Go Ahead – Make My Day

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Teaching is a very fulfilling way to spend one’s time. There are few things as motivating as seeing a student “get” something the first time, to share the joy of a person playing more confidently or accurately, to experience the culmination of a student’s hard work right there in your studio.

I enjoy sharing the harp with others. I always get a thrill when I see progress and it’s enhanced when they see that they have made progress! Such a feeling!

Part of teaching is to share hard earned knowledge. By passing on the wisdom of previous harpers and other musicians, we teachers seek to help students build shortcuts through those tedious (but necessary) things. We don’t want to watch you struggle. It’s not that we won’t help you get out of the struggle – but if we can help you avoid it, then you have that much more energy to tackle the next challenging thing!

And so, weekly, we tell you to keep your thumbs up, your hands closed, your elbows up, your back straight, your head up. We entreat you to place your fingers, to slow down, to pay attention to the myriad details that are central to making each note.

And why do we do this? Because we want you to succeed. We want you to master the instrument – in as straight a line, as quickly as possible. We have been there – that’s why we’re sitting beside you!

And I know that you believe yourself to be doing all the things I ask of you. That you wonder if I’m not being a little bit too harsh with you. Or perhaps that I have run out of things to say and so I repeat myself. After all, you have got this!

And so I sit beside you and try to come up with new ways to say all those things that I have noticed you might improve upon. I don’t want to beat you up about the same things week after week. I don’t want to beat you up at all! I want you to play as well as you can, as soon as you can – and then move on to learn even more. If only I could get you to place and keep your thumbs up!

Teachers share this frustration – the gap between what we tell you and what you think you have done. And we laugh because we know that we can tell you something a thousand times but if a workshop presenter comes through and says it, you will likely come back to your lesson, clutching this pearl of wisdom and share it with us – as though we hadn’t suggested it in the past. It’s actually sort of a laugh we share. I actually put together a workshop based on this idea. And really, we don’t care where you get the information – as long as you use it!

One thing I often suggest to my students and to you here is that you record yourself. Your recording doesn’t have to be fancy – you can use your phone, a voice recorder meant for meeting – you could you use a cassette tape. It doesn’t matter, as long as you can hear yourself!

So, imagine my delight and surprise when one of my students came to her lesson last week with the opening – “I recorded myself playing as you suggested” (internal gasp! She was listening!). What floored me though, was what came next, “ I’m not keeping my thumbs up – just like you keep telling me” to which I wasn’t sure what to say. “Told you so” didn’t seem like a useful way to move forward!

But what was the most endearing and important was what she did next. Throughout her practice sessions that week – she continued to work. And continued recording – so s-h-e could see that she was making improvements! What a delight to hear! What an affirmation! What lovely hand position! And what fantastic tone!!!  She totally made my day!

So, please – use the information your teacher shares with you – the techniques, the tools, the tips. And incorporate all those nuggets into your work time. You’ll learn more, you’ll see improvement, you’ll know where to focus as you move forward and learn more about how you play. And you’ll make your teacher very, very happy.  But remember – it’s not about the teacher. It’s about you – learning to play, enjoying playing, and doing the work that you need to so that you can play better!

How do you capture your practice, incorporate your teacher’s suggestions, and evaluate your playing? Leave me a comment about how you move forward – I’d love for you to share your ideas – and progress – with me!

It’s August – stay strong!

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It’s stinkin’ hot. It’s boiling! It’s August. And you know what that means? It’s nearly Autumn!

Cooler days. Clearer skies. Longer nights. And, oh yeah, the winter holidays are coming. Whether you have a house full of family for Thanksgiving or if you have booked a full schedule of holiday party gigs – you will need to be ready. And now is the time!

Let’s face it, no matter the reason you play, it is easier to play if you are ready – and if you feel ready. Nope, this is not another post on practicing. Rather, let’s take a broader look. The mere act of sitting and bringing the harp to you requires an element of strength, stamina and self-possession (read balance – but didn’t that string of S words feel good to read?!).

