Music and Happiness: How to Get Out of Your Comfort Zone with a Positive Mindset

Every summer, I spend one week entirely devoted to piano performance at pianoSonoma, a chamber music festival that brings together serious amateur musicians like myself with world-class professional musicians for a week of collaboration and performance in the beautiful Green Music Center, at Sonoma State University. The festival is led by founders and co-artistic directors, Jessica and Michael Shinn. I …

Music and Happiness: How to Boost Your Mood

Music and Happiness: How to Boost Your Mood Did you know that listening to music can boost your mood, improve your mental and physical health, make you more productive, creative, and ultimately make you happier?  Last week, I had the privilege of leading a workshop for students and graduates of the Happiness Studies Academy covering just that! We have all …

Optimism in Troubled Times: 3 Ways to Cultivate More Joy

I am a born optimist, and it’s challenging to remain optimistic these days, given the current state of affairs in our country and around the world. Yet optimism is a crucial element of well-being, and finding joy in our daily lives is an important way to cultivate that optimism. That’s why I commit to enhancing my sense of joy and …

Welcome to Wellness for Leaders!

Each week, I post a video highlighting research-based wellness practices that can enhance your leadership abilities. My first video is about Flow. Flow comes from the research of the late psychologist Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi as described his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. Csikszentmihalyi researched the conditions under which people experienced Flow and defined it as doing something that: you …

SPIRE for Leaders: Implementing SPIRE into your Life and Leadership

In our last post, we shared how leaders from OPERA America’s Leadership Intensive Class of 2023 are applying the science-based SPIRE wellness framework.  These leaders have learned the value of promoting wellness at work both for themselves and for the staff members. They are also implementing SPIRE into their lives and enhancing the wellness of their staff members and their …

SPIRE For Leaders: One Year Later

Since 2013, I have had the privilege of teaching at OPERA America’s Leadership Intensive Program. This initiative trains mid-career opera executives to take on senior leadership positions at major opera companies. We meet for a week in New York and then I have a series of coaching calls with the leaders throughout the year. For our most recent cohort in …

Entrepreneurial Projects at the Yale School of Music: What Today’s Audiences Need from Classical Music:

Each fall, I teach a wonderful class at the Yale School of Music (“YSM”) entitled, Collaborative Leadership To Advance Creativity, Innovation and New Opportunities in the Arts.  My class uses the experiential semester-long collaborative project to teach graduate music students how to create innovative solutions to problems in the classical music field.  Our focus is on meeting the needs of …