when i grow up
working on a new piece and while trying to balance left hand and right hand, i’m reminded of the the effort involved trying to train one’s mind or the assumption […]
Bob Wiseman
ostensible and lean
student for whom english is not their 1rst language, worried about whether she makes sense, wants my help checking her lyrics. how can anyone improve upon gold like this. He […]
sexy mofo
one time, at a wedding in chicago, the groom’s mother came over to welcome me for having traveled all the way from canada. At the same moment there was dancing […]
teaching secrets
Sometimes new students asked her if she could just show them her secrets, like how does she play that passage or how does she make that technique work. It automatically […]
the marking game
Marking assignments. There is a distance between good writing and not so good writing. Probably I should mark the good writing higher than the not so good writing. Probably the […]
in your head
I have many dead friends on Facebook. Sometimes I look at their old profiles now cluttered with advertisements for sun glasses and vacation getaways. We had a discussion in class […]
perfection
Each of the songwriting classes I’m teaching begin with a student playing us a song that changed their life or significantly inspired them. Recently we listened to Imagine by John […]
being your fool
I played the students Aretha Franklin’s I Never Loved A Man ( the way that I love you) because I thought, like me, many would have assumed the song was […]
is anything unrelated?
started teaching the new student chopin by ear. imitate me kid, just do this and then she just did that. next i said ok, just do that and so she […]
the ringo joke
There was a joke I once heard that made fun of Ringo Starr. The joke went like this “who was the luckiest person in the 60s?” the answer was Ringo […]