Most Orchestral Mud Comes From Too Many Instruments Sharing the Same Octave
The scores that students send me for orchestration lessons have the same issues in the same place far more often than anywhere else. Not the melody. …
Latest Posts
What Is Overlistening in Ear Training, and Why Does Volume Matter?
Overlistening is listening at a volume higher than the material needs. It is a term I use in my ear training courses, and it is why I prefer that you…
The Suspension Chain in Fourth Species Is Allowed to Break
A student sent me a screenshot after lecture four, circling four bars of tied notes and asking a fair question: do you keep this pattern going for th…
You Can Hear the Chord. Naming the Root Is a Different Skill.
Two Judgements Happen in the First Second, and Only One of Them Is Trained The most common report I get from students working through ear training i…
A Note That Refuses to Move Creates the Tension Every Cadence Depends On
A Suspension Is Three Events Across Three Beats, Not One Tense Moment Most of the students who send me counterpoint make the same mistakes. They wri…
Audiation: The Skill That Separates Composers Who Hear From Composers Who Guess
Every composer I have ever taught arrived with the same unspoken problem, and most of them had misdiagnosed what was actually wrong. They believed th…
Beethoven Composed the Ninth While Deaf: Audiation Made It Possible
In 1824, a composer who could no longer hear conducted the premiere of one of the most celebrated works ever written. That paradox is only possible b…