How is a Special Event like a Performance?

This year at Curtis, I have the added responsibility -- in addition to the grantwriting -- of running the Curtis Crescendo Club along with my friend and colleague Trish Furman. The Crescendo Club's goal is to build interest in and support for Curtis among Philadelphia's young professionals. 

Coming Attractions!

Exciting new content is in the works! I have interviewed composer Joseph Hallman, a remarkable person you will learn a lot from, so please stay tuned. All of the interviews are giving me more insight into my own journey so I'll be writing more articles about that, too.

The interviews do take quite a bit of time to put together: scheduling, the actual interview, transcribing, and then lots of editing to make sure they're perfect and that the interviewees are comfortable with them because it's pretty personal stuff we're talking about. 

How it Started, Part One: "If he can do it, why can't I?"

Let’s go back in time to summer 2010, when this project began. I was sitting alone in my apartment, staring at my reed desk, trying to will myself to practice. And I couldn’t! I could not move out of bed. I had no energy or desire left.

I’d been working for ten years, starting at a restaurant the week after my fifteenth birthday. No music festivals for this lady; summer jobs instead. Three simultaneous part-time jobs for most of graduate school; then for my last semester, I went to grad school part-time and worked full-time in the office for the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia. Plus oboe jobs and auditions.

By summer 2010, I was ready to retire!