Clara Rowe lived in a cramped apartment above a bar that played loud music until three in the morning. Most nights the floor vibrated like a dying animal. She sat […]

Barry Blume had been in the music business long enough to turn hope into profit and talent into something you could skim. He cut corners the way some people bite […]

In a small, sunlit room there lived a guitar named Maple. It was modest, warm in tone and slender in form, carved from a tree that had once stood alone […]

DAUGHTER:Did you see this? Another festival lineup. Twenty bands. Two women. MOTHER:That’s progress. When I started, we were zero women. DAUGHTER:It’s ridiculous. They say, “We booked whoever fit the vibe.” […]

SON:You keep telling me to practice the modes. What even is a mode? FATHER:It’s a scale that’s had a couple of drinks. SON:So… a scale in a good mood? FATHER:Exactly. […]

Long ago, in a wind-washed city by the river of Mook, there lived a musician named Everulska. He played both the silver flute and the hollow drum. In the marketplace […]

Fred found it in the attic of a shuttered opera house, its case covered in dust. The mandolin looked ordinary, cherry wood body, ivory inlay, strings dulled with rust. But […]

Once upon a time there was a man who believed consciousness was like playing the piano: he was at once the player and the listener, the hand striking the keys […]

“Once upon a time,” her mother began, tucking the blanket a little closer under her daughter’s chin, “there was a musician who loved to play the piano late at night. […]