Teaching Mind and Body

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Happy 2026! In this episode I interview Grammy award winning and Latin Grammy nominated Venezualan violinist, Jesus Florido. We talk about his formative years, his training in the legendary  musical education program "El Sistema" of which he was a foundinging member and we also discuss his legendary teachers Margaret Pardee, Dorothy Delay, Larry Shapiro, and Joeseph Gingold and he shares  their insights. Since the interview was over 2 hours long i have split it into 2 parts. This is part 1.

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In this episode, we welcome back April Choi to talk about the skill of tightrope/ and slack line. She holds a Guinness book of world’s records for the most whip cracks while standing on a slack line. I found myself comparing violin playing metaphorically to walking a tightrope, but then realizing that understanding the issues of physics and balance involved in that might be very beneficial for string playing,   Turns out, there are a surprising number of things we can learn from this skill that relate to string playing. From balancing and counter balancing to issues regarding the physics of string tension and how one compensates for that. Her background in engineering as well as string playing makes her uniquely qualified to talk about that. I discuss the take aways that apply directly to string playing after the interview.

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In this episode I interview Dr. Jan Svennevig who is a professor of linguistics and a prolific researcher and publisher of numerous papers and articles on various aspects of communication. He has taught at the university of Oslo and  his current post is the University of Agder.  He has also been a guest lecturer at Stanford University. We talk about the nuances of communication, the cues that others give us as to their comprehension and receipt of information, as well as cultural aspects of language. We also discuss some of the research that has come out of his linguistics lab over the years. I believe that analyzing language in this way is not only helpful in communication but also because music follows similar language elements and structures, it helps us to  understand musical phrasingl, flow and emphasis.

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In this episode, we talk to Nasa aerospace engineer, world famous Whip artist and mutliple Guiness world record holder April Choi. We discuss her motivations, her career, her learning methods, and her feelings about being a performer as well as her records. It's a fascinating glimpse into the mind of an extraordinary human being, who I am fortunate to also consider my friend.

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Today's guest is associate professor of Art History Dr. Frida Forsgren at The University of Agder in Kristiansand Norway. She is a notable art history scholar, author of books and has numerous published articles on the subject. She teaches a course in the Beat era (1946-1963). We discuss it's impact on the arts, from the perspective of historical context, motivations, and cultural attitudes of the times. The Beat era represented a cultural renaissance and an interdisciplinary approach that produced a lot of innovative art in all areas (literature, visual art, music, dance, and theater).