdotes

Doc Watson

Doc Watson (Photo credit: armadilo60)

The articles for which links appear below, from this week’s New York Times, include personal anecdotes about the legendary musicians Doc Watson and Bucky and John Pizzarelli.  They are well worth reading, and poignant as well.

Generations (Bucky and John Pizzarelli album)

Generations (Bucky and John Pizzarelli album) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

To Hear Doc Watson, You Really Had to See Him
by the guitarist Ry Cooder

Doc Watson, an appreciation
by Verlyn Klinkenborg

Father and Son, and Other Pairings, concert review
by Stephen Holden

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

Summer Concerts

See complete details about Rocky Hill Concerts. 4 Sunday afternoons in July in air-conditioned comfort!

E-book

“Goal-oriented Practice: How to Avoid Traps and Become a Confident Performer” gives every musician a fresh perspective!

My book frees up time to learn more music, memorize, or do something else entirely!

“Goal-oriented Practice” is also available in print!

Goal-oriented Practice

sold in 8 countries!

Review by pianist Robert W. Oliver

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Happy Birthday, 3-year old!

05 Thursday Apr 2012

Posted by GretchensPianos in music, Thank you!

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

arts, blogging, Happy Birthday!, New York Times, writing

Happy Birthday to You!

Happy Birthday to You! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My blog is 3 years old today!

The stats

GretchensPianos has scored some nice stats along the way:

481 posts

1,709 comments

readers from 84 countries since 2/25/12 (as far back as the stats go)

What’s next?

My intention is to continue to share things that catch my interest, elaborate about my thought process, and communicate with readers.

Thank you!

Thank you to everyone who has commented, made suggestions, and taken the time to read my posts and the links I have included along the way.

Link to a book review

There are fascinating thoughts about creativity in this review from last Sunday’s New York Times (4/1/12).

Thanks so much for your interest.

Your suggestions are always welcome!

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

E-books

“Goal-oriented Practice: How to Avoid Traps and Become a Confident Performer” gives every musician a fresh perspective!

My book frees up time to learn more music, memorize, or do something else entirely!

“Goal-oriented Practice” is also available in print!

Goal-oriented Practice

sold in 8 countries!

Review by pianist Robert W. Oliver

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Applause, with variations

24 Friday Feb 2012

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, cadenzas, expression, music, the unexpected

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Applause, Carnegie Hall, concert, Maryland, New York Times, Riverside Church

English: Clapping hands 中文: 鼓掌

Image via Wikipedia

When is applause acceptable? Is it sometimes out of place?

This topic has been in my mind since last Sunday morning, when my choir was applauded immediately after singing the anthem.

My feeling was that applause was most welcome at that moment. In thinking it over after the service, many varied scenarios ran through my head.

Early on

While growing up in the Midwest, applause was never heard in church, whether that be a service or a concert.

A later surprise

Many years later, I was taken by surprise when playing a concert in a church in Maryland with a cellist. When we entered to begin the concert, there was no applause.

Things had changed.  In an earlier time, I would not have expected to hear applause in a church.

Audience questions

Programs often included a line encouraging applause during concerts held in churches. Audiences were frequently unsure what the norm was, and it changed from place to place.

Another audience instruction sometimes appears that requests no applause until the end of a group in the program. (Applause after ever song in a voice recital can add a lot of time to a program, as well as interrupting the theme of a set or story line of a cycle.)

Spontaneous reaction

A few years after the Maryland concert, I attended a service at The Riverside Church in New York in which the sermon received a standing ovation!

This was a first in my experience. The preacher had been channeling his Pentecostal roots, and the congregation was appreciative.

Other genres

In other genres, such as jazz and opera, applause during performances is expected. Think of especially well-navigated solos and ensemble sections, for example.

Just last week

A concert review published last Monday in The New York Times included the following quote:

Mr. Norrington encouraged applause after Mr. Denk stormed with aplomb through Beethoven’s long, wild cadenza.

That means that the audience at Carnegie Hall applauded at the end of the 1st movement!

My opinion so far

It strikes me that applause probably varies depending on geographical location, venue, and type of audience.

If applause is spontaneous, but not an uninformed response (i.e. following every song), and doesn’t feel forced, then it can be a wonderful thing.

What have you encountered in your own performances or in concerts you’ve attended?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

E-books

“Goal-oriented Practice: How to Avoid Traps and Become a Confident Performer” gives every musician a fresh perspective!

My book frees up time to learn more music, memorize, or do something else entirely!

“Goal-oriented Practice” is also available in print!

Goal-oriented Practice

sold in 8 countries!