Most of us are not about to build and keep a rigorous workout routine. But, what if it helped you to play better, longer, with less fatigue? Then it would be worth it!

Now, I’m not a physician, a physiologist, or a physical therapist*. Ok, really, the word “physical” may actually cause me to break out into hives! But, a little bit of physical exertion could make all the difference in being able to practice (or perform) for as long as you like at each sitting – without your back hurting, feeling exhausted, or falling flat before your time is over (any of which is embarrassing).

So, what should you do? Well, first, consult your physician – no doing stuff that’s not good for you (or worse, stuff that’s contraindicated for your condition!). Assuming you are well enough, consider adding a few things to your day. All of them are brief. Any one of them may help. If you’re an overachiever, you could try adding all of them!

  1. Go for a walk. Walking is good for many reasons. It’s a gentle exercise. You already know how to do it. You probably already have the shoes. Head out for 30 minutes. If you’re a total couch spud or have a condition, start where you are and build up to 30 minutes. Research suggests that 30 minutes a day will be enough to help you become more fit. If you’re not sure what to do, there are loads of programs available online that can suggest an appropriate buildup and level of exertion. Don’t want to walk outside?  Go to the pool and walk there (pool walking is easier on your joints and – did I mention that it’s hot?  it’s certainly cooler to walk in the pool!).  Or you can get on a treadmill. Walking is good on many levels – good for your heart, works your body, gets you some fresh air. It can also give you a chance to clear your mind. And it can be part of your practice – the rhythm allows you to think about your tunes with an active metronome.
  2. Stretches. I’ve talked about stretching before [here and subsequent weeks] and it bears repeating. But I wont’ – click the link and read those!  Stretching helps you recover but also helps overcome the stultifying sameness of sitting all day (even if you’re sitting at the harp!).
  3. Calisthenics. If you’re of a certain age, you might remember calisthenics from PE class. No, it doesn’t require a lot of equipment, space, or time. Just some exercises that help make you beautiful  and strong (from the Greek kali – beauty and sthenos – strong).  You know all these – pushups (full on, or from your knees, or against the counter or wall – it’s not a contest!  Do what you can); squats (like you’re sitting on a chair but not using your arms or moaning on the way down or up); jumping jacks; crunches or planks; and maybe some arm curls and extensions, and a few back rows. You don’t have to be all CrossFit about it! Just move and work a little everyday. That will help you become stronger which will improve your harp playing and may impact other parts of your life too (carrying laundry? groceries? moving your harp? A load of things will be easier). You can put these all together – walk to the park and use the playground equipment to exercise – or you can also do them as they fit into your day – just as long as you fit them in!

It does help to add these activities to your journal so you can see how you’re coming along – to see your strength improvements (and if you wall off the wagon – you can see by how much – and how quickly you came to where you were before your wagon departed…and how quickly you can get back on it!). Noting it in your journal will also help capture when you notice the impact of this to your playing – as well as when you notice you just feel better.

You don’t have to be a gym rat or an aerobics bunny to benefit – but your playing will tell the story of how you are staying strong!

*as always, I am not a health care provider – check with yours before beginning a-n-y type of exercise or before changing what you are already doing! 

What are your worst habits? Four ways to identify and then fix them

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Habits are supposed to serve us. They are behaviors we perform without thinking.

Habits can be good – like brushing your teeth, putting on your seat belt, or going to bed on time.

Or habits can be bad – like eating ice cream every day, biting your nails, checking your phone during dinner.

Habits are like callouses – forming slowly over time. They form when we’re busy paying attention to other things.  And so, insidiously, they creep into your processing, your playing, and you never notice.

And while you are not noticing, the bad habits grow stronger. Until one day – you see a photo, a reflection, or a friend laughingly points out that you look like a troll with a harp! Or worse, you develop pain in your neck, shoulder, hip, hand, arm that you d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y notice after you’ve been playing. Or sometimes you notice it when you’re away from the harp – and you wonder what you’ve done.

