As the new year opens I am currently working on promoting a few different projects, including my newest adventure in public domain drum notation translation (or transcription if you prefer), Ashworth’s 1812 book, A New Useful and Complete System of Drum Beating in which I’ve taken the illegible 19th century drum notation and rewritten it in a legible and standardized 21st century format. Its currently for sale on amazon, and you can see more details about it here. 

Of course, I also just put out my archeology non-fiction book The Forgotten Side of Bandelier in October, which you can check out here. It details the prehistory of Tsankawi at Bandelier National Monument and can be purchased from Amazon or in person from the Los Alamos History Museum gift shop, if you’re in town. Its not a drum book, but I think its an interesting topic none-the-less.

In other news, I am still working with the 30+ percussionists at Los Alamos High School and Los Alamos Middle School for the concert band season and will be occasionally preparing kids for marching band with auditions materials and other exercises. I will also be doing at least one session at Mountain Elementary to prepare for the upcoming middle school placement auditions. At home I have 14 private lesson students this year (and counting, there’s room for more), aged 7 to adult, many of which are working toward better placements and overall increased ability in next year’s marching, jazz, and concert bands.

I have plans for 2 to 4 more books this year or in the next couple of years, which I will have to space out prudently through time. Watch for those announcements; I’ve got more translations of 19th century classics and some much more modern drum kit instruction in the works… plus a totally different collaborative project going.

There has been almost no playing or performing going on, but with the roughly 40 students I see weekly, plus my publishing efforts and dad duty, I’m pretty busy.