Learning any difficult craft can end up being a metaphor for our relationship with ourselves. No sooner have we picked up the bow than a tree falls right in our path, preventing forward progress with its clear message of: Turn…
This morning, I played 100 notes on the cello. If this is the first time you’re reading my blog, that might sound like amateurish bragging. For SRCB veterans who know that it’s been less than a month since I had…
My teacher told to me: Stay the course. Too often, aspiring musicians of all ages and echelons are swayed by things other people tell them. Various powerful people convince us that we’re worthless, or unpopular, out of sync, or nearly…
Unlike many self-assured USC fans, this season’s rocky ride was not a surprise to me. Nor was it as horrifying or depressing for me as it seemed to be for other fans. I think the secret to my success and…
Parents have to tread a pretty fine line when it comes to encouraging/harassing/bribing/browbeating their kids to practice an instrument. My angle is that, after the age of 10 or so, it is up to the student whether or not to…
Ask yourself this: is my warmup a truly physical warmup? There is a difference between warming up your technical chops and just plain getting your body used to the crazy things we ask it to do while playing. This is…
I have a long-term student who has been very up, very down, all over the map in terms of her dedication to the cello. Of late, prodded on by the Galamian scales with martelé that every one of my students…
The way I see it, there is this thing, this Difficulty (capital D, for emphasis) to playing the cello. And it’s there; sitting, waiting, towering, looming, quivering. Many a student has tried to devise strategies to get around this Difficulty.…
One of the hardest things about teaching kids is that you have to watch talent languish. I routinely run into situations where a student just turns off to the whole learning process but, thinking that I can be fooled, turns…
Chameleon drawing from this online coloring book site!