Bad habits can be general – you’re slouching on the bench or your head is thrust forward as you look at the strings. Or they may be quite specific – your hands are not closing on your elbow is dragging your forearm along the edge of the soundboard, your feet are not flat on the floor. But all bad habits are called “bad” for a reason – these habits are not serving you or your harp playing!

What? You’re not screaming in pain? No one has laughed at your bad posture? Maybe you don’t have any bad habits…or maybe you just haven’t noticed! Insidious, remember?

How would you know? Here are four surefire ways to find your bad habits –

  1. Check it out.  Hang a full-length mirror where you can check your look while you’re practicing. This is not a decorating tip (although you can also use it to help light your space better too!). Whether you hang the mirror or get a cheval glass on a stand – put it where you can look up and see what you look like while playing. This requires no help or technology.
  2. Have a photo shoot.  Enlist a friend or family member to photograph you “in the act” when you don’t expect it. This is the same idea but might be a little less discombobulating – having the photos will also tell you things you might rather know before you sit to your next practice session.
  3. Star in your own show.  Videotape yourself – this is relatively easy now – just prop your phone on your music stand and prepare to learn all sorts of things (that you might rather not know – but will help you!). The second step is the most important – watch the video! See what you’re doing when you aren’t watching.
  4. Play freeze tag.  Remember freeze tag? When you begin to practice, set a timer for some random number of minutes. When it dings – freeze! Then very carefully check yourself out – look at your hands, arms, legs, head and back – are you where you want to be? How’s your posture? Make corrections, reset the timer, and go back practicing. If you are sitting for a long practice session, plan to do those a number of times including toward the end of your practice when fatigue will contribute to bad habits – you might even have some that don’t come up until later when your fatigue enhances them.

Any of these ways will help. A combination of them will give you a fuller picture of what you need to fix.

How do you fix your bad habits? Go back to the fundamentals! They are called fundamentals for a reason!

When you started playing, you learned these fundamentals – go back to them. Pull out your beginning book – whether it’s Sylvia Woods, Deb Friou, Bonnie Mohr, Maria Grossi, or any of the other beginning books – and head to the beginning, working slowly and carefully on the exercises that first helped you to learn those fundamentals.

Of course, there’s a whole other set of musicality bad habits but we can deal with those another time. Work on the fundamentals of playing first.

What are your worst habits? Let me know and we can compare notes!

 

 

Practice made simple – Make and Keep a Schedule

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I’m always nattering on at you about how important practice is – for lots of reasons. And you probably laugh and think (or say out loud?) “easy for you – that’s what you do for a living!” Well, let’s pull that thread, shall we?

First, like you, I have a life – a home and house that need care and tending. And perhaps like you, I’m not big on housework or tending to anything! But these things must be done. Groceries, call my Mom, laundry, prune the dog, take out the trash – it’s all there.

Second – only in my dreams do I have all day to play the harp! Yes, I’m a professional, so yes, it is work and it is a business. And yes, that means I often get trapped in Administrivialand – doing paperwork, making phone calls, sending email.  On the package its all flowers and hearts, but on the inside, it’s still work! Booking students, gigs, networking, advertising, blogging, website maintenance, teaching students, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera*.

Third – I have a day job too – just like you. With its commutes and joys and challenges.

And somewhere in there – I still need to fit in practicing. So, how to do that?  I find a schedule is very very helpful. But you need more than that. You need to keep the schedule. And in doing that you will allow yourself to meet some other gates as well:

