If I had a dollar for every time I instructed an ensemble “to listen” in a rehearsal, I would be writing this blog on my private island in the Caribbean. Sadly, most of those...

I got into a routine, well, more like a rut. During rehearsals, after stopping to correct something. I would identify the problem spot, state what was troubling me, and what I...

“If we don’t change the direction we are going,” a Chinese proverb suggests, “we are likely to end up where we are heading.” So I try to ask myself questions like, “Are we headed...

The renowned tenor, Andrea Bocelli, once said, "If an artist wants to move the listener, he or she must have something intense and convincing to tell through the singing.  This...

I once met a young man – a college first-year student – who excitedly talked about his goal of someday being a music teacher. I asked him about what led him to that decision. His...

If you knew that your next rehearsal would be your last rehearsal, how would it be different? Time is a gift promised to no one. Peter Loel Boonshaft, Director of Education KHS...

Choose one thing you regularly do in rehearsal. It could be anything: one phrase you say just before you start conducting, one activity you do in a warm-up, or one gesture you...

"If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." That wonderful quote is often attributed to Henry Ford. And though there is great debate as to...