When I was a young music student, I remember one of my teachers telling me, "I am not teaching you how to be a musician, I'm teaching you how to practice. I'm giving you the tools you'll need to be independent of me." So much of health-centered education is the same. Educators often ask, "Am I responsible for the hearing health of my students?" The...

The need to shelter in place during the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the way music instructors interact with their students. Most teachers now rely on various technologies to facilitate remote instruction for lessons and group classes. While this shift is essential to slow the spread of infectious disease, the sudden move to online instru...

"You have pneumonia."  It shouldn't have been a surprise. A cold reared its ugly head just as the school year started, but I had to push ahead. No daycare the week that classes start? Stay up late to write your syllabi! Feel like you might collapse? Those classes won't teach themselves! Been six weeks since you felt like yourself? It'll clear ...

The trapeziometacarpal joint, also called the "trapezium," is at the base of the thumb. Osteoarthritis, a well-known condition suffered by many adults, affects the trapezium in some people. Sufferers experience pain, stiffness, and weakness in the thumb joint. This is particularly troublesome when the sufferer is a pianist.  Luckily, there are...

Jill Dew is one of my favorite people. You can't help but love her charisma and her enthusiasm. She is a superb singer and vocal coach who loves her students. She also loves playing the piano, sometimes in tearful wonder of the instrument and her accomplishments. Then she was robbed. Robbed by the effects of arthritis. Jill is not naive—arthritis i...