  • You will be better able to focus – this is time you have set aside, so you don’t need to be thinking about how it’s time to wash the dog or vacuum the garden. Focus on your practicing.
  • You will have built in time for self-evaluation – because you have dedicated time, you can apportion it to include self-evaluation. Are you playing as well as you’d like? If not, how should you change your practice to improve? If you are playing as well as you’d like – what should you take on as a new challenge?
  • You will have time to get stuff done – because you have identified time to work, you won’t have to just “cross stuff off the list” but rather, you can bear down and work on individual elements of your playing until they are smoothed out while you also identify other things that need work.
  • You will have time to be generous – to yourself (and by extension others) you will have dedicated time to play more fluidly so you can be more comfortable while performing, all the while learning to be nice to yourself as you progress and develop as a harper.
  • You will have time to schedule for your best – you control your schedule so you decide when to practice. If you’re not a morning person, do not bother scheduling your practice for 6am! It’s your day, if you need to practice from midnight – do it! Just be sure you work with yourself. And be flexible – if you need to change the schedule, change the schedule!
  • You will have built in time to capture everything – be sure to include journaling and recording as part of your practice time. They need to be – and if you plan them that way, they will get done.
  • You will have built in time to be creative – creativity requires time and tools and time – if you add creativity time into your practice – you will have the time!

That is a lot to schedule in so it’s important to remember that there are seven days in a week. You don’t have to do the same thing every day.

Having a schedule means that you can have hard days and easy days, days that focus on a specific thing and days when you “play around”. Having a schedule means that you know which days are which, and that you are actually getting to all the things you have identified as important.

Be prepared to do work when you have scheduled it and include some “free time” to enjoy yourself! And what could be more simple than that?

* be the first to identify  the source of this quote in a comment for a prize!

Do you smell that? Ten ways to make it through the Dog Days of Summer

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It’s summer. Ok, it’s epically hot (or maybe it’s epochally hot) – after all, it is August. One might argue that it is most augustly August. One thing is for certain – it is one of those times in the year when it is challenging to get motivated to do work.

I get it. It’s a bit of a lull – school hasn’t started, the holidays are forever away (ha!), everyone is on vacation or wishing they were on vacation – and working hard just is not appealing. And these are the Dog Days of summer. Despite all this, we don’t want to our playing to stink – to smell like something left over from the Dog (days 😊). So maybe take a moment for something better – take time to smell the roses.

Huh? What does smelling the roses have to do with playing the harp? Nothing. And everything!

When it’s too hot to even think about sitting down and doing the work – maybe you need to not. Maybe it is better to take the time to smell the roses (of your harp playing) if only to remember why you even do the work. After all, if you aren’t motivated, you’re not going to get much work done anyway. And a lot of us do this for fun (even though it can be work) – so it’s important to, on occasion, remember what it is you enjoy about it.

Maybe you need to give yourself a mini-vacation to beat the heat.  If you do need a vacation – here are ten ways you can give yourself a little break, to take time to smell the roses here at the height of the dog days:

  1. Just start playing – then see what comes of it. I get it, simply getting started is difficult. Because – ugh. Even with the air conditioner on, you are facing sticking to the bench, sweating on the soundboard, having your fingers feel tacky on the strings. So, maybe, just sit down for 10 minutes. That’s quick enough to be done before the sweat starts to drip. Just feel your harp, hear the sweetness, and smell the wood….
  2. Rest when you need it. As I mentioned above – school will be starting, and the holidays are coming – and you’ll be inundated with life before you know it – so set this time aside to get a little rest.  It will help you enjoy being at your harp to practice so much more when you’re ready to start up again.
  3. Make a list – so you don’t forget what you wanted to do. Especially if you are resting – that doesn’t mean you’re not thinking. Use the rest time away from the harp to think – about what you are playing, what you’d like to be playing, what skills you need to work on (really – be honest – are your arpeggios smooth and flowing? Are your glisses accurate? You know what I mean – there’s always something that needs work!). Capture that in a list so you can be focused when you are ready to buckle down after your break.
  4. Replan. We were very careful to not set goals this winter but you have had half the year to progress – are you on target? You can take this time to evaluate if you’re doing the things you think you need to do to make progress to get when you’d like to be.
  5. Indulge yourself. Yes, this could be pack it in and get a cookie. Or you could simply play what you want – play things you know well, or things you haven’t played in a while, or things that just make you smile.
  6. Switch it up. Switching up can take a number of forms – you could turn your practice “upside down” (do all the activities backwards – end with exercises, start with polishing). You could take your practice in 10-minute segments throughout the day. You could practice at some other time of the day than you usually do. Just do something different to help you bring fresh perspective to your playing.
  7. Take a walk. I know, I’m always telling you to go for a walk. So maybe actually do it this time!
  8. Read a book. You can learn so much away from the harp. There are prose books about the harp (have you read Tree of Strings? Or Pentacle: The Story of Carlos Salzedo and the Harp?) and about music (have you read Lies My Music Teacher Told Me?). Learning new things might help you learn your music more quickly, or better, or just bring a new feel to your playing.
  9. Go shopping – buy some new music! Take yourself out for a music spree. Buy some new downloads or some sheet music – having something to look forward to will be fun.
  10. Smell the roses – literally! Buy yourself some flowers for your harp room! Brighten up the space. Enjoy the scent and sight while you’re playing. Try to play the flowers (make an improv that reflects what you see, what you smell, how you feel). Alternately – find some while you’re out walking.

