About Sarah Devin Kaufman

I’ve been playing classical piano since I was 3 and am led by my interest in the unique learning style of each of my piano students. I believe that in relying on emotional intelligence, open communication, and asking lots and lots (and lots) of questions to get to the root of what lights up every student. I’m a journalist by training (most recently at NBC News) and spent over a decade interviewing all kinds of people in all kinds of situations, so asking lots and lots of questions is my specialty. Different people love to learn music differently. Contact me here for more information about my lessons!

About GUSSIE B

GUSSIE BERGER was one of the code names used by the 1930’s actor Greta Garbo to avoid the press when she would check into hotels. I’ve been inspired by Garbo since college, when I was sucked into the dichotomy of the actor’s concept of her own gender expression and the pressure on her to be Hollywood’s beautiful leading starlet. In 1947, five years after Garbo’s last film, Billy Wilder and Walter Reisch asked the actor what interested her by way of a potential Hollywood comeback. She answered:

“A clown, A male clown. Under the makeup and the silk pants, the clown is a woman. And all the admiring girls in the audience who write him letters are wondering why he does not respond. They cannot understand."

Every person has a distinct and layered concept of their own gender, and most of it doesn’t fit into the binary that white supremacist patriarchy tries to drill into us. GUSSIE’s music tries to convey the complex and epigenetic trauma that accompanies being a woman in 2020’s America. It also deals with a lot of the heartbreak and physiological harm that I and many of my colleagues have suffered from under the pressures and exploitations of our techno-feudalist pseudo-capitalist economy. I wrote a piece here about how music, particularly Charli XCX’s Brat, helped me heal from severe burnout.

Learn more about my upcoming EP, “loved for it.”