Latest Blog Posts
Stick Time: A Little Brahms
Some many moons ago, the departmental musicologist and senior-most faculty member (a loveable chap and wanna-be curmudgeon) walked up to me after a concert and said, "Good job . . . but it wasn't really a choral concert because it didn't include Brahms." We shared enormous fun in the ensuing years over that comment – […]
Stick Time: Choral Diversity
As you read this, a great many of the conductors who have been asked to perform at the next ACDA National Conference are agonizing over the selection of literature for their performance. But they needn’t worry! Those of use who will be in the audience are eager for them to share from the astonishing variety […]
CJ Replay: Non-Verbal Communication
(From the Choral Journal article "Implications for Non-Verbal Communication and Conducting Gesture" by Joseph Kevin Ford) The subject of gesture has been clearly documented as a serious matter for discussion since the first century. All societies use gestures as took for communication, but gestures do not have universal meanings. A gesture that means […]
CJ Replay: Laud to the Nativity
(From the Choral Journal article "Ottorino Respighi's Laud To The Nativity" by Lee G. Barrow) Ask a musicologist to name the most important Italian composer of the early twentieth century, and the answer will likely be Alfredo Casella, or Gian Francesco Malipiero, or perhaps lldebrando Pizzetti. But ask a concert-goer to name a […]
CJ Replay: Gospel Music
(From the Choral Journal article “Black Gospel Music and Its Impact on Traditional Choral Singing,” by James Benjamin Kinchen, Jr.) Black gospel music is becoming an increasingly popular and pervasive part of Black! American culture. Gospel music is accepted more today than ever before; more people are singing it and listening to it. Many […]
Sibelius Software to cease to exist?
Richard Sparks pointed me to this article that exposes the decline at Sibelius Software. It seems the parent company, Avid, has elected to fire the programmers and make a “clean profit” over the next couple of years. By then, they will have made their money and then they will sell off the company: Sibelius is […]
When Music Meets Theologies
(From the interest session “When Music Meets Theology” presented during the 2012 ACDA North Central Division Conference.) A Catholic priest, a Jewish rabbi, and a Serbian Orthodox teen walk into a hotel ballroom, along with a Jewish cantor and a Catholic school choral director . . . But seriously, folks: the 2012 […]
Saturday Respite: What were YOU doing at age 9?
Okay, so these three young men may not be old enough to drive, but wow, can they play!
Dumping pianos
Most used pianos are destined for the dump: The value of used pianos, especially uprights, has plummeted in recent years. So instead of selling them to a neighbor, donating them to a church or just passing them along to a relative, owners are far more likely to discard them, technicians, movers and dealers say. Piano […]