Last week, I had the privilege of teaching at the Juilliard Lower Strings Seminar, taught by Astrid Schween, the fabulous cellist of the Juilliard Quartet. The class provides strategies on how to succeed in the world of music. My topic was how to cultivate the happiness habit and experience more flow in your creative career. Happiness Breeds Success I am …
Today’s Audience For Classical Music: How to Make Classical Music Relevant and Accessible
Every fall, I have the privilege of teaching a project-based seminar to a group of budding music entrepreneurs at the Yale School of Music. The class, Creating Value Through Innovative Collaborative Projects (Music 621a), addresses the problem of how to keep classical music alive and vital in our culture. My goal is to equip my students with leadership and innovation …
How’d You Get That Music Job Podcast: Career Success for Today’s Music Entrepreneurs
I am thrilled to be on the most recent music job podcast episode of “Hey, How’d You Get That Music Job?”, one of the top career podcasts of 2018. The host is L. Ariel, singer/songwriter/producer of dance synth pop, who hosts a series of podcasts with music industry experts with advice on how to succeed in the music business today. …
Bang on a Can: Inspiring Innovation for Today’s Music Entrepreneurs
Last week, I had the privilege of participating on a panel examining the music powerhouse, Bang on a Can, as a case study in successful arts entrepreneurship. The panel, a Career Development session for composers and other musicians, was sponsored by the American Composers Orchestra as part of the Underwood New Music Readings, a program that discovers today’s brightest orchestral composers and …
How Arts Leaders Build Expert and Relationship Power: The Two Best Ways to Establish Your Leadership Credibility
This past weekend, I again had the privilege and pleasure of working with the talented young opera executives who were selected for the 2017 Leadership Intensive program at Opera America. One of the most helpful topics of our intense sessions was how to gain credibility as a young leader because of a perceived lack of leadership power. One of the biggest …
Sō Percussion’s Model of Success: The Collaborative Entrepreneurial Ensemble
One of the highlights of my class at Yale is when I invite alumni from the School of Music to speak to the students about their experience. Since my class this semester is focused on collaboration, I was thrilled to invite Jason Treuting and Eric Beach, two of the four members of the percussion ensemble Sō Percussion. Jason Treuting is the longest standing …
Know Your Purpose and Share Your Vision: How Music Entrepreneurs Find Their Collaborators
Classical music faces a lot of challenges today and my goal in teaching and working with musicians is to help them find their place in the world of music and contribute something valuable and innovative. This fall, I began teaching a new class at Yale, entitled “Collaboration, Entrepreneurship and Innovation”. The premise of the course is that today’s artists need …
So Percussion’s Vision and Mission Statements: How Successful Music Entrepreneurs Communicate Their Purpose and Value
Arts entrepreneurship is about creating value to society through innovative ideas, fueled by a vision for how to make the world a better place, as well as a mission of how to make that vision a reality. That’s why successful arts entrepreneurs know their vision and their mission. People are often confused about what constitute a vision and a mission. …
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The Art of Collaboration: Top 10 Skills for Creative Success
This semester, I am teaching a new course at the Yale School of Music using the collaborative project as the vehicle through which to teach arts entrepreneurship and innovation. Arts entrepreneurship involves coming up with innovative ideas that create value to society and actualizing those ideas. Collaboration is more than teamwork, where there is a leader to set the agenda and …
Innovation in the Arts: What the Olympics and Happy Hour Can Teach Us About Audience Development
How could the Olympics and Happy Hour possibly help lead to a solution on how to attract more audiences to classical music? This was the topic of a fascinating workshop that I led last weekend at the Juilliard School Leadership Retreat on The 21st Century Artist as Entrepreneur and Innovator. My goal? To tap into the creativity of today’s bright young …