I love these photos -- there's another one on an earlier post -- of Christopher Small and his partner. As I said in that post, the two men radiate joy. And, as I wrote, Small was a joyful voice, looking toward the future of classical music. Here's a site with many tributes from him (including one from me, which you can also read in my earlier post). And here's another tribute: Erica and I have been reading "Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening" by Christopher Small. Mr. Small challenges his readers to consider leaving … [Read more...]

I know I'm neglecting other things I might post about. But this subject seems pretty hot. Patience, if it's not your cup of…shot of…[fill in your favorite hard or soft beverage; I'm partial to bourbon]. This post is about a workshop I taught for the Pittsburgh Symphony. I'll be posting on other subjects shortly. Prelude (about how I've worked when I teach how to talk and write about music): A few [people in a workshop I taught] were timid…but when I teach something like this -- and very definitely in my Juilliard course on music … [Read more...]

More on writing/talking about music, because as you'll see in another post, I'm inspired to start a business in which I help people do those things. In the past, I've taught workshops on these subjects. Here's one of them. I'll talk about others in future posts. Center for Arts Criticism, Minneapolis I did this workshop in the  '80s. I had 15 or more people to work with, both pop and classical critics. My method: We read Greil Marcus's famous chapter on Elvis, from his first book, Mystery Train (one of the classics of rock criticism), … [Read more...]