Thursday, January 1, 2026

2026 Musical Projects

Once again, here's a list of my musical projects for the year.

Continuing Projects

Scales

When I sit down at or with an instrument, I play a scale, provided I know the instrument well enough that I can play a scale on it.  I go in the order of Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier and move on to the next one on Sundays.  For the first full week of 2026, I'll be practicing D major.

This is my blog for hymns and (occasionally) classical sacred music.  On Wednesday, I have a post tracing the Biblical sources of a hymn in The Lutheran Service Book (I finished writing them last year, but they're scheduled through 2028), and on most Fridays, I have a short post about a musical feature in a hymn.  On rare occasions, I post about classical sacred music on Monday.

Cover Projects

Initially, the goal for most of these was to learn every part to every song, and while I'm still working on that, the focus now has shifted more to writing about various features I notice.  Here's a list of the projects and what bands they cover:

For every time that old high school classmates (a sometime singer-songwriter and a self-styled author) post about their projects, I figure out a part from a song by one of these bands and listen to an album (cycling through the projects and in a roughly chronological order within each project).  I'm still behind on quite a few albums from last year, though.

In August last year, I started listening weekly (on Sundays) to an album from the bands I cover in the Verulam Cover Project (using the same cycle), and I intend to continue this.

I plan to watch the Hung up on a Dream documentary again (probably in April), Argent's appearance on Set of 6 on 29 May, and the Zombies' Live from Studio Two on 21 September.

As a sort of sub-project to Verulam Cover Project, I run a blog where I collect interviews and performances by the Zombies.  I'm slowly transcribing the interviews.  Currently, I'm working on one that Rod Argent did in 1994, which is included on Greatest Hits, Greatest Recordings.

I've been reading the updated edition of Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story, and I listen to the albums and watch the episodes when I read about their original releases and broadcasts. 


Bach Cantatas

On Sunday, I listen to a Bach cantata, going in order by BWV number.  Occasionally, I follow along in the notation and jot down some notes.

This year, I'll be listening to BWV 25 through BWV 77.  My box set lacks only one in that range, BWV 53.

Mandolin Monday

Every Monday, I post a video of a mandolin piece on Instagram and Twitter, and I upload a slightly edited re-run on YouTube.  I'm currently alternating between a collection of German folk tunes and Francis O'Neill's Music of Ireland.

Hohner Pianet

In 2019, I started a blog where I write about the Hohner Pianet, a German electric piano from the 1960s.  As a continuation of the original demonstration disc, I've also recorded a number of pieces using Pianet samples on my Nord Electro 5D.

I have no particular plans for this blog this year, but I'm sure I'll post at least a few pictures or videos of Pianets.

Telemann Lieder-Buch

In March 2021, I started working through Telemann's Fast allgemeines Evangelisch-Musicalisches Lieder-Buch, a collection of some 400 hymn tunes.  Along with learning to play the pieces, I'm modernizing the notation.  I post a tune every Thursday.

Work on this project has become increasingly difficult over the last year or so, and my goal this year is just to keep meeting my deadline.  I have enough tunes recorded to last a year or so, but doing the notation takes time (transposing Telemann's notation from alto clef so I can play the pieces and also doing the modern, digital notation for the videos).

Parroting the Bird

Like I did last year (and more informally in previous years), I'm going to try to copy (to some degree) what my cousin does with his band, which is named after a bird.  Mostly, this involves listening to music he mentions (provided I'm interested in it myself) and occasionally figuring out parts.  I'm giving this project a bit more structure this year, though:  I'm going to use the music he alludes to as a starting point and continue forward in the discography of the band it's performed by (or the classical composer it's written by, but I find that possibility unlikely), switching to something new whenever it comes up, although I'm limiting this to an album a week, on Saturday.  In the event something new appears while I'm in the midst of a box set, I'll listen to all of the discs before moving on.

I'm considering starting C.P.E. Bach's Essay on the True Art of Playing Keyboard Instruments in August (because my cousin plays piano [but always forte], and his birthday is in August), but the book seems well beyond me, so I'm not sure.

Projects Specific to 2026

Themed Months

For most months last year, I had a theme and listened to specific music (for example, blues in August and harpischord music in December).  I'd like to do this again, but I don't want to plan too far in advance.  January will be a mix of Schubert (specifically a seven-disc set of chamber music and an album of piano sonatas I didn't get to in "piano month" last year), Bread (a six-disc box set), and as many of the 20th Century Masters albums as I can get through (excepting the Christmas-themed ones).  February will be Mendelssohn (particularly Elias and Paulus, and probably also the incidental music to Antigone, Oedipus, and Athalia), and I have a ten-disc set of German swing music (mostly from the 1930s) that I want to listen to sometime in the spring, probably April or May.

Roy Orbison

On Orbison's 90th birthday (23 April), I'm going to start the official biography written by his sons (which I've had for a few years but haven't read yet).  I'm sure I'll listen to him a lot around then, too.