Main: 203.761.0150
Email: robsilvanmusic@aol.com
Rob Silvan has been the musical director at Talmadge Hill Community Church in Darien, CT since 1995. THCC is a non-denominational church and can also be thought of as a "piano church." Let's say that means: an intimate, unpretentious, deep feeling way of being with the spirit. The worship style is inclusive, personal and expansive, and the music reflects that. This past year, for example, our choir and soloists have sung the words of Rumi, T.S. Elliot, St. Paul, Pablo Neruda, Robert Frost, Duke Ellington, St. Augustine, Emily Dickensen, W.B. Yeats, and on and on.
The music comes from the depths of joy and gratitude.
YOU are welcome there any Sunday morning.
870 Hollow Tree Ridge Road
Darien, CT 06820
p: 203.966.2314
Rob Silvan has been teaching piano to young people and adults for 30 years. Rob teaches classical, jazz, blues, popular, improvisation, and composition.
The teaching method here is personal. It is to find the best and most natural way for each individual to learn. We establish a certain foundation in notation, reading and technique, ane then we go to the students' strengths. If a student has a natural ability to read well, or improvise, or play by ear, or learn through songwriting and composition, then we will use that predisposition for advancing his or her musicianship. The same goes for stylistic preferences such as jazz, rock & roll, gospel, and so on. If the student is a singer, we'll use that too.
Students tend to stay with Rob for years. Often, a young student will move on to major in music at college. And at times an adult student will begin playing gigs.
There is a recital every June featuring his younger students and on a different evening, there is an informal musical gathering of his adult students.
Rob has a B.A. in English Literature from Iona College. His B.S. in Music is from the Westchester Conservatory of Music.
"I had listended to jazz all of my life and always wanted to play it. But I never found a teacher who could take me there until I met Rob. In three years I have gone from zero to the point where I am playing, and even composing and having a wonderful time.
Rob has a true gift for teaching and an extraordinary sensitivity to the needs of each individual student. He doesn't have a lockstep approach to learning but understands where each student needs to go next, and how to take him or her there."
Michael Schatzki, MPA, CSP
Negotiation Dynamics
908.766.3530
“I founded KEYS in 2004 because I believe that all children benefit from music, particularly in the form of personalized one-to-one instruction. My conviction is rooted in my own experiences as a student of music, as a musician, and from having been a longtime piano teacher.
Rob Silvan has been creating music in new ways for more than 30 years in this area and beyond. His group plays jazz: that is if you allow the term to mean: an international cross blending of standards , current waves, tropical styles, original composition and improvisation and whatever else may come up in the moment.
The Innkeeper is an interpretation of the Christmas story using music and theatre and is intended for children to perform. It is entertaining and lighthearted at times yet it also conveys a deep and personal meaning of the Birth story.
Imagine the Innkeeper, his child and the characters who knock on their door on the eve of Jesus' birth. No one could know the transforming power that his birth would bring to the world.
We believe that the story can still transform peoples' lives. The person of the innkeeper is at once sad and humourous, lost and find-able, hard and penetrable. Because of his child's openess and innocence and simple love, the innkeeper's heart is touched.
All of the action happens around the large open doorway of the inn. Through a series of encounters with Isaiah, Mary and Joseph, and finally the magi, the innkeeper has a dramatic breakthrough. He now experiences (and we as well) the compassion and celebration at the heart of the Christmas story.
As the drama begins we can see the doorway, the innkeeper and child inside. The Magi arrive. They are searching for the Christ child and are incredulous that this would be the place they have been seeking. It doesn't fit their expectation of the birthplace of a king. After singing their song, "Searching", they move on in case their calculations were wrong. Then the innkeeper introduces himself in all his gruffness and avarice.
In a dream-like sequence, Isaiah visits the Inn and offers his prophetic speech. The child hears it and by way of musing on it sings "A Little Child Shall Lead." It, of course, refers not only to the baby Jesus but to the child of the innkeeper as well as the child-spirit the Jesus invokes in Matthew 18:3.
The third scene reveals the relationship between the innkeeper and his child as a conflict between hope and fear. Hope opens the heart, while fear seals it shut.
Scene four brings Mary and Joseph to the door of the inn where the conflict between faith and doubt culminates in their singing, "My Soul Magnifies God", which becomes the underlying theme of the whole play.
In scene five the innkeeper finds himself welcoming Mary and Joseph to stay in his barn with the animals in a fit of generosity gently provoked by his child.
The next scene is a vision of the Biblical story of the shepherds and the angels with dialogue based on the second chapter of the Gospel of Luke. It culminates in a lively song between the shepherds and the angels that brings together the earthy and the divine in a humorous passion.
The final scene brings the magi to the door of the inn where the innkeeper welcomes them expecting their money for a room, but finds a treasure much greater than "paying customers." The scene concludes as the innkeeper makes his way to the manger. There, he suddenly sees the light and leads the entire ensemble in a final rendition of "My Soul Magnifies God."