“Sometimes when you’re overwhelmed by a situation – when you’re in the darkest of darkness – that’s when your priorities are reordered.” Phoebe Snow Sometimes I search for the epigraph for my ChoralEthics blogs before I write them and other times, after. I usually know exactly what, or whose, quote I want but many times […]
The Choral Life
The Conductor as Yogi: Letting Go
“Letting go” is hardly a surprising topic for a yoga blog. But for the conductor? Now there’s an interesting exploration. Letting go is central to yoga and other wisdom practices. We sit on the mat and focus on our breathing, letting go with each exhale. We consider the words of poets and sages, of scripture […]
Choral Potpourri/Choral Ethics: Stupid Questions
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” Thomas Szasz Like many of you, I’ve had a few teachers in my time who would announce—often–that there is no such thing as a “stupid question.” No one was asking questions and the teacher must have felt […]
Choral Potpourri/Choral Ethics: Adversity
“The friend in my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who helped to relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of my prosperity.” Ulysses S. Grant As September winds down, we will deal with a few more Choral […]
The Conductor as Yogi: The Illusion of “Done”
We are list makers, task accomplishers, and detail managers. We juggle between our professional and personal lives, never really stopping for long because there is always one more item on the list, one more email to send, one more errand to run. When we finish that, we think, then we will be “done.” The only […]
Choral Potpourri/ Choral Ethics: Set in Our Ways
“The only means of strengthening one’s intellect is to make up one’s mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts.” John Keats To say the least, it’s been a challenging time for us all. As recently as three years ago, we could not have imagined wearing masks in rehearsals or […]