Consulting, Coaching & Workshops by Gerald Klickstein

Gerald Klickstein

Gerald Klickstein’s workshop and consulting services enable music schools, arts organizations, musicians, and educators to excel.

Please submit inquiries via the Contact page.
You may also download a printable pdf version of this page.

Gerald Klickstein’s 40-year music career encompasses roles as performer, producer, educator, author, career coach, and consultant. He has taught at multiple top music schools and universities, including 20 years as a member of the distinguished artist-faculty of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (1992-2012). From 2012-2016, he founded and directed the Music Entrepreneurship & Career Center at the Peabody Conservatory of The Johns Hopkins University.

In addition to earning graduate and undergraduate degrees in music performance, he holds a certificate in entrepreneurship education from the US Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship.

Gerald Klickstein regularly lectures at leading music schools such as the Curtis Institute, Rice University, and Norwegian Academy of Music as well as at prestigious summer institutes such as the Meadowmount School of Music and the National Repertory Orchestra. He also presents talks at prominent conferences, including those of Chamber Music America, the College Music Society, the Society for Arts Entrepreneurship Education, and more.

To inquire about consulting or workshops, please write via the contact page. Learn more about Gerald Klickstein at LinkedIn.

Jump to summaries: Presentations for Arts Organizations, Students, Professionals | Presentations for Music Faculty, Administrators, Career Coaches

Presentations for Arts Organizations, Students, Professionals

Designing Arts Events that Attract Diverse Audiences
Using the time-tested principles of design thinking, participants develop plans to grow their audiences and create high-impact performance events. We explore avenues to better understand our target audiences and define their motivations and barriers to arts participation. Next, we generate ideas to address those issues and map out ways to prototype and test performance projects. We also review model concert events that drew large audiences, explore funding strategies, and consider audience development resources available from the Wallace Foundation and others. See: Design Thinking for Audience Development and 3 Traits of Successful Concert Programs on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Commissioning & Funding New Music
Composers, performers, and arts administrators who attend this workshop discover abundant sources of grant and other funding, learn to organize consortium commissions, acquire frameworks to write successful funding proposals, and gain strategies to manage rights and premieres. With those concepts in hand, composers are empowered to attract good-paying commissions, and performers acquire the ability to build distinctive repertoires that attract interest from presenters, the public, and the media. Learn more on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Grant Writing Strategies that Succeed
Across the globe, foundations and government organizations offer funding for arts organizations and individual artists to develop and present their work. Nonetheless, few emerging artists and organizations can effectively identify suitable funders, create fundable projects, craft grant proposals, and put together detailed budgets. This session provides attendees with the know-how and materials they need to create high-impact projects, discover funding sources, and author grant proposals that succeed. See: Resources for Grantseekers.

Confronting Music Performance Anxiety (may include a screening of the film Composed)
Discover research-based strategies to build on-stage skills, take charge of nervousness, and perform from the heart. Gerald Klickstein demystifies the causes of stage fright and supplies musicians with dependable techniques to excel in high-stakes performances. This workshop can include a screening of the acclaimed 75-minute documentary film, Composed, which depicts classical musicians’ battles with performance anxiety and the strategies they used to overcome difficulties (Gerald Klickstein is a featured cast member in the film). Also see articles on The Musician’s Way Blog in the Performance Anxiety category.

The Essentials of Music Career Success
In this fundamental workshop, Gerald Klickstein depicts the abundant opportunities in the music industry and guides musicians to map out pathways to success. Participants explore career possibilities that fit their interests and then identify ways in which they can both build entrepreneurial skills and also increase their employability across the music profession. Musicians depart with step-by-step action plans they can immediately undertake to achieve their long and short-term goals. See the Music Career Articles on The Musician’s Way Blog.

12 Habits of Healthy Musicians
From hearing loss to hand pain to vocal nodules, musicians can be felled by numerous mishaps. This presentation encapsulates research-based ways in which performers, students, and educators can understand the causes of musicians’ occupational health problems and then create music abundantly while avoiding injuries. Read about the 12 Habits on The Musician’s Way Blog. Also see Chapters 12 & 13 of The Musician’s Way.

