It's About the Music, Period.

Greetings after a short absence!


I was busy trying an interesting concept. Write less, practice more 😋

Having said that, the practice has been pretty specific to once and for all address deficiencies in my fingers and articulation and is slowly but surely coming along, thank you very much.


I have to keep reminding myself of that last bit....."surely coming along". I still have so many ingrained insecurities about my ability and fall into a lot of self fulfilling prophecies. I have a feeling that though my personal journey as a non-traditional student may be slightly unique; the insecurities certainly aren't.

This leads me to my lesson this week and a statement which has been a complete game changer for me.

I was preparing Karel Husa's "Elegie et Rondeau" for a recital performance this week and my professor, Mark McArthur, was listening to a run through with my pianist. Afterwards, in his commentary, he pointed out a series of glissandos in the Rondeau and said something to the effect of "What you did with these glissandos didn't fit the piece at all. Why did you perform them like that?". I responded that I was just trying to play them cleanly. Mark explained something fairly poignant to me......that I was worried about simple glissandos because I had such little confidence in my technique and then said something that sounds so simple on the surface but has caused a complete change in my mindset this week. I didn't write it down when he said it. I should have. However, the gist of the statement was this:


Never base your musical ideas or interpretation on what you think your technique is capable of doing. Instead, base your technique on what musical ideas you want to express.

It's a simple enough statement but for me, it was a total eye opener.


Yes, you need good technique.
Yes, you need a good sound.
Yes, you need to have solid reading chops.

Mostly, though, you need to have the ability to serve the music and use it to say what you and the composer wanted to say. If something gets in your way, don't allow it to affect the piece. Instead, get in the practice room and work the problem until you can get past it and just play.


Work hard
Get better
Just play and let nothing get in your way.