August 2011 review by pianist Robert W. Oliver

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How Decision Fatigue Can Affect Musicians

26 Friday Aug 2011

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, auditions, career, concentration, directed practice, fatigue, focus, learning, music, new insights, practice, process, work

≈ 14 Comments

Tags

arts, Decision making, fatigue, glucose level, John Tierney, Music, New York Times, New York Times Magazine

sleepy?

Image by loudtiger via Flickr

Last week during a shopping trip to CVS, I looked for Band-aids.  You wouldn’t expect to encounter problems shopping for Band-aids, would you?  Think again!  CVS was sold out of the plain ones.

I found myself faced with an entire aisle of choices:  medicated, sport, extra-wide, fingertip, waterproof, super adhesive, sheer, cloth, and so on.  By the time I had looked at everything on the shelves, I was ready to leave the store without purchasing anything else on my list.

There is a wonderful article by John Tierney in The New York Times Sunday Magazine, “To Choose Is To Lose.”  In it, Tierney begins by examining the odds of a prisoner being given parole, depending on what time of day he meets with the parole board (and how recently the board has had a snack break).  After that, he includes several experiments conducted on a variety of ideas from different disciplines.

What I encountered at CVS is called “decision fatigue.”  We are faced with so many choices every day, we are constantly making decisions.  Our grandparents had far fewer decisions to make because they had fewer options.  Cars, for instance, came in only a few different colors.  And all phone calls were made on land lines.  (Last night, I made the following calls in an attempt to reach one person:  cell to cell; land to cell; land to land.  Success!  Score:  3 options tried out of 4 possibilities.)

In one experiment discussed in the article, subjects who were asked to make all their choices online about a car they were going to purchase experienced decision fatigue the quickest when asked to decide among 50 colors at the beginning of the process.  After all that brain work, subjects would continue by making only default choices.  (Oh, just put hubcaps on the car.  Click…)  But if fewer choices were presented at the beginning of the process (i.e. 3 types of gear shift knobs rather than 50 color choices), the subjects would keep deciding among them for a longer period of time.

How does this affect us? 

When we practice, we need to take on the most difficult music or tasks at the beginning of the practice session.  When we are deciding on fingerings, dynamics, tempi, balance, and many other things, each decision makes our brains more fatigued, making it less capable of making such decisions further into our practice session.

I experienced this over a 6-week period when practicing a recital program at night after work.  Since I normally practice in the daytime, it was obvious right away that my energy level was much lower at night.  In addition, the program was all music of Messiaen!  There were so many accidentals, I needed all the focus I could muster just to play the notes correctly.  Somehow I managed to talk myself through the music with good phrasing, under tempo.  Weekends were the only time I could actually play the program!

Why is timing important? 

Parole boards are more alert when their glucose levels are high, so they tend to be more lenient by a huge percentage just after a snack.  According to the article, a prisoner would have about a 70% chance of being granted parole if he met with the board first thing in the morning, but only about a 10% chance later in the day.

If you have ever taught a lesson immediately after school, you know how much better things are when the student has time for a snack first.

When we audition, there is usually a panel of judges hearing many people.  The best times to schedule an audition are first thing, immediately after a break, or right after lunch.  Of course, there are many other factors influencing music judges’ decisions, as there are more factors affecting a performance than staying in jail or getting parole.  I have blogged about factors affecting auditions here.  But even though we can’t control everything, optimal timing will help our chances.

Sometimes we call music directors to gain information, get on their list, or arrange performances.  The kind of response we receive can depend on when we call.  Best times:  Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday from 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

Why?  On Mondays, people are wishing they were still enjoying their weekend.  On Fridays, everyone is thinking about leaving for the next one.  At 9 a.m., people are just arriving at work.  A phone call might annoy them.  Give them time to have their coffee.  After 2 p.m., people are tired and thinking about picking up their kids from school, what to have for dinner, or what they need to wrap up today and organize for tomorrow.

And of course you wouldn’t want to call someone just before lunch!  They don’t want to talk to you then, they want to get out of there!  (It’s not you.  They don’t want to talk to their best friend, either.)

Give them a few minutes to settle in after they’re due back at work, too.  If they have to run for the phone, you may not get the positive response you were hoping for.

Gail Fischler has written a similar post based on the same article at Piano Addict!

Have you been aware of decision fatigue?  Do you consider glucose levels and time of day when you look t0 optimize an outcome?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

E-books

Learning a new piece? New program? Heading back to school? Looking for teaching ideas? Then this is the perfect time to read “Goal-oriented Practice: How to Avoid Traps and Become a Confident Performer!”

Goal-oriented Practice

August 2011 review by pianist Robert W. Oliver

When You Buy a Piano

How to Maintain Your Piano

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“Bravo, Muti!”