No reason to let the Dog Days of summer be the dog doo days. Smell the roses, treat yourself gently, and enjoy the time when you maybe don’t feel like playing. What other things do you do to help motivate yourself through these doldrums? I’d love to hear from you – I can always use new tips to avoid slacking.

Technical Ecstasy

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I’m sure that your teacher has exhorted you to work on your technique. I have too. And hopefully, you too, urge yourself to work on developing, strengthening, and enhancing your technique.

I know I have, on many occasions over the last few years (ok, way more than a few). And we all know that technique is central to playing. It is essential to growing and developing as a player. And while you might see a brilliant musician play with less than exemplary technique, those tend to be rarer than not. While you might aspire to play like that person – you could just smarten up your technique – so you don’t have to work so hard to pull it off!

So, I’m sure we are agreed – Technique is important!

Technique is important – but you have to watch carefully that you make music!

Technique is important – but you have to watch carefully that you make music!

I’m not going to debate that.

However….

Technique is not where we make music!

W – H – A – T?!?!?

You read that right – and I mean it! Technique is not where you make music. Technique is the hard work you do so that your ability to play becomes effortless. It is a tool – a means to an end.

I once saw a video of a cellist making an A440*. There he sat, tuner on the floor just below the cello, playing an A over and over – watching the needle on the tuner, working (very hard) to make an A accurately, consistently, repeatedly. [Note: this video also made me so grateful to play the harp where we set and forget (sort of) our tuning. I’m delighted that the pitch part of the intonation is not part of the deal!]

By the end of the video, it was clear that the work on technique had helped to play better. But it was also clear that it was not music. It was carefully executed sound.

Because music isn’t just sound (yes, I know you already know that, but it bears repeating). It has been said that the music actually happens in between the notes.

What?!

Music is not just the notes. It is not just putting noise into the air. Music includes putting in the silences, the spaces in between. It also includes adding the breathing, the inflections, the dynamics, the pulse, the tempo. It includes all the shading, highlighting, and storytelling you can get in there!

Of course, you can see that your good technique will make it easier for you to do all those things. Technique is necessary but not sufficient to achieve making music. I’m sure you have all heard some people who play technically accurately but with no music. They achieve Technical Ecstasy (with apologies to Black Sabbath). They try to master the music, but instead the music (typically via the tyranny of the dots) has mastered them. In fact, when you see these performances or hear these recordings, you have no doubt that all the notes have been delivered – but you are left empty – hungry for and bereft of the feelings you get from a lesser (technically) performance delivered with heart.

So, I encourage you to continue to work on technique (of course) but also to devote practice time to breaking out and rendering music – not just notes. This is easiest if you record yourself to reveal what is coming out of you – and working on that too.

After all, technical ecstasy won’t give you music, but music may just lead to ecstasy, technically!

* I wish I could remember who that cellist is – I’d give credit if I could!

Contributing to the diversity of a minor

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So, now you know that the minor scale is related to the major scale in that it uses the same notes but starts instead on the sixth. And you know, from your playing, that the minor scale is used a great deal. Although in modern western music the minor scale is considered dark, sad, lamenting, etc. earlier in western civilization the scale was considered happy. Things change.

