My Tennessee Sonata
The Sonata has come full circle: from describing a piece of music that was sounded (i.e. instrumental music, as opposed to "cantata" - which was sung), it came to mean a specific, formal arrangement of musical ideas. Recently, I think it has become acceptable to name any work for a solo instrument and piano "sonata"? I have long been fascinated with both ideas – to write a multi-movement recital piece for my own instrument, and to see if I could write in actual sonata form.
Writing your own cadenza
As a horn player, there are not too many opportunities to write original cadenzas. I can not think of any pre-classical horn concerti that leaves room for a cadenza. During classical times we have several examples, most notably the concerti of Haydn and Mozart need cadenzas and shorter "eingang"s in several places. Also Rosetti and Punto leave room for cadenzas in their concerti (and I assume some other classical concerti that are not in my active repertoire fall in the sa
A special lesson with Maestro Jens Nygaard
I had the great fortune to work with Maestro Jens Nygaard for several years. I've never met a musician that made a stronger impression on me. I had one or two more conventional private horn-lessons with him, and while they were tremendously informative and inspiring, the moment that will stay with me forever is when I observed him practicing before a perfomance of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue". Jens Nygaard had been a child prodigy, trained at Juilliard to become a concert


The Art of Transcription
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S0DnVSlZAQ Over the years I have made many transcriptions. Some projects have been very ambitious – like trying to realize Mahler's Kindertotenlieder for Violin, Horn, Piano and Voice. Sometimes I have been paid quite well for my work – for instance when I made the wind quintet version of Dvorak's A flat Major Sting Quartet op. 105. Mostly, though, I have found some music that I loved dearly, yet wasn't avialable for me to perform in its cu
My Website is Live!
I had been wondering for several years: How difficult would it be to create a website? Is it really necessary? Would I need to update it continuously? Would it just be a distraction to my art? I'll answer the questions in order. Creating the website was in fact ridiculously easy - and I expect it to only become easier and easier. Using Wix was as self-explanatory as I could have dreamt of, yet left me with the feeling of having near unlimited options for how to present
