“In my training as a composer, learning to write fugues in the late Baroque style of JS Bach was probably the skill that was the most difficult to acquire. It required years of previous training in the discipines of harmony, counterpoint and form, months of close listening and analysis of many Bach fugues, and then a good deal of practice and patience on top of that to get my own attempts to sound reasonably good.

In my efforts to learn to imitate the master of masters, I developed my craft in important ways, gaining tools that I now use toward all sorts of musical purposes and projects. I was mentored through this process by a wonderful professor, Johannes Schild, who was undoubtedly my most influential teacher in composition. ”