A Sheet Music Collection (And Other Project You Can Do While COVID Keeps You Indoors)

Things You Can Do (As a Musician) While Staying at Home

It has been a long year, especially the way the pandemic has unfolded (meaning, of course, that ever since Thanksgiving the number of COVID-19 cases has soared, at least where I live) and now that we're getting close to the end of December it's good to reflect on the big picture. It has been about ten months that this health crisis has had a significant impact on everybody's lives, whether it's those who have actually contracted the illness, or just those who have had to adapt in some way or another (in other words, all of us). 

For me, it has definitely been a while since I've put on any kind of a virtual piano concert, partly because Facebook Live was acting funny (freezing up during the livestream) and I want to make sure I can use a method of livestreaming that's more reliable (maybe YouTube Live). So what else is there to do? I still teach my piano lessons on Zoom, as well as in-person. The in-person students are required to wear their masks, and with the 28 students that I have now it's about half-and-half (half of them are on Zoom, the other half meet me in person). Even as we approach close to a year since the very first COVID-19 cases showed up, my business hasn't really decreased at all, which I continue to be grateful for. 

One of the many ways I've been spending time, aside from having put on several virtual concerts, is adding new sheet music to my website. I finished putting together new sheet music for two of my songs, which are now up on my site, along with all the others.

I continue to cross my fingers and remain hopeful that the vaccines which have now been approved (which they're distributing as we speak) will eventually start to bring this under control. In the mean time -- since there apparently is a silver lining with everything -- I've been churning out one song after another in my sheet music collection. I recently finished putting together the sheet music for "Search at Jan Mayen's Coast" and "Waking to the Rain," and am about to wrap up another two: "The Falls of Dynjandi" and "Liliana".  After I add one more I'll have a total of 12 pieces with sheet music available, which led me to start selling these as a collection. 

Podcast Hiatus

From August until November I was posting a weekly podcast on YouTube, along with Melissa Brown (another piano teacher who works here in Chico) and we had hoped to continue through the fall and the spring of 2021. We discontinued it temporarily because of the high number of COVID-19 cases and, even though we're both extremely cautious, because of our need to take all necessary precautions. The good news is that all the videos are still up on our YouTube channel, "Treble with Missy and Thor" (a name that I'm still very fond of :D ). As far as a timeframe of when we'll consider it safe enough to resume the weekly broadcast, that's anyone's guess. 

Now, of course, and along with about a dozen on-going projects that are music-related, I'm waiting for some available time to start polishing up the videos we already have -- this would include, among other things, adding intro music at the beginning of each show, fixing some audio issues, and adding a second "blooper video" (the first one got some good feedback, and a few chuckles). 

So remember, there are many things you can do as a musician to keep yourself busy. If I'm able to keep myself as occupied and busy as I have, others can do it too.