Researcher Educator Musician
NEWS:
7/7/22: My arrangement of Georgia On My Mind is now available for purchase here
4/16/21: This study of structural brain differences between artist-level jazz musicians and non-musicians was just published. You can read the article here
6/3/21: I was part of a team of researchers from The University of Georgia, Georgia State University, and Georgia Southern University working together to collect information about the impact of the pandemic on the student teaching experience. Read article
Research in musical improvisation
I study musical improvisation from several different angles. For my dissertation, I used qualitative interviews to investigate cognitive processes underlying artist-level jazz musician's improvisations. Later I used corpus analysis of Charlie Parker solos to look for patterns, computer modeling, and experimental paradigms to further understanding of cognitive underpinnings. See my articles on Google Scholar here:
Educational materials for jazz strings
I have published a number of jazz string instruction books on Mel Bay publications. Jazz Fiddle Wizard is for advanced violinists who want to learn to improvise within the jazz tradition. The Wizard junior series is for middle and high school violinists and can be used in groups. I also have several published orchestra pieces published by The FJH Music Company and Alfred Music Publishing.