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phyllis cole-dai: About Phyllis

phyllis cole-dai

About Phyllis


Please see the Music FAQ below if you'd like to know more.

Phyllis is a composer and performer of solo piano music, as well as an author and public speaker. Raised on a farm in rural Ohio, she now resides in Brookings, South Dakota. She and her husband Jihong, a research scientist and university professor, were married in 1994. They dote shamelessly on their young son Nathan, whose Chinese name, LanTian, means "wide-open blue sky."

Phyllis unites her deep love of composing, performing and writing with an even deeper passion for humanitarian service. Following the lead of pianist George Winston, she tries to make every concert an occasion for a food drive (or other local charitable endeavor). Also, with the sale of each recording and book, she financially supports social justice and humanitarian relief efforts. In the words of legendary folk singer Pete Seeger, she wants more than anything to help "bind up this sorry world with hand and heart and mind."

You too can help bind up the world through your purchase of a title in Phyllis's Store. Or, you can browse her Links to learn about just a few of the humanitarian organizations whose work she so respects, and even make a direct donation on one of her personal fundraising pages. Who knows? You might even decide to volunteer on the devastated Gulf Coast, or pitch in at a local homeless shelter, or speak up about the ongoing genocide in Darfur. . . .









Music FAQ


If you have a question not already answered below, feel free to contact Phyllis.



How do you pronounce your last name?

"Cole-Dai" is pronounced as if you were saying "coal dye". Cole is my family name. Dai is the family name of my husband, Jihong, who was born in China. We both took this hyphenated name when we got married, in 1994. Back to FAQ list . . . .

How long have you played the piano?

As best I can remember, I started taking piano lessons when I was six years old, practicing on my grandparents' instrument since my parents didn't yet own one. That was nearly forty years ago. Back to FAQ list . . . .

How much formal piano study have you done?

I have had very little formal piano study. I took lessons from several piano teachers between first and eighth grades. I'm very grateful for the fundamentals they taught me. One teacher in particular gave me a wonderful gift, teaching me to recognize and improvise upon chords found in church music. However, all of my teachers emphasized the classical European repertoire and style of playing. I quickly tired of that tradition. It just didn't fit my spirit. I quit taking lessons very abruptly, just prior to a huge recital in eighth grade. While I continued to play the piano in school, accompanying choirs and such, there was no more formal study. My world at the time was very small: On the piano it seemed you were to play either the classics or church music or show tunes. Eventually, to my delight, the shell of my musical world got cracked open. Folk, jazz, blues, soul, new age, world music—all of these (and more) reawakened my interest in music, but my appreciation of the piano as an instrument was by then very deeply buried. It wasn't until about five years ago that I actually started to take pleasure again in sitting down and playing. That little bit of playing led me to composing, and now even to performing again. But I've never studied piano music beyond those childhood lessons. In this and other respects I happily consider myself more of a folk musician. Back to FAQ list . . . .

Can you play by ear?

Playing by ear is a tremendous gift that I simply don't have. I have known people—an elderly housewife, a folklore professor, a school-age boy—who could read scarcely any sheet music but could play almost anything by ear on the piano and make it sound magical. Such people amaze me. Back to FAQ list . . . .

Do you write down your music?

Although I don't really enjoy it, I have to write down my music because my memory, like the old gray mare, just "ain't what she used to be." I rely heavily on technology. My Yamaha Clavinova CLP 115 digital piano communicates with notation software on my computer. I've chosen to use a digital piano despite my preference for acoustic instruments because it makes the process of scoring music much more efficient; plus, it never needs to be tuned, a very important detail when you reside in a house dating back to the 1800s. Back to FAQ list. . . .

Are your compositions available for purchase as sheet music?

Sorry, no sheet music is available at this time. As you may know, creating a high-quality score is labor-intensive and requires much expertise. Frankly, I'd rather be composing a new piece of music than preparing an old one for publication. Should I receive enough requests, however, I'll consider selling some sheet music. Please let me know if you'd be interested in a particular title. Back to FAQ list . . . .

