sonder
the blog of William Brown Percussion
Perspective. Purpose. Personal.
Sonder: The profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passed in the street, has a life as complex as one’s own, which they are constantly living despite one’s personal lack of awareness of it.
Clouds | Sonder 018
I. KTPA 020753Z 02008KT 10SM BKN250 12/06 A3023 RMK AO2 SLP235 T01220056 $ Humor me. Draft a new text message and send it to 358782 (standard message and data rates may apply) The body should be the...
Performance Psychology | Sonder 017
A Sonder post in video format! A deep dive into performance psychology during a clinic I gave in Vigo, Spain during my last tour with the World Percussion Group.
Feedbach
Try phrasing towards the bass notes in mm. 6-10. You have to push the register in mm. 14-20, make it sing. Look how the fragmented countersubject tumbles over itself in mm. 14-20, it needs rhythm, no don’t rush, no accents, make it land on each downbeat, watch the agogic accents.
sonder 015 | balance
The picture above was taken in New Hampshire in May. To be precise, the photographer is standing at about 43°19'32.9"N 71°41'03.1"W, give or take a few feet. To be less precise and more accurate, my...
Gradual
Eight schools over three years. Flights, drives, and zoom calls. 2 am practice sessions. Emails, audition deposits, admissions seminars. Forgetting to turn the snares off, missed notes on Porgy,...
Dark
September 22nd was a special day. It was a day of gentle breezes and cool air, bright skies and sunbeams. It was a day whose weather inspired nostalgia, a breeze that hinted at a cold future while...
Sonder 012 | Case Study
This blog has been incredibly cathartic for me during the year. It has given me the opportunity to refine the tangle of thoughts I have rolling around in my head into tangible threads. With that...
Resilient
WB: I met Ghadeer Abaido when she showed up in an orchestra rehearsal to play Totentanz, Liszt's monument to the Dies irae. By the end of the exposition I was thoroughly entranced by her playing....
A Year Lost
"Sophie Lee Morris' Liesl stands out in beauty and in voice; her duet with Doman in "Sixteen Going on Seventeen," complete with bicycle tricks, was to die for." WB: My time playing The Sound of...