Interviews & Talks
Speaking & Presentations
I speak to schools, colleges, conferences, arts organizations, and cultural communities on music, education, beauty, tradition, and human formation.
Available topics
Music and the Formation of Attention
Why Beauty Matters
The Purpose of Education
Tradition and Creative Freedom
Learning to Think in an Age of Noise
Music, Culture, and Worldview
The Art of Living Well
These interviews and talks explore the questions that connect my work as a musician, scholar, composer, and educator.
Education • Intellectual Life
On the Brink of Eternity—Classical Conversations Commencement Address, 2025
Reflections on intellectual formation, moral imagination, and the role of classical education in a pivotal moment in students’ lives.
The Art of Living Well—Keynote Address, Festival of Ideas, Liberty Commons, 2023
Considerations on integrating the liberal arts into personal flourishing and community life.
Inefficient Education is Best—Basecamp Live Interview with Dr. Davies Owens
A discussion on why deep, slow learning rooted in dialogue and tradition outperforms surface-level instruction.
Why Most Kids Can’t Spot Propaganda (and What You Can Do)—Basecamp Live Interview with Dr. Davies Owens
Strategies for helping students think critically about information and resist cultural bias.
The Purpose of Education—Interview with Robert Bortins on Refining Rhetoric
Explores multidisciplinary education, the distinctive Gutenberg experience, and the role of discussion in personal and intellectual growth.
Pathways to College—Association of Classical Christian Schools Webinar
Guidance on preparing students for higher education with intellectual curiosity and disciplined judgment.
Markers and Milestones—Interview with Leigh Bortins
Discussion of developmental benchmarks in classical education and how they shape lifelong learning.
Brothers Karamazov Worldview Book Analysis—Interview with Worldview at the Abbey
A deep reading of The Brothers Karamazov for its insights into faith, reason, and moral complexity.
Music • Art • Beauty
On Beauty, Silence, and the Challenge of AI—Kalos Arts Foundation Interview with Gustav Hoyer & Benjamin Harding, 2026
A conversation exploring how beauty, silence, artistic practice, and attentive listening resist distraction and help from us into more fully human people in an age of AI.
The Music that Shapes Us—Basecamp Live Interview with Dr. Davies Owens
A conversation about how music—through listening, discipline, participation, beauty, and community—forms human beings rather than merely serving as entertainment.
The Sound of Beauty—Kalos Arts Foundation Interview with Benjamin Harding, 2024
A conversation exploring the relationship between beauty, the arts, and human formation in education and culture.
The Discipline of Music—Interview with Great Hearts President Dr. Rob Jackson
Insights on how musical discipline shapes attention, character, and interpretive skill within educational contexts.
Speaking of Music History—Kepler Education Interview with Joffrey Swait
A conversation on music history’s role in shaping cultural understanding and interpretive habits.
Composing New Music, Traditionally—Great Hearts Symposium
Reflections on blending traditional music forms with contemporary composition practice and pedagogy.
From Grief to Hope in The Odyssey of These Days—KLCC Interview with Wes Hurd
Train of Thought Interview on The Odyssey of These Days—with Wes Hurd
Spartcast and The Odyssey of These Days—with Wes Hurd