How do you go about composing?

To tell you the truth, in many ways I don't know what I'm doing, technically, when I compose. Beyond the essentials, I'm not very knowledgeable about music theory and composition. I just follow my intuition and my fingers, and the music wells up,sometimes in a gush, sometimes in a trickling of "fits and starts". Often there's a particular inspiration behind a piece—a moment in family life, or an event in the world beyond; a phrase from a book or poem; a dream; a deep emotion that won't let me go. I sit down on the bench, try to center myself in that inspiration, and then start tinkering around on the keys. Usually it doesn't take long for the music to let me know where it wants to go. When I have no such inspiration, the process remains pretty much the same. I park myself on that bench and play. "Play" in the sense that a child does, without purpose, without evaluating what's happening, without an eye on the end of things. Just be there and do what's in front of you. The spontaneity of this process gives me great joy, great peace. By contrast, the more self-conscious I become while composing, the more labored and affected the process becomes, and I'm far less satisfied with the music I create. I'd rather the music come from someplace other than mere ego. Someplace deep. Probably for this reason I only work on composing one piece at a time. When the thing exhausts itself, I'm free to move on. Back to FAQ list . . . .

How long does it take you to compose a piece?

No piece of music I write is ever completely finished. The compositions have lives of their own. They're always asking to be changed, even if just a tad. But if you're asking how long it takes to compose the bulk of a composition, well, my best estimate is a week, on average, if I'm able to be at the piano a couple of hours each day. (Motherhood requires making much time for other kinds of play!) Back to FAQ list . . . .

Would you describe your piano music as "New Age"?

I'd rather describe my piano music as "contemporary solo piano." Unfortunately, though, I have to categorize my music as "New Age" because the music industry assigns this label to any instrumental recordings that aren't strictly "classical" or "jazz". If you walk into a record store looking for music by George Winston or Jim Brickman or other contemporary solo pianists such as myself, no doubt you'll find it in the "New Age" section. Yet in my view the "New Age" label is less than helpful, primarily because it means so many things to so many different people. For some, it means that the music will inevitably be quiet and dreamy and soothing; for others, it means that the music will incorporate not only acoustic but electronic and/or ethnic instruments; for still others, it means that the music has emerged from "New Age thought" or the "New Age movement" and is intended for use in New Age spiritual practices. Obviously the label "New Age" suggests a broad range of meanings, yet few if any of them apply to my work. Back to FAQ list . . . .

What have been the biggest influences on your music?

I don't mean to dodge your question, but it's impossible to answer. I firmly believe, I know, that everything I am and do and experience in one moment influences everything I become and do and experience in the next. The world—existence—is very full; fuller than any human being can fully grasp. Yet through me and other composers and musicians, that incomprehensible world somehow squeezes itself into notes, melody, harmony, rhythm, music. . . . The world grasps us. Just how that happens, I can't say. It's mystery, and I'm content to leave it at that. Back to FAQ list . . . .

How long have you been composing music?

My first try at composing a song was in elementary school. (That short, messy, fragment of a score has somehow survived all these years. Guess it must mean something to me!) That first attempt was followed by some casual songwriting for piano and voice during high school and some very sporadic activity during my adulthood. Nothing serious. Then, early in 2002, my husband and I learned that our son Nathan had been conceived. As a child will do, Nathan changed my world, even from the womb. All at once I had to compose. I needed to compose. Dozens of children's songs poured out during my pregnancy. (With the help of some friends, a small number of those songs became Beautiful is the Moon,  a children's CD that you can still listen to on this website, though it's no longer available for sale.) After Nathan's birth, I lost all desire to write children's music, but the composing fire had been lit. Soon I started experimenting with writing music for solo piano, and the fire just blazed up. The work is an absolute joy. Back to FAQ list . . . .