It's not often you meet someone who can boast being both a popular Classical radio host and the dean of one of the premiere schools of music in the US, but Dean Robert Cutietta is not your typical dean.
When his book, Who Knew?: Answers to Questions about Classical Music You Never Thought to Ask came across my desk, I was as intrigued by the title as I was by the author's biography.
Dean Cutietta was kind enough to sit down for a phone interview with me after I read his book about "the questions no one thinks to ask about Classical music," and I simply had too many questions of my own.
Before becoming dean of the Thornton School of Music at The University of Southern California, Dr. Cutietta had already established a long career of blending popular music, popular culture, music education, and composition.
His other publications include: Raising Musical Kids: A Parent’s Guide (Oxford University Press, 2013), Encountering the Fundamentals of Music (Mayfield Publishing. 1989) and Spin-offs: The Extra-Musical Advantages of a Musical Education (UMI, 1998).
But there is much more to "Dr. Bass," as his friends and colleagues sometimes call him, than academic publications. Dr. Cutietta is an active Public Musicologist and radio show host with a passion for sharing Classical music and tearing down the pomp and circumstance that so often accompanies it.
Here's my conversation with the host of the hit radio show, Ask The Dean: