August, 2024 Greeting

Dear Friends,

I hope you are enjoying these relaxing days of August. I’ve spent the entire summer at home with April, my wonderful wife of 32 years. This has been especially welcome after a busy first half of 2024, during which I performed 114 concerts across states from California to Maine. But the concerts were exciting and satisfying too — highlights included collaborations with some great jazz players around the US, and several orchestral performances, most recently, Saint-Saëns’ 2nd Piano Concerto with the brilliant conductor Francisco Noya and the Boston Civic Symphony.

Looking ahead to the next season, I have two performances of Rachmaninoff’s 3rd Piano Concerto scheduled with orchestras in California and Texas, the Grieg Concerto (a first for me), as well as many recitals and jazz concerts across the US.

This summer, I have been focusing on developing music software. Here is a photo of me in my studio practicing with Measure-by-Measure, my sheet-music application. I’ve adapted it to run on a dual-screen laptop that opens like a book. The commercial score-reading apps are made primarily for tablets which I find too small. (These apps also lack the tools I need for analysis, practicing, recording, accompaniments, etc.) On a related note, the software company, LiveCode, has asked me to describe how I use their software in my work as a concert pianist. As I look back, I realize that I could not have made a living over the past 41 years solely from playing concerts and selling recordings without LiveCode. It’s an approach to building a concert career unknown to the experts. Here’s a link to the article: https://livecode.com/livecode-and-the-concert-pianist/

Fred