Lutheran Summer Music

I’m very much enjoying my time as Composer in Residence at Lutheran Summer Music, hosted this year on the campus of Valparaiso University. LSM is a fantastic program for high-school-age musicians interested in performance (band, jazz band, orchestra, chamber music, choir, musical theater, conducting, etc.), composition, church music, and more. It’s a four-week program that, in the composition program, culminates in a recital of student works. This year there are approximately thirty(!) student composers who have elected to either study composition privately or as part of a group class. I’m also teaching musicianship/theory, which has been a true joy, as these students are simply absorbing and devouring so much information and are eager to learn more. Yesterday I covered (or tried to) what is normally about three weeks of an undergrad theory course in a fifty minute class session — none of the students seemed to mind.

I’ve also enjoyed the opportunity to perform several times, including excerpts of my Suite for Bari Sax and Piano with faculty saxophonist Stacy Maugans, a couple jazz standards with vocalist Daniel Greco, some more jazz with trumpet and cello, and on Monday, another performance of Taxonomies of Pulse with Christina Giuca Krause, who is also here on the piano faculty.