March 2023
It was 20+ years ago today
as I write this,
that, late at night after a rehearsal, my dear friend & songwriter David Garza stood up and proclaimed --
You are doing this!
-- and he and I pushed my Yamaha U1 Piano (from what later became London's bedroom) all the way down the hallway* and across the back room of my house to the far corner by all the windows... of what was afterwards known as my piano room.
What his proclamation was referring to was my decision to open my music studio and leave my very fine job teaching
International students in the Intensive English Language skills at the University of Texas.
Bewildering as this decision may have seemed to some (like my boss, and my dad)...
and even though my own mind was overcome with questions:
Who will my students be?
How will I find them?
How will they find me?
Curiosity consumed me.
I had to do it.
I was anguishing--wanting with all my heart to only only only be
working in, thinking about, and dreaming of--only music.
What followed was
Twenty Magical Years of Music Making (and coffee)
in my happy piano room on Joe Sayers Avenue in Austin, Texas—
with YOU!
So much love, discovery, musical accomplishment and wall paint color changes occurred in this room. I have had the privilege of working with hundreds of students over the past 20 years, as well as hosting countless band practices, Erik Satie birthday parties, and many house concerts and classes.
As most of you know, I am no longer at the house on Joe Sayers. After several very hard years of taking care of my sweet momma, London and I are finally setting our sails for other shores (French ones, to be specific), and my teaching studio is now fully online, so that wherever in the world I am (or you are), I hope we can be close still!
In my life, there will never be another experience like that I had on Joe Sayers with you. So many moments, most of which you probably don't remember as you were only 6, 10, 17...which now already may seem like a blip as so many more things happen in the decades after that. But for me, I remember all of your ages and phases! Conversations, your frustrations and then breakthroughs. The songs you liked and shared with me.
For all of this, thank you from my heart of hearts!
One of the most heartbreaking aspects of living in Austin for me over the past years has been how the places and businesses I discovered and fell in love with when I first moved there in 1995, are not just out of business, they are often totally erased. Some, bulldozed and replaced with indistinguishable corporate nothingness. I know this sad song is sung by many in Austin, but I also can't bear that my own little studio, where I met all of you, my studio, has met the same fate.
I so much can't beat that, that I have I am making this page as an archive of it all, in case you ever want to drop by, and revisit, and I will drop things in here as I run across them, and I invite you to LITERALLY send me anything you want to share, from recitals, or any performances, pictures, things you made, things you remember, stories. Anything you have, I would love to have, too, for my own memories, and to add anything you feel comfortable with having posted here, to this collection below.
And so, below, you will find all the Piano Arthouse Videos made during the Pandemic and all the recitals that had posters (there were many more that did not!).
I am in contact with some of you, and if we are not in touch, I want to be! Please contact me and say hi--I'd love to hear what you are doing in the world, what your life is like, what you are playing, listening to, over the moon about in any way!
Thank you for being a part of my life and my growth as a teacher, as a musician, and as a human.
How brilliant, inspiring and unforgettable you are!
*Pushing a piano ANYWHERE is ill-advised. This action is guaranteed to leave a very noticeable and permanent groove in the floor. As I found out.