How to Win a College Music Faculty Position
Many musicians pursue advanced degrees, especially doctorates, hoping to becoming college faculty, yet graduate school curricula rarely equip students to compete for today’s positions. This workshop shows aspiring faculty what qualifications they need, how to acquire them, how to apply and interview for faculty positions, and how to succeed in the academic job market. See Applying for Faculty Positions on The Musician’s Way Blog as well as Gerald Klickstein’s 2-part article in the May 2021 issue of College Music Symposium, “Preparing DMA Candidates to Win Tenure-Track Jobs” – Part I | Part II.

The 4 Elements of Successful Collaboration
An ensemble’s professional success depends on four things aside from the members’ musical abilities: their culture, interpersonal skills, business practices, and rehearsal/performance strategies. In this session, musicians learn to establish effective team cultures, adopt positive interpersonal habits, employ sound business practices, rehearse productively, and perform artistically. See Ten Tips for Collaborating Musicians on The Musician’s Way Blog.

The Power of Deep Practice
When deep learning concepts merge with effective practice strategies the result is a supercharged form of music learning Gerald Klickstein calls Deep Practice. In this session, musicians absorb proven practice strategies – such as varied, distributed and interleaved practice techniques – that both build and reinforce neural connections, enabling musicians to solve technical problems, create compelling interpretations, and become secure performers. See the Music Practice articles on The Musician’s Way Blog and Part I of The Musician’s Way.

Masterful Memorization
Is the ability to perform from memory a talent or an acquired skill? Research shows that expert memorizers employ skills that any musician can learn. Gerald Klickstein deconstructs the memorization process and supplies performers with an arsenal of ready-to-use strategies. See The Four Stages of Memorization on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Master Classes for Instrumentalists & Singers
Gerald Klickstein presents high-impact master classes for diverse musicians. Regardless of instruments, he empowers singers and instrumentalists to refine their interpretations and stage presence, gain technical fluency and confidence, improve their practice skills, and recognize professional opportunities. Employing his signature approach that integrates artistic and career concepts, he enables participants to perform fearlessly and achieve their short and long-term goals.

For more information about Gerald Klickstein’s workshops, please write via the Contact page.

Presentations/Consulting for Music Faculty, Staff, Administrators

New-Century Music Education – Improve Outcomes
Spanning a single workshop or multi-day residency, Gerald Klickstein proposes ways that colleges and conservatories can transform their programs to meet the needs of today’s students and graduates. He shows how schools can incorporate low-cost offerings that boost student retention and success as well as improve the career outcomes of alumni. He outlines structures for curricular modernization, academic advising, career services, internship creation, community engagement and change management. Participants investigate ways to integrate into existing curricula education in entrepreneurship, creativity, collaboration, technology, occupational health, and more. He also delineates avenues for school leaders to build consensus among faculty to implement innovations. See: 6 Keys to Music School Survival as well as Music Education and Entrepreneurship on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Modern Practices for Studio Classes
Applied music faculty typically run studio classes like masterclasses: students perform, and their musicality and technique are critiqued. Is that format optimal? Gerald Klickstein contends that the traditional masterclass structure is incomplete and offers 12 learning outcomes and teaching practices that address more inclusive competencies. The learning outcomes encompass both the procedural and declarative knowledge involved in becoming a capable, 21st-century performer; their corresponding teaching practices foster not only musical and technical facility but also self-efficacy, scholarly inquiry, and career readiness. Beginning with a 25-minute lecture, faculty then discuss strategies to implement studio class innovations, assess student learning, and overcome implementation constraints. Attendees depart with armloads of teaching and peer learning techniques that they can readily employ.

Designing Arts Events that Attract Diverse Audiences
Using the time-tested principles of design thinking, participants develop plans to grow their audiences and create high-impact performance events. We explore avenues to better understand our target audiences and define their motivations and barriers to arts involvement. Next, we generate ideas to address those issues and map out ways to prototype and test performance projects. We also review model concert events that drew large, diverse audiences and consider audience development resources available from the Wallace Foundation and others. See: Design Thinking for Audience Development and 3 Traits of Successful Concert Programs on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Boost Career Readiness and Employment Outcomes with Experiential Learning
Music students who participate in curricular or co-curricular experiential learning activities enjoy superior career outcomes compared to those who don’t. In this workshop, Gerald Klickstein shows music schools how they can implement field projects, practicums, and off-campus work-study partnerships that boost students’ professional know-how and career readiness. Attendees examine legal and ethical issues, view examples of successful experiential learning programs, and delve into the fine points of designing, executing and evaluating EL initiatives.

