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Nathan and Julie Gunn: A Musical Power Couple Comes to Interlochen
The Gunns spill their secrets to a sane and productive life in the arts.
The Gunns define what it means to be a power couple in the world of professional music.
Julie is a pianist, song arranger, and music director who has given master classes at universities and young artists’ programs all over the United States. Her arrangements have been heard in venues like Carnegie Hall, Chicago’s Symphony Center, and Interlochen Center for the Arts.
For his part, Nathan has earned acclaim for performances bridging the genres of opera, musical theatre, and recital. One of his most recent credits is “Santiago” in The Old Man and the Sea, an opera by Interlochen alumna Paola Prestini.
Together, Nathan and Julie are a formidable duo—and Interlochen Arts Academy welcomed both of them to campus this November to teach students.
Here, the couple share their top strategies for working with students, as well as their secrets to staying sane and productive in the world of professional music.
Many of our theatre and classical voice students try to copy somebody they've heard about or who inspired them, and I want to shake that up a little bit. I want to get their version of things.
Getting students out of their heads
Both Nathan and Julie are passionate about sharing their skills with the next generation of young artists. For the Gunns, music education starts with digging down to the core of the person, and seeing how the student’s personality relates to both the text and the audience.
Julie favors an inside-out approach to teaching that showcases each student’s unique gifts. “Authenticity” is a word that’s bandied around frequently in the arts community, but for her, it’s a very real concern—she wants her students to express themselves honestly.
“Many of our theatre and classical voice students try to copy somebody they've heard about or who inspired them, and I want to shake that up a little bit,” she says. “I want to get their version of things.”
While he wants his students to express their true selves, Nathan adds that he wants them to go beyond themselves, too.
“I hope to trick or inspire each student to get beyond their fear, whatever it might be,” he says. “The only way in which I have found that that can actually happen is if they are not thinking of themselves. They either have to be performing as a host, welcoming the people into their world and being okay with someone not liking it, or they have to have a profound love for the people that are around them.”
The Gunns’ secrets to success
The Gunns ascribe their success as artists to their spiritual practice and to the way they help others.
“I get up early and do a lot of what would be described either as contemplative prayer or meditation,” says Nathan. “I think having that inner world, and spending time with what's real, is a vital part of my life as a musician.”
His morning routine is a mindset he extends throughout the rest of his day.
“Part of being a professional musician is that you usually spend a lot of time teaching others,” he says. “You need to find little moments of stillness in your life, and I do that frequently. It could be 15 seconds of it, or 30 minutes, or 45—whatever. So I do that. I read a lot of poetry, and I’m really curious about the lives of the mystics.”
Part of being a professional musician is that you usually spend a lot of time teaching others. You need to find little moments of stillness in your life, and I do that frequently.
While Julie feels most meditative when she’s at the piano, she finds her true sense of purpose in helping others shine.
“I love producing shows. Everybody's got talent, and I get to show that off,” she says. “I think about offensive linemen in football—no one ever congratulates them, right? Nobody ever notices them. But then they think, ‘Wow, that running back is so talented! Look how he just ran through that hole!’ Well, that hole was there because somebody made that hole. Somebody was blocking. I want to be an offensive lineman for other artists.”
The Gunns frequently work side-by-side, and they even have their own cabaret company, Shot in the Dark. The couple also has five young children together. Whether they’re teaching at arts institutions like Interlochen, or showing off their talents on the performance stage, the Gunns appreciate the chance to share their deep love of music with each other—a love that informs everything they do.
“It is really nice to be able to share something that's so important to your life with the person that you're spending your life with,” says Julie. “I can't imagine it any other way.”
Interlochen Arts Academy frequently welcomes guest artists like the Gunns to campus to work with students. Learn more about our arts boarding school.
