Taking the Plunge: August 2014

How does one adjust to small town living after performing on the world stage? Deborah Rambo Sinn seems to have found the secret. Maybe a hint lies in the title of her book, “Playing Beyond the Notes.” Talented, for sure, Deborah has an air of self-confidence in life often missing in gifted artists.

Deborah Rambo Sinn

Deborah Rambo Sinn has given concerts and master classes on four continents and has taught students from more than 14 different countries. From 1996-2001, she lived in Hamburg

Germany

where she played concerts and musicals and operated two music studios for coaching and private instruction. In 1990, her piano/cello duo was invited by the government of Mainland

China

to give concerts and master classes in four major cities. In addition to a lifetime of playing classical music, she has played for productions of Little Shop of Horrors, Cats, Phantom of the Opera, Wizard of Oz, and Mikado.

She holds a doctorate and master’s degree in music from Indiana University, where she studied with Menahem Pressler (Beaux Arts Trio) and James Tocco. Her bachelor’s degree in music is from Florida State University. Before moving to

Germany

, she served on the music faculty of Angelo State University in Texas and taught one semester at Universität Lüneburg (

Germany

) as an exchange professor. In 2004, she founded the Olympic Music School in Sequim, Washington. Most recently, she can be seen onstage and in the classroom with violinist Monique Mead from Carnegie Mellon University. The duo appears regularly as musicians in residence for the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival.

Dr. Sinn is the author of Playing Beyond the Notes: A Pianist’s Guide to Musical Interpretation, published by Oxford University Press in 2013 and is currently working on two additional books.

1. Who are you? List 5 words that define you!

Curious – Funny – Analytical – Creative - Outspoken

2. What have you done that you’re most proud of?

I finished my doctoral degree at a top music school despite having a learning disability.

3. If you could change one thing in your past, what would it be?

I wish I would have pushed fear out of the way much earlier in my life.

4. On a personal/client level, what drives you crazy? What gives you joy?

Dishonesty makes me crazy.

Joy comes from being married to my best friend and from watching kindness in other people.

5. Given no restrictions (i.e. money/physical capabilities) – what would you most like to do?

I don’t think I would change a thing!

Deborah and Zoey enjoying the Northwest

www.OlympicMusicSchool.com (business)

www.PlayingBeyondtheNotes.com (blog on music interpretation)

www.DeborahRamboSinn.com (professional)

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I'm happy to report as TAKING THE PLUNGE readership grows, so does the outreach to talented, interesting people. I met Alice Acheson (one of the most knowledgeable people I know in the world of publishing) at a writers' conference years ago and have kept in touch. Her introduction below for author Brenda Webster is just another example of networking at its best! R2

Brenda Webster was born in New York City, educated at Swarthmore, Barnard, Columbia, and Berkeley, where she earned her Ph.D. A top-rated author on Redroom.com, she is a novelist, freelance writer, playwright, critic and translator who splits her time between Berkeley, California and Rome, Italy. For many years she has been President of PEN West American Center.

        She is the author of four previous novels: SINS OF THE MOTHERS (Baskerville, 1993), PARADISE FARM (SUNY, 1999), THE BEHEADING GAME (Wings Press, 2006; finalist for the Northern California Book Award), and VIENNA TRIANGLE (Wings Press, 2009). Her new play, THE MURDER TRIAL OF SIGMUND FREUD, was inspired by VIENNA TRIANGLE but goes beyond the story of Tausk and Freud to chronicle the latter's relationships with women patients, disciples, and his family. It was written in collaboration with Meridee Stein, who conceived the idea of a play and brought to the table many stimulating ideas and twenty years of experience in the theater.

        She has written two controversial and oft-anthologized critical studies: YEATS: A Psychoanalytic Study (Stanford) and BLAKE'S PROPHETIC PSYCHOLOGY (Macmillan).   She is co-editor of the journals of the abstract expressionist painter (and my mother), Ethel Schwabacher, HUNGRY FOR LIGHT: The Journals of Ethel Schwabacher (Indiana, 1993).

        Her memoir, THE LAST GOOD FREUDIAN (Holmes and Meier, 2000) received considerable praise. The Modern Language Association in 2007 published her translation of Edith Bruck's Holocaust novel, LETTERA ALLA MADRE. She also has translated poetry from the Italian for THE OTHER VOICE (Norton) and THE PENGUIN BOOK OF WOMEN POETS.
Alice B. Acheson, Book Marketing/Publicity Specialist

Brenda Webster

As a child I thought my mother was a miracle worker. She made things come to life on canvas. Branches weighed down with fuzzy peaches, blue-green bulls, enormous lilies, goldfish in an underwater world. Naturally, I assumed I would be able to do that too, but I was hopelessly bad at it. By the time I was ten, I refocused myself to painting with words.

My new novel, my fifth, AFTER AUSCHWITZ: A Love Story, takes on the most difficult subject I've had so far. It is narrated by an eighty-eight-year-old man suffering from early dementia and investigates the way enduring love strives against loss and aging, illness and imminent death. Finally, I feel in command of my tools and can fully use what a lifetime has taught me about my subjects and my craft. Of course, there is always more to learn. As one of my earlier characters says: "It is hard to get things right." But trying and getting closer is what makes writing so compelling.