Sustaining a career in music by pursuing multiple paths, usually performing and teaching, is neither new nor unusual. In this article, I consider another option—the musician-writer—to demonstrate how the process used to create in one’s primary field or career path may be transferrable to the pursuit of new endeavors. Analyzing and comparing the process of writing my book about piano teachers and studying the fourth movement of the Schubert Sonata in A Major, using a framework extrapolated from my experiences as a writer and piano student, reveals similarities between these seemingly different endeavors. Written prior to the pandemic, the message of transferability is even more important now, given the immediate and long-term challenges to performing and teaching music, which demand alternative approaches (e.g., podcasts and music lessons via Zoom). Exploring the questions raised in this article should assist a performer, teacher, or student to identify their personal creative process and facilitate its conscious, deliberate, and systematic transfer to other endeavors and fields to sustain a career in music.

通过追求多种途径来维持音乐事业，通常是表演和教学，既不新鲜也不罕见。在这篇文章中，我考虑了另一种选择——音乐家兼作家——来展示在一个人的主要领域或职业道路上的创作过程如何可以转移到对新事业的追求上。使用从我作为作家和钢琴学生的经历推断出来的框架，分析和比较我写关于钢琴教师的书和研究舒伯特 A 大调奏鸣曲第四乐章的过程，揭示了这些看似不同的努力之间的相似之处。考虑到表演和音乐教学面临的直接和长期挑战，需要替代方法（例如，通过 Zoom 播客和音乐课程），在大流行之前编写的可转移性信息现在变得更加重要。