The minor scale remains a very useful convention. But what you might not know is that one of the things that the minor brings is diversity – there are a number of minor scales.  Yikes! But with a little bit of explanation, you’ll soon understand (and be able to use) the different types of minor scales.

First, there are different minors! And there are terms that can be confusing. But once you get the lay of the land, you’ll be able to participate in those high-falutin’ music conversations with anyone!

There are the relative minor, the natural minor, the parallel minor, the harmonic minor, and the melodic minor. First off, it’s not as complicated as it sounds. Sort of like the Future Perfect Continuous Conditional verb tense – it sounds terrifying but you use it all the time (I would have been practicing…). Like last week, now, we’re just learning the formalized rules. So, here we go! We’ll work from C major (again, because with no sharps or flats, it’s easy to see and write). 

Relative minor. On the harp this is the easy one. Start at the root of the major scale and walk your way to the sixth of the scale. If you’re lazy (and flexible), you’ll just go down three (in our example, from the C go down to the A) and start the scale from there (of course, you can also go up to the a above and start there). Because you’re clever, you’ve already figured out that this is the Aeolian scale that we talked about last week. The intervals in this scale are: W(whole), H (half), W, W, H, W, and W and the notes of the scale are A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. This is also referred to as the Natural minor. 

Parallel minor. This minor scale is “parallel” because it starts on the same note as major scale in consideration. In our C example, the parallel minor starts on C – so you can already see that something else will have to change – we are going to have to engage some levers. The intervals in this scale are W, H, W, W, H, W, and W, while the notes of the scale are: C, D, E♭, F, G, A♭, and B♭. You’ll see that the key signature has three flats. Let’s think that one through. That means that this is the relative minor of E♭! 

Harmonic minor. This scale is close to, but different from, the relative (or natural) minor. In this scale you raise the 7th up ½ step. The intervals are W, H,W, W, H, W+H, H (you can see the “big jump” going to the raised 7th).  In our example working from the C major scale, the notes become A, B, C, D, E, F, and G#. This scale allows you develop some delicious harmonies when you use it to build up the chords for the scale. 

Melodic minor. Ok, there’s no way to dress this one up – it’s a little bit challenging to understand and to remember because going up the scale is different than coming down!  Except when it doesn’t. It is often expressed that for the melodic minor, on the way up the scale the 6th and 7th are raised. But on the way down, scale goes back to “normal” (with the 6th and 7th lowered). In this case the intervals are W, H, W, W, W, W, and H on the way up and W, W, H, W, W, H, and W on the way down. For the A minor scale, the notes would be A, B, C, D, E, F#, G# on the way up and on the way down, the scale is A, G, F, E, D, C, and B (you’ll see that it goes back to the natural minor). Of course, some of the weird comes because sometimes the scale is the same up and down. You might hear that this is a jazz scale – and it is, but it is also quite present in classical music as well. In addition, you might find that sometimes this scale is played the same in both directions. I told you it was a bit challenging.

Play with these scales. Really give them a working through so that you can find what you like and what you think you can use. The diversity in these versions of the minor scale will give you plenty to work with as you work through tunes and as you develop arrangements – you’ll be delighted with the things you find!

In the Mode – Useful theory

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Ok, first, let’s be honest – simply saying “Music Theory” in a room may cause you to come out with no friends. Most people don’t like theory. They don’t understand theory. They probably don’t actually know anything about theory, but they have heard the stories…and those stories are terrifying!

But really, theory is just a way to have a common language to talk about music. Think of it as the “English Class” of music. It’s where all the rules and conventions are held so that you don’t have to find out the rules every time you use them (or abuse them). And, of course, if you’re a rule-breaker, that’s bad. But if you know the rules and elect to bend them, that’s avant guard!

