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Shaun Michaud, Assistant Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"Teaching has made me a better guitar player; it's taught me a lot of things about how people learn and how I learn. And it helps me learn things faster. Anytime I need to learn something quickly, I think, 'How would I teach this to somebody?' And all of a sudden it clicks for me. I try to approach it that way with my students, as well. I ask them, 'If you had to show this to your roommate, how would you go about explaining it?'"
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Jane Miller, Associate Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department
"In the labs I teach, the class chemistry feels to me very much like leading a gig or running a show. In this case it's the students rather than the audience giving me the energy exchange; there's a definite back and forth going on. In the performance skills lab, I ask my students to pair up to work on their midterm project as a duo performance. They have to interpret the music, work out an arrangement, and rehearse together, and then perform it for the class. The final is a similar format except that I'm everybody's duo partner. There are no rehearsals; they talk me through it for a minute or two in class, and then we play together. They know it's on them to be able to tell me what they need from me and have an arrangement prepared."
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Tim Miller, Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"I've learned so much playing with musicians that I admire; just having the experience of playing with them opened my eyes. I think that's an important component of a lesson, so in private lessons we often play duets together. A lot of my students come in wanting to learn contemporary improvisational styles, but I try to enable them to find their own approach instead of trying to force my approach. I want to try to expose the player's own voice if at all possible."
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Amanda Monaco, Assistant Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"Berklee is so comprehensive and up to date with what's really going on in the music business. They tap into that in a way that I think other schools don't. And they're very realistic about what a musician needs to have to be a complete musician as opposed to just a player. The resources are vast, and students are getting a whole music experience, even before declaring a major. They have a foundation."
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Joe Musella, Assistant Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"I specialize in contemporary guitar playing. I played in bands from the time I was in eighth grade, and learned a lot just through real-world experience. I was a performance major at Berklee, and when I graduated, I played relentlessly four or five nights a week. It was tough at times, but I was in my early twenties and totally loving life at that point. I never felt I was particularly naturally talented or gifted; I just kind of stuck with it and worked hard. So I think it's not necessarily about natural talent, it's about working hard and having your basics together. If you have a strong foundation, you can pretty much go anywhere from there."
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David Newsam, Assistant Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"To walk out of school and have professional opportunities—that's what I want for my students. If I can recommend any of my students for performances I can't accept, then I've succeeded. The students who go above and beyond what is asked of them are the students I end up performing with or who have successful teaching businesses. They're the ones who possess that inspiration to go well beyond what I gave them. In a concert I just did, two of the four other performers were former students of mine, and both of them are successful performers and teachers."
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Lauren Passarelli, Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"A lot of kids who come to Berklee are struck by the magic of the songwriting process. So I feel like I'm showing them how the trick works. And the magic always comes back when they get into the emotional side of things, because they're putting their heart and soul into it."
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"It's really important to be versatile. When you get 'that phone call,' the more prepared you are, the less time you have to waste getting prepared for the gig. Regardless of what style you're learning, it is important to be versatile, because at some point you have to deal with other people in a recording studio who are going to say, 'I don't want you to play that part the way you play it, I want you to play it like it's written on the paper, because this is how the producer wants it.' If you don't do that, then you're not going to get paid, and you probably won't get called back."
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Jack Pezanelli, Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"Berklee students come to me for my harmonic approach to jazz guitar. Even as a kid, I was dissatisfied with the way harmony was broached on the guitar. So I started to learn more from piano players than guitar players, which has given me a comprehensive, pianistic approach to melody and harmony on the guitar. Guitarists generally are not taught harmony on the fretboard in a comprehensive way. Pianists learn harmony through systems of inversion; if you do that with the guitar, what you end up with is a deeper understanding of applied harmony on the fretboard."
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Joe Rogers, Assistant Professor
DEPARTMENT : Guitar Department"I hope my students will learn wholeness, in the sense that the guitar, for instance, and the music itself, are just vehicles for expressing the creative potential within. If people don't have clear access to what is within them, what they express might stay with them as lifelong pain. You hear of musicians and artists who are extremely creative, but who have led tortured lives. What good is that? If I can help a person clear away the blocks, the wholeness of their life expression is cleared as well. Then the instrument can become the vehicle for that expression."
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