I didn’t hear the quote directly, it was related to me later by my mother, but the comment made in passing from my very first mentor would mark my career trajectory. If I recall, my mother had asked him about playing the organ in Duke Chapel, and he responded “Every organist wants to play all … Read more
Evolving isn’t talked about much in our world. Pity, that – because I consider it the most important thing about life on this earth. We are born with the seeds required for living a meaningful life: compassion, wisdom, a thirst for knowledge, a desire to live (physical health), a desire for happiness (psychological health), a … Read more
Cathedrals & a Royal Peculiar I’ve always thrived on pressure. Perhaps it’s the residual effects of having worked as a triage secretary in a hospital Emergency Room while in college, or perhaps it’s just my particular constitution. But in the music world, one’s ability, or inability, to remain calm and flexible under extremely stressful situations … Read more
A few hours after posting my last blog, I was fired. It wasn’t the first time I’d been fired from a church job; it was actually the fifth! So the psychological pattern that would follow was well-known: shock from being broadsided, anger and desire for vengeance, long aftermath of depression and self-doubt. But this one … Read more
Although I don’t recall the actual circumstance, part of our family lore is that when I was three years old, sitting next to my mother at church (Presbyterian Church on the Green in Morristown, NJ), when the organ started to play, I leaned over to her and told her: “When I grow up, I’m going … Read more
Rocamadour is a place of legend. It emerges, high upon a cliff, from fog and clouds, and seems to brood over the surrounding valley like a mother hen over her chicks. Historically one of the main four pilgrimage spots in Christendom (alongside Jerusalem, Rome, and Santiago de Compostela), this UNESCO site continues to draw spiritual … Read more
The Global Pandemic has created a ubiquitous artistic presence that was only somewhat employed in prior years: YouTube recordings of music. Like countless other musicians during the pandemic, I chose to create video musical presentations, solo performances and choral performances (edited from individuals performing from their homes), during the sudden absence and impossibility of performing … Read more
It sounds like an oxymoron, but I played my first live funeral service a few days ago. The church had a congregation of masked and socially distant attendees; I was accompanying a singer and playing prelude and postlude music. It felt incredibly foreign and normal at the same time. But unlike in the many hundreds … Read more