Writing
Articles
Writing on practice, repertoire, glissandos, mutes, and the working life of a contemporary trombonist — plus reflections on teaching, ensemble work, and FlowFrame.
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Land of Winter: Resisting Easy Assumptions
I had a small epiphany today about Land of Winter (Donnacha Dennehy’s large-scale work for chamber orchestra, written for and recorded by Alarm Will Sound.). Or maybe, given my day job, an alarm sounded. The piece, in many ways, deals with misunderstandings.…
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Beyond the Click : Six Real-World Ways I’m Using FlowFrame Right Now
I built FlowFrame to scratch a very personal itch: a practice tool that could keep up with the way musicians actually work. Since then, the app has grown in directions I never imagined… mostly because my own playing, teaching, and…
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Built for Progress: Practice Tracking in FlowFrame
When I started sketching out FlowFrame, it wasn’t just about building a better metronome; it was about creating a space where practice tracking could feel focused, intentional, and rewarding. A place where structure meets flexibility, and where your growth is…
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There’s No One Right Way to Make Music
If there’s a single belief that’s guided the development of FlowFrame, it’s this:There is no one right way to make music. Not in how you compose it.Not in how you teach it.Not in how you practice it. Music is shaped…
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Built With You: How FlowFrame Grows Through Your Ideas
One of the best parts of building FlowFrame has been seeing it evolve not just from my ideas, but from user-suggested features. Some of my favorite features weren’t in the original plan. They came from musicians I admire, collaborators I…
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Dividing Time – FlowFrame
Time, Sliced and Felt Time is the raw material of every practice session. When I began building FlowFrame in January 2025 I was staring down four uncertain years and trying to decide how I would make it through them. I…
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The Art of Noticing
An Experiment in Musical Mindfulness You know that feeling when you’ve spent weeks with a piece of music, and suddenly you start hearing all these little details you missed before? The way a particular harmony shifts, or how two instruments…
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Contemporary Trombone Excerpts – Ayres, In the Alps
No. 42 (In the Alps), Richard Ayres Melodrama for soprano and chamber orchestra (2008) No. 42 (In The Alps) by Richard Ayres is an orchestral trombonist’s dream: part Strauss, part Rossini, part Mahler, mostly hilarious. Here’s how the composer Richard…
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Contemporary Trombone Excerpts – Haas, Remix
Trombonists (and “ensembly-minded” musicians in general) spend a lot of time thinking about excerpts, passages of music from repertoire. We naturally single out these snippets as places we need to dedicate extra practice time. An excerpt might be an exposed…