Music Career Coaching for University Career Counselors
Music students pay the same required fees as other college students, yet university career centers often lack the resources and expertise to provide comprehensive career counseling to musicians. In this residency, Gerald Klickstein works with career counselors and career center directors, providing them with conceptual frameworks to understand common music occupations, materials such as templates for creating career-specific resumes and websites, strategies to create and fund internships, and guidelines to equip music students for rewarding, in-demand careers.

Preparing DMA Candidates to Win Tenure-Track Jobs
This workshop maps out curricular innovations and advising strategies that empower doctoral students to succeed in academic job searches. We first examine the competencies that performers and composers require to compete for tenure-track positions. By comparing those qualifications to typical DMA curricula, Gerald Klickstein demonstrates that DMA programs leave most graduates underqualified for today’s faculty roles. To close that qualification gap, Gerald Klickstein presents a two-pronged approach. One prong entails implementing an efficient curricular pathway that fits within existing DMA course sequences and enables candidates to incrementally acquire the knowledge, skills, experience, and materials that optimize their job-readiness. The second prong equips academic and career advisors to provide inclusive services to DMA students. For more information, read Gerald Klickstein’s two-part article “Equipping DMA Candidates to Win Tenure-Track Jobs” published in the May 2021 issue of College Music Symposium: Part I  | Part II.

Commissioning & Funding New Music
Composers, performers, and arts administrators who attend this workshop discover abundant sources of grant and other funding, learn to organize consortium commissions, acquire frameworks to write successful funding proposals, and gain strategies to manage rights and premieres. With those concepts in hand, composers are empowered to attract good-paying commissions, arts organizations become equipped to launch commissioning ventures, and performers acquire the ability to build distinctive repertoires that attract broad interest. Learn more on The Musician’s Way Blog.

Grant Writing Strategies that Succeed
Across the globe, foundations and government organizations offer funding for arts organizations and individual artists to develop and present their work. Nonetheless, few emerging artists and arts organizations understand how to identify suitable funders, create fundable projects, craft grant proposals, and put together detailed budgets. This session provides attendees with the know-how and materials they need to create high-impact projects, discover funding sources, and author grant proposals that succeed. See: Resources for Grantseekers.

Teaching Performance Skills
Music Educators: Equip your students to perform confidently and artistically with a research-based program for building performance skills. Discover ways to conduct performance-development classes, teach anxiety-busting techniques, incorporate performance skill development into lessons and rehearsals, and empower students to practice performing. Teachers gain materials that they can promptly use such as a list of student learning outcomes, a rubric, and student self-evaluation tools. See the Music Performance articles on The Musician’s Way Blog. This workshop can also include a screening of the 75-minute documentary film, Composed, which depicts classical musicians dealing with performance anxiety problems and illustrates how typical music curricula fail to educate students to cope with performance stress (Gerald Klickstein is featured in the film).

Masterful Memorization
Is the ability to perform from memory a talent or an acquired skill? Research shows that expert memorizers employ skills that any musician can learn. Gerald Klickstein deconstructs the memorization process and supplies educators and performers with an arsenal of ready-to-use strategies. Materials include a list of student learning outcomes, a rubric, sample lesson plans, and a student self-evaluation. See The Four Stages of Memorization.

The 1st-year Music Seminar – Elevate Student Retention & Success
More than 20 years of research shows that well-designed first-year seminars can dramatically increase college student satisfaction, retention, and graduation rates. This session spells out strategies to design, implement, and evaluate a one-semester course that outfits incoming college music students with practice, performance, collaborative, self-care, student success and career skills. Materials include learning outcomes, assessments, and a syllabus. Attendees also review data from a music school that implemented such a seminar and achieved outstanding results. See: 6 Keys to Music School Survival.

For more information, write to Gerald Klickstein via the Contact page.
You may also download a printable pdf version of this page.