VJC Q&T podcast host Russell Schmidt has shared a journey in music education with violist Nancy Buck since they first met in 1995 at Bowling Green State University’s new faculty orientation. And for more than two decades, Nancy and Russ have maintained a joyous partnership on and off the concert stage. Nancy is a nationally-renown artist/teacher who presently serves as an Associate Professor of Viola at Arizona State University. She is also the Artistic Director and Co-Founder of the Arizona Violacademy.

Nancy recently stopped by the MSW-Tempe studio to share questions and tangents with Russ. In this, the first of two podcasts together, they discussed the pervasive impact a great mentor teacher can have, the factors that shifted her path from violinist to violist, and even the unexpected benefits that may fall to the first student of the day to get a lesson.

Learn more about Nancy Buck here:

https://music.asu.edu/profile/nancy-buck

Learn more about the Arizona Violacademy, for which she serves as Artistic Director and Co-Founder, here:

https://astaaz.org/event/violacademy/

Learn more about some of the people, institutions, and other subjects mentioned in the podcast here:

Heidi Castleman – https://www.juilliard.edu/music/faculty/castleman-heidi

Otto Erdesz – https://josephcurtinstudios.com/otto-erdesz-remembered/

Howard Johnson – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Johnson_(jazz_musician)

Elizabeth Oakes – https://music.uiowa.edu/people/elizabeth-oakes

Vincenzo Sannino – https://tarisio.com/cozio-archive/cozio-carteggio/vincenzo-sannino/

Rayburn Wright – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayburn_Wright

Arizona State University School of Music – https://music.asu.edu/

Bowling Green State University College of Musical Arts – https://www.bgsu.edu/musical-arts.html

Canton Symphony Orchestra – https://www.cantonsymphony.org/

Cleveland Institute of Music – https://www.cim.edu/

Oakland Symphony Youth Orchestra – https://www.oaklandsymphony.org/community-education/oakland-symphony-youth-orchestra/Oberlin Conservatory of Music – https://www.oberlin.edu/conservatory

Plymouth Church UCC of Shaker Heights (OH) – https://www.plymouthchurchucc.org/

San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra – https://www.sfsymphony.org/EducationCommunity/SFS-Youth-Orchestra

Strings (magazine) – https://stringsmagazine.com/

Tendonitis (a.k.a. Tendinopathy) – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendinopathy

Thanks for listening!

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Website: https://www.valleyjazz.org/

Social Media (Facebook): https://www.facebook.com/ValleyJazzCooperative/

About The Host: Pianist/composer/educator Russell Schmidt has performed with such celebrated artists as Carl Allen, Michael Brecker, Eddie Daniels, Joe Lovano, Gerry Mulligan, Lucas Pino, Arturo Sandoval, and Clark Terry. Among his recordings as a leader are Anachromysticism (2012), which highlights Russell’s wide-ranging efforts as a jazz composer, Jazz Triptych, Volume I – The Sacred (2018), a collection of hymns and spirituals reimagined in the jazz language, and his most recent recording, the companion album Jazz Triptych, Volume II – The Secular (2019).

After a distinguished career in academia, Russell joined Music Serving The Word in June 2014 as Coordinator of Education, founding MSW’s Valley Jazz Cooperative program in 2016. Previously, he served as Director of Jazz Studies at Bowling Green State University and the University of Utah. He was also a member of the Eastman School of Music jazz faculty, where he co-conducted the Eastman Studio Orchestra. A student of Rayburn Wright, Russell holds two degrees from Eastman.

Find music from VJC Q&T host Russell Schmidt here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuao1b7Ztc7JNpUTzyorXDQ?

The Questions & Tangents podcast is produced by Caleb Kilian, for the Valley Jazz Cooperative, an outreach of MSW Ministries, a 501(c)(3) organization.