Hello, Newgrounds! I haven't posted here in the past two months, though I do generally log on to Newgrounds once a day to check my feed and see what some of my favorite artists and creators have been releasing. Among the best recently was by @ToonHole, which broke a long string of funny and raunchy comic strips to release a thoughtful video on the creative process, detailing the steps for painting a comic called the "Introvert Olympics". There have also been some beautiful new works in July from @carrion and @Kamikaye and @maruki, and others I'm sure I'm forgetting.

If you'd like to see what I've been up to*, read on, or watch this video summary:

Concert at Waterloo Greenway

The first thing I wanted to mention actually wasn't recorded, to my knowledge, but I just wanted to thank Liz Cass and Graham Yates for a great concert on June 4. This was a concert called Outside Voices at Waterloo Greenway. It was a free concert of music by Bizet, Faure, Debussy, and Mahler, and it also featured some of Graham's original music. Thank you to Liz and to Graham for collaborating with me on that. It's always wonderful to work with you guys, and keep an eye out on the LOLA website for future events like this. LOLA does a lot of performances of opera and great music.

Ballet Austin Summer Intensive

I also did a lot of playing for Ballet Austin these last two months, specifically for the Ballet Austin Summer Intensive, which is a kind of dance camp and a set of dance classes for young ballet dancers. It attracts kids and young adults from all over the country. And these classes are really a joy, because the students are so enthusiastic about their craft and so eager to learn and to improve. I enjoyed it last year as well. I hope to do this every year, if I can.

Timbral Music Studios Fall Recital

For my own students, I wanted to let everybody know we've booked a fall recital for my students at Timbral Music Studios for Sunday, October 15, and this will be in two sessions, one at 2:00 p.m. and one at 3:00 p.m. It's also open to my students at Premier and Armstrong. It's slightly less convenient because of the distances between these locations, but for all of my students, truly, if you'd like to perform, you're welcome to come and sign up for this program. Just let me know.

Student Video Performances

I've also uploaded a couple of student performances, two from my student Sima. Sima played an arrangement of 'River Flows in You' by Yiruma, and a performance of 'My Heart Will Go On' from the movie Titanic. My student Azza also performed that beautiful song made famous by Elvis, 'Can't Help Falling in Love'. Those are available on my YouTube channel.

Updates to YouTube

And speaking of YouTube, I've worked really hard these last two months to, let's say, up my game with respect to my YouTube channel. I uploaded a couple of videos that were fairly experimental, the first of which was a commentary video, a kind of audio essay on the ad hominem fallacy. I uploaded two videos featuring improvisations that I did, and I uploaded a video that I actually made in high school called 'Throw Back'. And that's pretty much what I did these last two months. It was a little bit of a slow time of year, and also it was really hot. So I think perhaps I'm working at a slightly slower tempo than usual.

Conclusion

If you like my work, please consider subscribing to my website, which supports me. It's basically a donation of $4 a month. And in exchange for that, as kind of a thank you from me, you get access to exclusive content on my website.

And that's it from me. I hope you've enjoyed this. Stay cool.

Best wishes,

Ben

*Following that stupid preposition rule, I guess this should be, "If you'd like to see to what I've been up..."