When I applied to the Brandcenter, I was fresh out of 17 years in the classical music world and itching to be a creative (you can’t take many creative liberties with guys like Bach or Beethoven).

The application brief was to make an ad for Nike Air Max. I figured the one thing I could do that no one else applying could was play the violin, so I took… a very loose interpretation of that brief. (Don’t worry, I’m way better about staying on brief now!)

I’d never directed anything before, but I knew exactly how I wanted the shots to look. So I snuck into the IU concert hall with my beat up iPhone camera and filmed each frame myself, first with my friend in the shot, and then had him recreate it.

I guess that’s when I learned you can either be an actor or a director, but probably not both. And that if you’re holding a violin, people will just let you walk onto a concert stage.