Latest Blog Posts

In this episode, I reflect on the psychology of gratitude, and on the importance of helping our students develop a healthy relationship with their own mistakes, and even flaws and weaknesses. Not because we don’t care about high achieving ensembles, but precisely for this reason. There is power in psychology, both from our perspective as […]

I am taking a bit of a Choral Ethics break during the summer, and this is a Choral Ethics Blog repeat, taken from Choral Ethics blogs from 2018 through 2019. We will also have a guest blogger a time or two.  I will be working on the fall’s Blogs during the summer, so if you […]

How did a choir director, meditation teacher, and bagel maker go from a quiet, content life in Lincoln, Nebraska to a job as a Visiting Professor in Shepherdstown, West Virginia? First, let me dispel the incorrect notion that meditation breeds apathy and/or passivity. While the Buddha noted that attachment was a primary cause of human […]

As the summer draws to a close, so, too, does my six-part series on mindfulness and meditation. I have enjoyed putting my thoughts about meditation into words, and I hope you have found my posts to be thought provoking and inspiring. Moving forward, I’ll be blogging once a month, a “Monthly Meditation,” so this last […]

ChorTeach is ACDA’s quarterly online publication, designed for those who work with singers of all levels. Following is a list of the articles in the Summer 2022 issue! A full annotated ChorTeach index is available online at acda.org/chorteach. Over 160 articles are organized into seventeen categories. For submission information, to view the index, or to read the latest issue, […]

A Choralosophy Oxford Series episode! One of the most challenging aspects of being a teacher of singing is dealing with the male changing voice. Not only are we undereducated on the physiology of the issue, we are often inconsiderate of the psychology as well. In this conversation, I have called in a true expert to […]

I am taking a bit of a Choral Ethics break during the summer, and this is a Choral Ethics Blog repeat, taken from Choral Ethics blogs from 2018 through 2019. We will also have a guest blogger a time or two.  I will be working on the fall’s Blogs during the summer, so if you […]

What are you currently doing to attract singers and grow your choir? What are you telling folks to get them to join you in a singing community? We talked in last month’s blog about communicating the value of choir, especially outside of musical circles – the “business of choir” per se. This week we continue […]

I realize that it’s been several weeks since I’ve written. It’s been quite a busy summer for me because I have a big life update! Earlier in the summer, I was offered the position of Director of Music Ministries at St. Andrew Presbyterian Church in Iowa City, Iowa. As a result, I stepped down from […]

The August 2022 issue of Choral Journal is online and features an article titled “Reflective Practice and the Choral Director” by Emily Mason. You can read it in its entirety at acda.org/choraljournal. Following is a portion from the introduction. _________________ For choral directors, the start of a new school year brings excitement and anticipation of the great music that […]