Tuesday was awesome! I was able to take all 3 of the concert bands at Mercer to the PMEA Instrumental Adjudication festival at Westminster College. I am very pleased with the groups and their performance. Pennsylvania’s adjudication circuit allows directors to choose music from the state list (which NEEDS serious revamping PMEA!!! Not that I dwell on the problems within […]
Today marked the second day without a student teacher for the first time since Mid-January. Over the past eight weeks, I had the pleasure of working with Nick Samson (from YSU), and in a couple of weeks Krista Schmidt (from GCC) will join me. I enjoy the opportunity to have student teachers come in to the program, and watch them […]
I need to keep evolving. That means staying current, and that means staying up with what these youngsters are listening to. So it requires some time on my part and sometimes painfully enduring the contrived chord progressions and hollow lyrics of any number of artists that students feel compelled to ask me to listen to. So I decided I would […]
It is the Super Bowl of Music Conferences. The Cadillac of Music Cars. It is the only place where you hear gems like: Francis McBeth” “I am proud to say I have lived long enough to see the rise and fall of Communism in Russia and 12 tone rows.” A wonderful two days in the city of Chicago, Illinois. There […]
What a great day of teaching! MS Band played through the setting of the Jupiter Chorale, HS Band worked Flourish for Band by Vaughan Williams, and the Wind Ensemble really dug into 1st Suite by Holst (After all, The British are coming…). But that wasn’t even the best part. Thanks to the encouragement and assistance of Dr. Joseph Pisano, I […]
