About Dan Rider
I’ve been teaching at Imperial, and now Hix Brothers, since 1998, and I love teaching. I don’t think when I started teaching fresh out of grad school that I would have expected to enjoy the process of teaching so much. I had been working on repertoire and etudes intensely for years and planned on then working with advanced students on classical saxophone literature. But I started working with beginners and struggling students too. Going from not being able to make any sound, to making a GOOD sound, to making a good sound for the right length, to playing Twinkle Twinkle and on and on…it’s such an amazing process! I love watching the progress and the “lightbulb moments” when something clicks and my student goes “I get it!” Now, I try to teach my students to problem solve, the process of learning and practicing, and the hows and whys of both mistakes and solutions. I want them to be able to not only play this note, this measure, this piece but the next one and the next one and the next one.
