Hello, Newgrounds! Here is another of my personal updates, this one covering the music I made in April and May.

One of the nice opportunities I had these past few months was related to Newgrounds: I was interviewed for the Off The Wall podcast, which used to be hosted by @ThatJohnnyGuy and which is now hosted by @Aalasteir. I had a great time talking with Aalasteir. If you'd like to hear our wide-ranging conversation, it's available on the @OffTheWallShow account. And for those that prefer to read text, I've created an edited transcript of the entire interview (though you'll miss the bit halfway through when I improvise on the piano).

As usual with my updates, I've made both a video and a text version, which you can watch or read below. Enjoy!

I should say first off, congratulations to those of my students who participated in the Timbral Music Studios spring recital. This happened in April at the Blackerby Violin shop. I think what we've probably settled on for recitals is to do two of them a year--one in the spring and one in the fall, most likely in October.

I'd also like to congratulate my students that have made recordings of their pieces to share on the TV in the lobby and to share with their family and friends. I want to continue to do that from time to time, and you can see a few of those student recordings on my YouTube channel.

I've been playing a lot of piano myself. I've been doing some concerto competitions for students at the Cedar Ridge High School and the McNeil High School. And I had the privilege of performing with One Ounce Opera the other day at the "Here Be Monsters" event at the Vortex. This was a five hour marathon of what was described as "indie classical music". I like that title. Basically, this just means new music, in a somewhat experimental vein. There were eleven premieres at this Here Be Monsters event. The piece that I played in wasn't a premiere, but it was by a contemporary composer, Tony Solitro. I performed in what was called an opera vignette named "She's Fabulous" with Julia Watkins-Davis and Patricia Combs under the direction of Julie Fiore. I'd also like to extend a congratulations to my friends Keith Allegretti and Amy Herman, who had a piece on this concert premiered called "Undine Speaks". This was super fun.

I had the privilege of performing with my friend Samantha O'Hare up in North Carolina recently, at the University of North Carolina Greensboro. We performed music by Valerie Coleman, Herman Beeftink, Ian Clarke and Amanda Harberg. Sam is a talented flutist who I've worked with a number of times before. If you go to the archive on my website, you'll see a bunch of recordings that we've made, including a piece that she commissioned me to write, the "Club Sonata" for flute and piano. (They're under her maiden name, Samantha Levreault.)

I appeared as a guest on a podcast recently called "Off The Wall". Off the Wall is a podcast that lives on Newgrounds.com, one of the original online portals where people could upload their own art, their own music, and their own animations. It pre-dated YouTube by some years, and in a way it was the natural predecessor to sites like YouTube. I've been a member of Newgrounds and uploaded music there since 2009. I was interviewed about my music, my creative process, my style of teaching, and my thoughts on a number of things. It was a very long, wide ranging conversation that lasted about 2 hours or so. I've provided a link to this interview on my website, along with a heavily edited transcript, at BenTibbetts.net/OffTheWall.

Finally, for subscribers to my website, I've uploaded some exclusive content that I hope you'll enjoy, including some unreleased sketches and some music that I made for Ballet Austin. And if you're interested in becoming a subscriber and supporting my work, you can go to BenTibbetts.net/Subscribe. People who subscribe to my website get reduced rates on services (just reach out to me for more details and we'll work something out), and access to exclusive content that I upload every month.

And that pretty much does it. As I look out the window here in Austin, I can't help but feel some dread as the weather continues to warm up into the hot summers here. A hundred degrees is hard for me, but it was a nice spring. I'm grateful for the good weather that we had and look forward to when those days come back.

Thanks for reading!

Ben