Winning Composition Premier now on YouTube!

September 02, 2016 in Competitions, Flute, Portuguese composers, Scherzo Editions, Summer Flute Academy-AFV

My magnificent Summer Flute Academy colleague Stephanie Wagner is back from holiday, and thus the recordings from the concerts at the Academy are going online! (She's the IT whiz amongst us). They are on the Academy site, FaceBook page or YouTube.

The first one I'd like to draw your attention to is the fabulous performance by André Cameira (flute) and Patrícia Pires (alto flute) of Ricardo Matosinho's work "Traveling". It is extremely well-written and fun to listen to—bravo to the performers and the composer, who received First Prize in the Academy's 3rd Composition Competition for Works for Flutes!

As soon as the work is available—it will be published by Scherzo Editions before the end of the year—I'll let everyone know. Until then, enjoy listening, and to the composer: keep writing for flutes, please!

Composer Ricardo Matosinhos, Patrícia Pires and André Cameira. Photo ©Susana Neves/AFV

Zen and the Art of Returning to Practice

September 01, 2016 in Flute, Inspiration, Practicing flute

It is September! A new season beckons, full of plans as well as many unscheduled surprises! The feeling of "back-to-school" permeates the air, and in spite of the implied work, it is somehow invigorating!

A rather Zen-style tactic that I find helpful after some rest is to focus not on the audible results of my playing straight away, but rather to disconnect from the goal and focus on the elements that will help me to arrive at that goal: good posture and body use, relaxed breathing, generous blowing, making corrections to any errors encountered with a low-stress attitude, and connecting to the pleasure of music-making through improvisation or sight-reading. Even while gradually adding in the "menu" of required exercises, studies or pieces, this Zen attitude can be encouraged and you may be surprised by…the results!

Here's a photo to remind us of the joy and wonder of making music!

Indulge! (It's August 31st…)

August 31, 2016 in Inspiration, Practicing flute, Flute

All of a sudden it is the last day of August—how did that happen? I would like to say that I did the European thing of taking the month off, but to be honest, musicians rarely take a month off without "paying for it". Do we all know the classic joke? Here goes:

"If you take one day off, you will notice. If you take two days off, your wife will notice. If you take three days off, the whole world will notice."

So how about we split the difference, we hard-working musicians who appear (I emphasize the word "APPEAR") to just get up and play, and INDULGE ourselves in whatever counts in your book as an indulgence? It could even be a healthy indulgence (though I think that should count less, no?), but here's the remainder of my little indulgence for the day. Tomorrow is September, and I'm gonna need all the boost I can get!