Pro/Am

"I'm nobody. Who are you?" Emily Dickinson's insightful opening line caught me entirely unawares when I was 15 and haunts me to this day.

For many years I could not imagine qualifying as the pianist I longed to be. The notion of "pianist" as thrown around the professional world only rarely spoke to that pianist. The longing persisted, thank God. Now I ask myself how many professionals in the music business long to be the amateurs they once were: i.e., when they were kids deeply loving every sound whether perfect or not.

This phase of the blog will be targeted to the pro/am conflict as we are living it, on whichever side of the slash, for it is a real conflict, not to be taken lightly but to be savored.

Feedback invited, whoever you may be.