Category: Blog posts

While I’m certainly not its intended audience, that hasn’t stopped me from enjoying the multiple-award-winning animated children’s series Bluey. My first direct contact with the series was, unsurprisingly, through Joff Bush and company’s fantastic music, but I have since then also watched several episodes and enjoyed them thoroughly. In fact, I have bassist and videographer… Continue reading I’m Not Crying, You Are

Back in February I devised a system, mostly for fun, to help me compose a little bit every day throughout March when I would be too busy for more involved composition work. To me, as I know it is to many others as well, composing is not only a skill you can learn, but also… Continue reading Saulesco’s Etude Game

I composed Notes in a Notebook, my little piece for two violins and violoncello, back in early January. The Weber Quartet premiered it two weeks ago, yesterday. I have been wanting to discuss it here on my blog ever since, and finally had the chance to sit down to write about it. Writing “Notes…” only… Continue reading Notes About Notes in a Notebook On a Blog

In the past week, I’ve had the opportunity to reflect on how interpretation can affect the performance of a composition – in both old music and new. Back in the 17th century, interpretation was the order of the day in notated European music. Around the start of the century, a new notation system for instrumental… Continue reading A Matter of Interpretation

Two weeks ago, I posted the game sheet to my “etude game” here on my blog along with the first etude. I challenged myself to compose one short etude every day throughout March, and here at the halfway point I am 16 for 16! I have felt rather liberated, on some level, to have the… Continue reading Half-Time

In one of my favourite books, “Where Does Music Come From?”, the late musicologist Gunnar Valkare asserts that music isn’t something we learn to do or consume, but rather something we are born with an innate affinity for. Music, he argues, is foremost a human activity, a human behaviour. The book is named after a… Continue reading Why Do We Art?

Computer and video game enthusiasts of a certain vintage might recognise the reference in this week’s blog post. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, it shouldn’t be surprising that I include an off-hand game reference. It is, however, also directly related to the topic of this week’s post. So far this year, I… Continue reading It’s In the Game

Life has kept me busy in the weeks since my last blog post early this month. In fact, when I wrote that post I was still (technically) 40 years old, but have since then turned 41! In actuality, of course, these annual delineations are man-made constructs; I was only 41 years old for a brief… Continue reading Down the Rabbit Hole

In his two most recent videos on the channel “Vlogbrothers” – which he runs collaboratively with his brother, science communicator Hank Green – writer and philanthropist John Green discusses art: why we make art and for whom we make it. As is often the case, I have to say, his musings really resonated with me.… Continue reading To Instruct and Delight

Last week, I had a lecture at Kapellsberg Music School in Härnösand for the first time in three years. It felt a little awkward at first – simultaneously familiar and foreign, like my brain couldn’t quite reconcile all the new faces – looking at me with a mix of attention and disinterest – with the fact… Continue reading Back, Back Again