Contrabass Conversations double bass life

Sarah Hogan Kaiser has been a member of the St. Louis Symphony since 2004.  Prior to that, she performed in the New World Symphony, and she received her Bachelor of Music from Indiana University and her Master of Music from Rice University. Sarah and I shared a stand in the Spoleto USA Orchestra many years ago, and it was great to reconnect and talk about her career, life in the St. Louis Symphony, and the challenges of take an audition in your own orchestra after many years of not auditioning.  Enjoy!

Maggie Cox is an undergraduate student at Rice University and co-authored an article last year which sparked controversy in the double bass world.  This article led to the creation of the Project for All Gender Equality, which is focused on the unique experiences of gender minorities in the bass community. We chat about this and more in this engaging conversation live from the 2019 International Society of Bassists Convention with Maggie.  Enjoy!

Joel Braun is taking over at the University of Texas at Austin as bass professor, and he joined me and San Diego Symphony principal bass Jeremy Kurtz-Harris for a freewheeling conversation on competitions, auditions, learning modalities, living in an age of distraction, and much more.

Jay Starkes and I caught up live at the 2019 International Society of Bassists Convention to chat about the passing of his friend, colleague, and mentor Lisle Atkinson. Jay discusses the wealth of musical collaborations that Lisle experienced in his life and the memorial concert being planned for fall 2019 to commemorate his life and artistic contributions.

Desmond Bratton has had an interesting career so far, and he’s only in the early stages of his professional bass life.  He has studied with Lloyd Goldstein and Nicholas Walker, two of my favorite past podcast guests. We talk about his artistic pursuits, meditation, and pivot points we all encounter in our lives.  Enjoy!

Both Danny Ziemann and Adam Booker have appeared on the podcast before, and I thought that it would be fun and valuable to sit down with both of them and chat about the state of the union in terms of jazz education. This is a great conversation that covers all kinds of important topics like mindset, professionalism, challenges unique to jazz bass education, and much more.  Enjoy!

Aaron Olguin is one of my favorite people, and it has been such fun following along with his projects and successes in the music world.  Aaron was the opening classical headliner for the 2019 International Society of Bassists Convention, and he and I also played on Andrés Martín’s recital at the convention. We talk about what he played on is recital, what his new job in the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra is like, and more!  Enjoy, and check out our deep-dive with Aaron and his career from early 2019

Today’s episode was recorded live at the 2019 International Society of Bassists Convention with Dr. Randy Kertz, Chi-chi Nwanoku, John Patitucci, and Steve Bailey about how to stay healthy on the bass as you age. Enjoy!

Blake Hilley just finished his freshman year at the Juilliard School, and he’s already done more than many people do during their entire undergraduate careers. 

Sélène Saint-Aime is a young Afro-French bassist, singer, and composer with Caribbean and West African origins.  She has spent the last few years traveling the world and absorbing the musical cultures of places like Cuba, North Africa, Spain, Italy, and the West Indes.

Stephanie Patterson specializes in teaching adult learners.  After playing professionally for a period of time, she developed an overuse injury and had to leave her symphonic career. Her teaching career began by accident about 10 years ago when her former hairdresser wanted to learn to play bass to do rockabilly. Through her own experiences and advice from Orin O'Brien, Stephanie has developed a teaching philosophy specifically tailored for adult learners.

Cory Palmer recently won the position of Principal Bass with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra.  We first met in person at the 2019 Pittsburgh Double Bass Symposium, and it was great to sit down and do a deep dive on his career thus far. We cover a variety of topics, including: •studying with John Hood and Orin O'Brien •Cory’s path from Carnegie Mellon University into the freelance world •refining his audition process •using Modacity to practice

Sascha Jacobsen recently put out a super-cool new video titled Un Bajo de Magia / The Magic Bass.  This new release was a great excuse to connect in person with Sascha, who also lives here in the San Francisco Bay Area. Sascha has an incredibly diverse creative life, and we dig into a whole bunch of topics about various projects, including: his Musical Art Quintet his Trio Garufa getting projects partially funded by InterMusic SF Sascha’s new Patreon account and the importance of supporting arti

Olivier Babaz recently released his first course with Discover Double Bass.  Titled Jazz Bowing, this course explores all kinds of cool bowing techniques that Olivier uses in his playing. Lessons cover topics like: Fundamentals of Bow Technique Basic Bow Strokes Slurs Arco Technique and more... We reference a video interview that Olivier filmed with Discover Double Bass founder Geoff Chalmers, and  we dig into Olivier’s background, using kalina and bass, staying inspired, and many other top

Justin Carney recently started a new podcast called Kill The Bass.  It’s all about exploring various concepts of musical practice from the perspective of jazz bassists. Justin has been planning this podcast for several years, and it was great to have a chance to sit down with him and talk about life, musical highs and lows, how musical practice relates to other areas of life, and many other topics.