A month or two ago, I had the opportunity to see.... up close and personal....... Jim Self and one of his former students perform. They were, quite literally, all over their instruments. Extreme ranges, weird rhythms, outrageous intervals, high speed tempos..... you name it. They never missed a beat...

Bloke...... Just for clarification.......... I wasn't disagreeing with you. I'm merely pointing out that it shouldn't happen, and especially shouldn't be passed off as "close enough." While I went to a very small college with an even smaller music department, my piano prof played like an i...

Any piano player worth his/her salt has prepared for the transition to a "far reach" long before it happens. You gotta know where your body is! The slightest shifting of foot position, center of gravity shift, hip position, body weight and control, mind-picturing of keyboard target, hand p...

Calculus??? Heck, I had a bit of a time with Algebra!! Simply wasn't interested in it.

I'm 71 now, and I still don't know what X equals!!

Bloke!!........... You really hit on a great topic for discussion with this topic. Maybe we can start a movement to have composers write better and more likeable/listenable music. I have always said that an audience wants to softly hum or tap their toes at a concert. When I was a church organist, I ...

I'm actually surprised that anyone....... besides me..... actually knows of Peter Schickele....... and actually remembers him!! We'd listen to PDQ Bach recordings for hours in college, and laugh ourselves silly in music history class, when the prof mentioned a piece that was "lampooned" by...

Great topic!!! I am a firm believer in playing to the audience. The conductor/leader of any group should "know" the type of audience they are going to perform for. You can "educate" the audience once or twice during the performance, but any more than that, you're asking them to t...

While I definitely prefer the T-K action and sound, sometimes I had low brass students start with Dug-Ga, Dug-Ga. It's a little easier to start with when having difficulties. Then, as they got more proficient at it, I had them switch to Tuk- Ka, Tuk-Ka. It worked for them. Triple tonguing...... same...

Yeppir!! I can see it.

Do the pics in my earlier post show up??

Just out of curiosity.... has the attachment issue been rectified yet??

Okay.... this is a quite strange. The pics are showing up just fine on the website on my computer. I'm on my iMac desktop computer, so left and right clicking do not exist. I emailed them to myself from my iPhone to my computer. Took them from my email program and dragged them right into the post. N...

IMG_1778.jpg https://www.iup.edu/music/faculty/directory/collins-zach.html Indiana University of Pennsylvania sponsored a "Tubaphonium Day" on Sunday. Actually..... it's still going on thru Wednesday. A very good friend of mine invited me to attend, so I went on Sunday. He is close friend...

After taking our daughter to two completely different orchestral auditions, we're seeing some needless confusion and lack of organization in the way the process is carried out. I'm not talking about amateur auditions. These are professional orchestras. That said, they are not in major cities, but, n...

Just a couple of suggestions that served me well over the years of job interviews. Research the school district a bit. You don't want to take a step down!! Find out what they want from their band program....... and be exactly the guy they're looking for! (Even if you figure out during the interview ...

.........We used cardboard and newspaper inside our shoes when the soles wore out because we didn't have the money to get them repaired..... or God forbid..... buy new ones!! Also, when the shoelaces broke, we just tied a knot in them and skipped a couple of holes at the bottom so they could be tied...

Quick Jesse Owens story.... of sorts: Way back when I was in college..... Geneva College (small college) in Beaver Falls, PA, Mr. Owens came to Geneva as the main speaker at our monthly convocation. After things were over he was extremely gracious with his time, and asked a small group of us to get ...

I was 18 years old.... just graduated from high school in 1969. Family too a vacation to see relatives in FL. Stood on the beach near Titusville, FL, and watched Neil Armstrong, et al, take off for the moon!! You can't imagine the sight and sound of that Saturn V rocket taking off..... and I was ten...

My daughter has to do some traveling with a "one of a kind" horn. Considering an Apple Air Tag as a safety measure. I know there was a discussion about using them some time ago on here, but I don't remember exactly what was said. I'm aware that there is some kind of "abuse" of th...

I'm 70. Grew up surrounded by a lot of older folks............. I know that song quite well!! Same for Nat's and Kitty's tunes, too!!

Over the years I've seen several different seating arrangements used for countless band and orchestra festivals. A few have opened my eyes in surprise as to "improvement" in the sound of the groups. That said, the vast majority of them have been, in my opinion, a dismal failure when it com...