20 Wednesday Apr 2011

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, music, rehearsal, tools

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Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Giuseppe Verdi, libretto, New York Times, Otello, Riccardo Muti

The Russian tenor Arnold Azrikan in Verdi's Otello...

The Russian tenor Arnold Azrikan in Verdi's "Otello" ~ Image via Wikipedia

Riccardo Muti, music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, recently provided his orchestra members with the libretto to Verdi’s “Otello.”

What a great idea!  How many orchestral players are given the same opportunity to look closely at the text?

In rehearsals, Muti took the time to interpret the meaning of the text.  As everyone knows, a single word can have several distinct meanings.  Not only that, but the same word in a single definition can be uttered in many ways:  sincerely, sarcastically, sadly, excitedly, humorously….

With this depth of insight, the orchestra was able to play in a new way.  Normally, orchestral musicians would react to the conductor’s motions and the notations in the instrumental parts.  Add the words and all the emotions that come with them, and you have a whole new range of instrumental expression available.

The New York Times review of the concert, while expressing a reservation or two, recognizes the level reached by Muti’s approach, crediting him for being “immersed in the Verdi style like few conductors before the public…”

The Chicago Symphony received high praise.  They are already incredible, and the influence of the words took this performance to an entirely new level.

​​How wonderful it would be if every instrumentalist knew as much about the words as the Chicago Symphony did in this concert!

What do you think?  Should instrumentalists be concerned with text?  Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

E-books

Goal-oriented Practice
Review by pianist and conductor Andrei Strizek

When You Buy a Piano

How to Maintain Your Piano

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Update: James Levine adjusts schedule

23 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, career, ethics, health, music

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Boston Globe, BSO, James Levine, New York Times, Tanglewood, Thet Met

Metropolitan Opera

Image via Wikipedia

In looking at his extremely busy conducting schedule vis-a-vis his health, James Levine has made several changes in his schedule.

Articles have appeared in The New York Times and the Boston Globe, providing detailed information about the most recent changes:

You: Levine Cuts Back on Work for the Met (nytimes.com)

James Levine withdraws from remainder of BSO season (boston.com)

Letter: Missing James Levine (nytimes.com)

Previous articles on this blog:

Update: James Levine
14 November 2010
Boston and James Levine
5 October 2010
James Levine, cont. Someone finally said it!
4 August 2010
What’s YOUR story?
12 June 2010
Tanglewood Review: the James Levine Saga, Cont.
13 July 2010

“James Levine Withdraws from Tanglewood”
18 June 2010

More articles of interest:

Classical music news: Does the case of James Levine show that maestros, money and media are too tilted toward celebrity?(welltempered.wordpress.com)

James Levine Cancels Another Performance
(artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com)

Mr. Levine has cancelled more and more frequently over a period of ten years.  With that in mind, I find his recent decision to be a positive for all concerned. Both the Met and the BSO recently made plans for conductors to be available in case of cancellation.

What do you think?  Has this gone on too long?  Or should major institutions be expected to continue to be accommodating at all cost?

Please share your thoughts in the comments section below!

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E-books ~ take a look!

Goal-oriented Practice 

New review by pianist and conductor Andrei Strizek

When You Buy a Piano

How to Maintain Your Piano

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Mindset gets it done!

20 Monday Dec 2010

Posted by GretchensPianos in article, auditions, career, concentration, distractions, focus, goals, health, injury, learning, observations, performing, practice, preparation, process, tempo, tools

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

athletes, concentration, focus, Music, New York Times, trance

Tasha Danvers, British Olympic athlete.
Tasha Danvers, British Olympic athlete ~ Image via Wikipedia

A recent New York Times article talks about the mindset athletes need to push through pain during competitions.

This post is not intended to suggest that musicians play through pain!  The mindset, though, can be very useful.

The following is a paraphrase of some of the article’s main points, stated slightly differently for musicians.

When you have a performance:

• Try out the piano, acclimate yourself to the venue

• Concentrate intensely on the act of playing

It takes practice and experience to get it right.

So keep trying!

Some go into a trancelike state to focus ~ others maintain an awareness of possible derailments.

I love it when a trancelike state happens!  The second method has caused me to panic and make mistakes when a problematic section occurs in the music.

What I prefer is ensuring that the entire program is as foolproof as possible.  I practice difficult passages first.  And, when preparing a fast section or movement, I begin at the tempo of the passage that I play the slowest, with metronome.  Then I practice the entire movement at that tempo, increasing the tempo by one or two clicks at a time.

Haphazard attempts at speeding up an entire movement have uneven results, meaning that the potential for panic is still there.  More about speeding up with the help of a metronome appears in a previous post, “Increasing the tempo.”

Elite runner Kim Smith says, ​”You have to be talented, and you have to have the ability to push yourself through pain.”

Vis-a-vis performing music, I strongly agree with the “push yourself” part.​  “Through pain” ​may work for the large muscles involved in sports competition, but the small structures in our hands just can’t take it.  The presence of pain for a musician is a red flag indicating injury.  Pushing through will only exacerbate the problem.

As you have probably noticed from reading this blog, I enjoy watching professional tennis.  During the past two tournaments, I was struck by what the commentators said with regard to various players.  Whenever either Rafael Nadal or Roger Federer played, the conversation was about how they came out to win.  All other players were trying to win.

John Bradshaw, who has written several books about paying attention to the inner child in all of us, told of his therapy patients when I attended a Learning Annex lecture he gave in New York.  The patients would try to stand up from their chairs.  After several minutes of watching them “try,” he would say, “You either stand up from your chair or you don’t!”  Enough trying already.

So yes!  Go for it!  Nail the performance!  But don’t push through pain.

Do you have an athlete’s mindset when learning a program?  How do you focus going into a jury, audition, or concert?  Is there anything different that happens when you are performing?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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“Goal-oriented Practice” is available in both E-book and Print versions.  You’ll see great reviews and wonderful readers’ comments when you click on the link.

Credit cards and PayPal accepted.  You do not need a PayPal account to make a purchase.  And if you prefer, you can mail a check!

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Chance: of trial and error and “Aha!” moments

17 Friday Dec 2010

Posted by GretchensPianos in constructing a piece, directed practice, learning, music, practice, practicing basics, preparation, process, tools, work

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Benedict Carey, different methods, Fresh Air, learning, Melissa Leo, Music, National Public Radio, New York Times, practice

Calvin playing with ball
Say hello to Calvin! ~ Image by dolescum via Flickr

For some time, ​I have been fascinated with the various ways in which people learn.  Observing the process is always full of surprises!

A New York Times article about creative problem-solving caught my eye.  In it, Benedict Carey describes a study at Northwestern University about the way people solve word puzzles.

In the study, the researchers found that people use analysis, the trial and error method, and wait for “Aha!” moments.  Puzzle solvers have the ability to switch between methods, regularly using all three.  The “Aha!” moments are preferred.  (Who wouldn’t like them?)

I wondered whether the process of learning music might have a lot in common with puzzle solving.

Ten days after the Times article appeared, I happened to hear an interview on NPR in which the actress Melissa Leo described different methods of acting.  She had the opportunity to watch a fellow actor “morph” into his character, producing variations in mood upon suggestion by the director.  (“With regret,” for instance.)  With a different director, actors found themselves “reaching” to find expression by way of his ideas.

Where does trial and error fit in?

While I sat on a bench in New York’s Riverside Park reading the paper one afternoon, a father and his young son appeared.  The little boy, 3 or 4 years old, was carrying a plastic bat and a Wiffle ball.  Batting practice!

At first the child faced his father directly, with the bat held vertically, directly in front of him.  You can guess how well that turned out…

About 20 attempts later, dad showed his son how to turn sideways and hold the bat away from his body.  Still no luck.

And then ~ SUCCESS!!!  Dad managed to hit the bat when he threw the ball.  I cheered!

I was wishing I could have seen the next few sessions.  How much trial and error goes into hitting a baseball?  When does hand-eye coordination begin?

How much is trial and error a factor in practicing?

One of my college piano teachers, a child prodigy, had never played chamber music or worked with singers.  With no background in collaboration, she partnered with another faculty member to perform Schubert’s “Die Schöne Mullerin.”

The performance was stunning.  But the process seemed arduous to me.  My teacher practiced the cycle for a year!  Her philosophy concerning the cycle and her other practice was to “find something” that worked.

Is random practice necessary, or even desirable?

My practicing was completely random for several years.  I didn’t have a useful approach.  So there was constant frustration, hearing what I wanted to express in my head but not knowing how to express it.

Now I can leave the angst behind and make decisions.  The works of Bach, Verdi, and Poulenc, for example, each have their own characteristics.  They are played differently.  So being completely random when learning music that can be ascribed an individual style seems to be a waste of time.

I would go with the style of each composer until that style doesn’t fit a certain piece of music.  (Composers sometimes write “out of character.”)  A newly-composed work, however, would require a different approach.

How do you learn music?  Do you begin with certain assumptions?  Is some of your practice random?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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“Goal-oriented Practice” is 50% off in the E-book version, 20% off in Print.  You’ll see great reviews and wonderful readers’ comments when you click on the link.

Credit cards and PayPal accepted.  You do not need a PayPal account to make a purchase.  And if you prefer, you can mail a check!

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Gretchen Saathoff

Collaborative Pianist/Vocal Coach

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