An Award-Winning Master of Genre-Busting Music, Composer-Pianist-Vocalist Peter Saltzman Has Produced Everything From Whimsical One-Minute songs to Brilliant Improvisations to Complex but Accessible Orchestral Scores.
“Imaginative…brilliant”—Chicago Tribune
Check out the music. Check out the podcast. And don’t forget to read the blogs!
Intro to Peter Saltzman
Don’t know where to start? Click for a quick intro to the art of Peter Saltzman…
S3-E4: Themes Alive—Musical Structure from One Note!
The moment a theme is stated, it wants to do something. What? Like all lifeforms, it wants to replicate, mutate, transform…become something. That something is musical structure. How we get from a single note to a theme (motif), to a full-blown musical structure (song,...
Musically Novel
I’ve moved most of my writing to Substack…
Substack, as you may know, is the latest hot platform for writers and while it is far from perfect, it’s a good place for me to park my two primary writing projects (besides the TV show, which doesn’t belong there at all): Blues, Preludes & Feuds and Music For Its Own Sake. I could say more, but why not head over there and see what it’s about…
Provocative Podcast
Improvisations on the Ledge is a podcast about what’s really going on inside the music. For both serious listeners and serious musicians.
IOTL S3-E3: The Theme Dream Machine
Musical themes seem to emerge from the sonic abyss almost by their own volition. But where do they come from? Are they elusive attempts to describe the moment? State of musical mind? Emotion translated into sound? Or are they just, as I discussed in the previous...
“Improvisations on The Ledge is a must for musicians, composers, music fans, artists, and indeed anyone with an interest in and appreciation for organic music and creative expression in their purest forms.”
— Rebecca Cullen, Stereo Stickman
Deep Music
Jazz? Classical? Pop? Avant-Garde? No, just great music.
All together. Like it’s meant to be!
Featured Album
Timlessly Unhip Pop Songs
These were already timelessly unhip pop songs when I first released some of them 17 years ago. That’s the beauty. They’ll always be timelessly unhip!
Featured Track
“Just Plain Genius”
The Song in Between
When does a melody become something other than a song? Easy: when you develop the theme beyond what we are familiar with as being “a song.” But does that mean it’s no longer a song?
“A Genius Musical Craftsman”
Painted Piano?
Introducing Piano Sketches
Watch and listen as painter Jeremy Harrison and pianist Peter Saltzman perform duets—across art forms!
A Pop Arty Abstraction
This trippy Jeremy Harrison painting, improvised on Peter Saltzman’s solo piano improvisation Poppy Asymmetric Bounce, perfectly captures the color and whimsy of the music.
Featured Piano Sketch
Merged: Painted Music
It’s painted music, as Jeremy Harrison improvises an impermanent painting on his Buddha Board to a frenetic Peter Saltzman piano improv.
And Read About the Concept