What I’m Playing & Listening to This Month

Classical

When it’s practice time for me, I am still turning to my good old friend, Johann Sebastian Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1. I find the fugues impossibly hard, but the preludes are a joy to learn.

Bach’s music is very mathematical, and so is Steve Reich’s—who notes Bach as one of his major inspirations. Reich is one of my favorite all-time composers. I keep returning to his Octet (for two woodwind players, two pianos, and a string quartet). The pianos provide the percussive backbone of this piece.

Jazz

I’ve been kind of obsessed with improvising in the lydian mode lately, which I tend to think of as just stacking a ninth, a sharp eleventh, and a thirteenth on top of any major chord that I’m passing through—like playing on a D7 chord over a C major. I love that sound.

As we’re here in Roanoke, everyone oughta know about Don Pullen, native son of our city, and one of the great jazz pianists of the twentieth century. As a teenager I wore down my CD edition of his epic solo piano album, Evidence of Things Unseen. I’ve returned to listening to Pullen’s music lately. He has such a distinctive touch and style, and I love that he’s not afraid to get really messy and raunchy, swirling his hand like a paint brush up and down the keys.

Pop

I think my biggest challenge continues to be figuring out the art of various Latin piano stylings. I’ve learned a lot by listening to Bad Bunny’s “Baile Inolvidable” and attempting to teach myself the piano line.

I’m a big fan of Blondshell, whose angsty indie rock music harkens back to the sonic palette of the 1990s alt scene. I haven’t tried playing of her songs on the piano, but they are good to listen to in the car while driving around town on errands!