Education
University of North Carolina at Chapel HIll
My first course of study in the music department at UNC was in jazz. The jazz program was very small while I was at school, but the faculty were excellent, and that is the area where I did most of my studies. I studied jazz guitar for three years under Scott Sawyer, an extremely accomplished and renowned guitarist who taught students individually in the program. The work consisted primarily of learning standards in order to develop my repertoire as a jazz guitarist, and to have a new tune ready to perform each week with him in our lesson. I would be considered to have learned the tune if I could convincingly play the melody, chord changes, and improvise over the whole form. In addition to those weekly assignments, I was also required to do several transcriptions per semester, which I would generally select myself, but occasionally Scott would assign a piece in particular that he thought would be useful in developing my vocabulary as an improviser. At the end of each semester, I would be evaluated and graded based on a jury performance, in which I would be required to bring two pieces of music, in my case jazz standards, which I had studied that semester and prepared for the performance, to the "jury," which consisted of Scott, along with all the faculty instructors in the jazz program of the other instruments, and perform the music while leading these faculty members, who would accompany me.
My transcription of Charlie Parker's solo from Blues For Alice, from a 1951 recording which was first released on the 1955 album "The Magnificent Charlie Parker"
I also participated in jazz combos, which were student-led, faculty-managed small jazz ensembles of around five to seven players, who would hold one to two weekly rehearsals and perform at various times during the semester. Each faculty member within the jazz program would manage a combo, with each one typically being organized around a theme -- for example, one semester I played in the "fusion" combo, which primarily played music from the 1980s fusion era of jazz, including Chick Corea, Return to Forever, Weather Report, etc.
During that same time, I also studied intensively under Dr. Stephen Anderson, who became the program director while I was there. I had a class with him almost every semester that I was involved in the jazz program. The courses I took with him include jazz improvisation, jazz harmony, jazz composition and arranging, jazz theory, jazz history, with some of these having multiple levels.
Dr. Anderson also taught classes outside of the jazz program, a few of which I took, including one on twentieth century classical composition. That class made a big impact on me, most especially in the exploration of the composers Arnold Schoenberg and Anton Webern, atonal composers of the Viennese School.
This is a piece of atonal music that I composed for an assignment in Dr. Anderson's twentieth century composition class. This piece is for string trio: violin, viola, an cello. It was read and performed by a string trio at the time the time of the assignment.
My time at UNC represents a foundational period in my development as a musician, both for all the work I did as a student, and for all of the other unrelated work I did during that same time period. I think I must have started school at just the right time, because, had I been a little earlier, they might not have let me into the music program at all -- a little later and I might have ended up becoming an academic. The reality of the situation was somewhat of an unhappy, but ultimately fruitful middle ground. I was far behind the serious among my classmates, always striving to catch up to their level, not ever quite good enough to gain the opportunities that would have allowed me to fully immerse myself in academia, and therefore constantly seeking -- and finding -- other opportunities in music outside the university.