Bio

What happens in the brain when we play composed and improvised music? Why does music appear to have a positive effect on learning and how can music help people with various challenges related to mental health? These and many other related questions are the focus of my lab at Georgia State University, the Music Cognition and Creativity Lab. I am educated as a jazz violinist and teach string education courses as well as graduate research courses. My research appears in the Journal of Research in Music Education, Cognition, The International Journal of Music Education, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, Scientific Reports, Brain Sciences, Brain Connectivity, and the interdisciplinary journal Music Perception among others.

 

I am the author of ten jazz string method books for Mel Bay Publications including Jazz Fiddle Wizard, Jazz Fiddle/Viola/Cello Wizard Junior, and Getting Into Gypsy Jazz Violin and the composer of several string orchestra pieces for The FJH Music Company and Alfred Music Publishing.

 

Born and raised in Denmark, I moved to the United States to study jazz performance at William Paterson University, and Queens College in New York, where my instructors included Rufus Reid, Hal Galper, Jimmy Heath and others. I then moved to Nashville, where I taught jazz and commercial strings at Belmont University and Vanderbilt University. I directed the Belmont Jazz String Quartet and Jazz String Septet, which were featured at the International Association for Jazz Education 2001 conference, MENC 2002 and ASTA 2003. Prior to my appointment at Georgia State University, I received a PhD in music and human learning from The University of Texas at Austin where I studied with Robert Duke and Laurie Scott.