About The University of Maryland
The University of Maryland School of Music is housed in a state of the art facility: The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. Completed in 2000, it put the school "on the map" among U.S. music schools. Dekelboum Concert Hall, with its 1,100 seats and impressive layout, was designed in consultation with Kirkegaard & Associates, one of the world's leading acoustic architecture firms.
The UMD School of Music "combines first-rate academics and conservatory-caliber training in a comprehensive, mid-size program". Learn more by visiting our website at http://www.music.umd.edu/about_us/
Scholarships are available for undergraduate students, and graduate assistantships may be available.
About My Philosophy
My main goal in bass pedagogy is, ultimately, to teach students to teach themselves. You can only become an accomplished musician if you can critique your own playing, envision musical concepts, and develop your own technical solutions. I guide the process along...
I believe in a practical approach to preparing for a career as a classical bassist. This means that the orchestral repertoire and techniques must be learned. Executing the orchestral parts successfully requires knowledge of musical styles and mastery of the bowing techniques they impose. At auditions, they must be performed with conviction and musicality, and an energy that projects them as stand alone pieces of music.
Solo playing is certainly important - I've performed the following with orchestra: Paganini's Moses Fantasy, Mozart's Per Queste Bella Mano, Giannini's Psalm 130, as well as concertos by Koussevitsky, Dragonetti, Bottesini, and Jacob. You can't be a musician without a sense of self expression - your own "voice". But very few of us can make a living performing the Bach Cello Suites, wonderful as they are.
The Repertoire Class
In addition to weekly private lessons and studio class, I we'll be teaching Orchestral Repertoire for Double Bassists. Here's the first paragraph of the syllabus:
"The goal of this class is twofold: to develop good orchestral skills, with an emphasis on successful orchestral audition preparation and execution; to get a foundation in the double bass parts of the standard orchestral literature. Over the span of four semesters, we will visit the major symphonic works played by orchestras in the present day and focus on excerpts which are likely to be required at live orchestral auditions. The four semesters are required by both undergraduate and graduate performance majors. For non majors, BMEs, and jazz majors, entrance to the class is at the discretion of the instructor, based on a demonstrated proficiency of the instrument, which is to be determined by submitting a recorded sample or by live audition."
We'll cover all of the big works that are likely to be asked at an audition, with the goal of achieving a competitive ability; each semester finishes off with a mock audition. My experience with the NSO gives me special insight into symphony auditions, as I played an important role in the hiring of the last seven NSO bass players to join the orchestra. And there are so many interesting things to be learned by studying the orchestra repertoire: musical styles, bowing and fingering techniques, ensemble. Let's face it, all bassists are likely to be employed by an orchestra at some point in their careers, whether full or part-time. I love playing in an orchestra, and I hope my students do, too.
About Me
Here's Chapter I:
My parents were accomplished musicians who met at the Eastman School of Music and went on to have distinguished careers as performers and teachers. I was exposed to classical music from "day one" and as a toddler could often be seen bouncing against the couch when the Kentucky String Quartet was rehearsing in my living room. I started piano and violin when I was about eleven, but was not particularly gifted at either. When I was fifteen my parents brought home a bass for me to try; I had never given much thought to the instrument. I agreed to a month of trial lessons if they would subsidize my golf game, which was just budding. Surprisingly, I loved the bass from the start and never really got around to playing golf that summer (and my game never recovered!). I immediately practiced two hours a day and played along with recordings of the Haydn symphonies (the only bass parts I had then).
I attended North Carolina School of the Arts for my junior year of high school and three years of college. (The only school I auditioned for!) I spent many summers at music camps like Brevard and Tanglewood, where I had the chance to be associated with some of the best bass students in the country. (From my group at Tanglewood, two are now in the Boston Symphony, two in the San Francisco Symphony, one went to the Cleveland Orchestra and then Principal in Houston, one was Principal in Hong Kong, and another flourished in Scandinavia.) I also enjoyed playing orchestral and chamber music concerts in Germany and Italy for two summers with the International Music Program of the North Carolina School of the Arts. It was a great cultural and musical experience, and I got to play ten performances of Dvorak's Quintet in G!
I had two primary teachers: Milton Beisiegel and Lynn Peters. Milton was a virtuoso player in his own right. A graduate of the New England Conservatory (1940s), he studied with George Moleux of the Boston Symphony, Samuel Levitan of the New York Philharmonic, and later in middle age with William Rhein, former Assistant Principal Bass of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Because a symphony career in the 1940s-50s was not very sustaining (low pay, few weeks, no security), he chose to be a businessman and play bass as a semi-pro. He was Principal Bass with the New Haven and Bridgeport symphonies for many years. Milton had an elegant sound and a wonderful spiccato technique. He could also negotiate Bottesini's works very well. I am grateful to him for moving me along very quickly in my first year of study. Lynn Peters was a product of Indiana University where she studied with Murray Grodner, a former member of the NBC Symphony under Toscanini. Lynn played with the Milwaukee and Detroit symphonies (under conductor Paul Parray). She was a great orchestral trainer, insisting that every "mark" on a page of music be observed. I learned how to honor dynamic contrasts and deliver up a variety of orchestral effects. I also feel a debt to various other musicians who influenced me, like Edwin Barker (from my two summers at Tanglewood) and Mistislav Rostropovich (great cellist and former NSO Music Director).
My first professional audition (at the age of 20) was for Assistant Principal Bass of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. My mother thought I was crazy, but I knew that I needed all of the audition experience I could get. To my surprise, I made the semi-finals! My next audition was for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. I made the finals along with one other guy, but after a long wait the personnel manager informed us they weren't hiring either of us (it's a mystery as to why this occasionally happens). Next, I applied to the National Symphony Orchestra, but my resumé was initially rejected. I sent letters of recommendation in my defense and they agreed to hear me. At the end of two days of auditions, I was the lucky recipient of a job with the NSO (and a sandpaper kiss from Mistislav Rostropovich - yuck!).
