The Perfect Recording (when you have kids)

Hahahahaha, for the past few months I have been flirting with the idea of creating a decent body of videos for myself, possibly for endorsements, just to get my name out there and hopefully give people who may be looking for performers something to watch.

Anyone who is a parent of young kids understands this so feel free to pass it right by. People unmarried, straight out of college, or associated with a collegiate music program, allow me to enlighten you. If you've had the wonderful opportunity, while in your practice room, to spend an additional hour on getting the perfect take for your Instagram account the minute you have kids you can kiss that time goodbye. Finding practice time alone is more than difficult. You either have to rob Peter to pay Paul by taking time after they go to sleep by burning the midnight oil or plop them in front of the TV while you take the time to work on yourself. The maddening thing about this is that most people who only superficially understand musicians will see the time commitment as selfish but those same people are good with taking hours at the gym. Strange that one is seen as beneficial but the other is seen as selfish. I digress....

I am working in my bedroom where my 5 octave marimba has been banished to because of its size. My daughter is playing on her Kindle Fire (selfish, I know, right??!) with her headphones on. I ask her to give me a few minutes to record some takes of a piece I am working on and she agrees. As I am working, I hear her making noises with her mouth that my senstive microphone can pick up without a doubt. Ask her again to please give me the time and we go through it again....with the same result. Oy.

If you don't know, I teach high school music students. As of March 16th, school in NY has been in the distance learning mode so in addition to my responsibility as a teacher I am also a parent who no longer has a minute to himself...Maybe, just maybe, I'll get some time in the future to get some clean copies of videos and audio recordings posted on this site. I think it will be some time before I can get some live video up. Wish me luck!