I was an ambitious teenager. I was also a very hard worker. As a high school flutist I used to set my alarm for 5:00 a.m. and practice scales for an hour in the basement. Then I would have breakfast and get on the 7:10 school bus.
I would use my free periods in school to practice (we had two practice rooms in the music office). I must have spent some after school time doing ...

My quartet friends and I have, over the past decade, made our way through all of Haydn's sixty-seven numbered string quartets in order, including the "spurious" quartets that were once attributed to him. And on Easter Sunday we are going to play (can you believe it?) the Seven Last Words. After that we will begin playing the Mozart "Haydn" Quartets, a truly delicious next place ...

Michael and I watched La Boheme on PBS last night. It was a performance recorded live on November 8 of 2025, and it is being broadcast for the first time now.

In light of an actor's comments (I have refrained from mentioning his name in previous posts, and will continue to do so) regarding the cultural validity of opera, I can't think of a better rebuttle to him a...

Freezing weather in March (snow today after huge high winds last night).

A deeply disturbing documentary we watched yesterday about the "manosphere."

David Markson's This is Not a Novel.

"Golden" running through my head, making me cry, over and over again.

Cancer-fighting drugs surging through my system, making me aware of the magnitude of m...