So, knowing the rules becomes a first step. You don’t have to learn theory by sweating over a badly written book. In fact, some of the best theory lessons can come right at your harp. But you’ll be faster at learning all the rules if you use a mixed approach of reading about it and sitting at your instrument and exploring.

Melody is one of the basic elements of music.  Melodies are built from scales. So, it can only help to know what the scales are. This is where some of you will be shuddering – because you know I’m about to talk about…modes (dun-dun-duhhhh).

The modes have a rich (and depending on who you read, varied) history. Much of this history is interesting. And it doesn’t seem to have much to do with music today. But we do still use the names.

Modes are not really that mysterious. They really are just variations of a scale. Let’s work in C for this example (everything will be applicable to any scale – but C doesn’t require a lot of #s and bs!).

Think of what we call the C Major Scale. It consists of: C D E F G A B. The relationships of the interval are either whole steps (W) or half steps (H). Therefore this scale is: W W H W W W H and it is called the Ionian mode.

BLAHBLAHBLAH, yeah, we know that.  This is a good time to bring your harp in so you can play along at home.  If you have a piano (or keyboard or piano app) this might be easier to visualize.

So, if you started on the D instead, now the scale is: D E F G A B C and the interval relationships become W H W W W H W. It’s a totally different sound – and it’s called Dorian. It sounds sort of “jazzy”.

And if you started on the E, now we’re at E F G A B C D. The intervals are H W W W H W W and we call it Phrygian. This scale sounds a little dark.

Starting on the F we get: F G A B C D E and the intervals are W W W H W W H which gives us the Lydian mode which is pretty peppy.

If we begin on G the scale becomes: G A B C D E F and W W H W W H W. This is the Mixolydian mode – and for those playing Scottish and Irish traditional music, it probably sounds very familiar – it has the flatted 7th that we’re so used to hearing.

By starting on the 6th we get: A B C D E F G with intervals W H W W H W W. This may also sound hauntingly familiar – this is what we usually call “minor” – it is the Aeolian mode.

The last mode is the Locrian – it begins on the 7th: B C D E F G A, and the intervals are: H W W H W W W. This mode is just weird (to us) and you don’t hear many songs in that scale typically because it doesn’t resolve which we don’t really like in western music (of course, other cultures have different scales and many include “unresolving” scales that we might shy away from).

No one scale is “better” than another, although you might prefer the sound of some over others. And that’s ok – music is a cultural thing so what you’re used to will likely sound better to you than something that is new and different.

Spend some time on your harp playing with these scales – see what you like. Keep at it and see if what you like changes over time, as you become more familiar with the sounds of the “different” scales. Once you get used to hearing and thinking about these, you might be more inclined to look for them or to use them. Later we’ll talk about the chord progressions that might set these different scales off if you use them for a melody. Keep practicing and the theory will work its way into your brain!

Work

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I am spending this week at an engineering conference. No, it is not as boring as it sounds. Yes, there are lots of very cool and interesting people there. The first session I went to was what I think of as a “hero round”. There were a few speakers who have “made it”. That is, they are recognized as being at the top of their respective heaps (in fact, that is why they were invited to come).

They gave interesting talks that shared glimpses of challenges they have faced, how they continued to grow, what they liked best and least about working their way up. It was fairly inspiring. They were asked questions about glass ceilings, impediments, and pratfalls that might have befallen them.

Interestingly, their answers were similar and focused.

They both talked about the importance of doing the work.

They talked about knowing their stuff.

About having their fundamentals firmly in hand.

About spending time to get their ducks in a row – whether they thought they had to prove themselves or if they already had command of the room.

They also talked about the importance of continually learning.

They talked about sometimes failing – and how much they learned in those instances.

All of those things really resonated – because no matter what you do, it matters.

Whether you are a professional or a hobbyist – it matters.

When you do the work, when you know your stuff – you are more comfortable when it’s your turn to play.

When you do the work, you get your fundamentals in hand – and the work becomes easier.

When you do the work, continued learning is a joy and adds to your baseline. And you learn more quickly and possibly more thoroughly.

And really – how much work is it? We play a beautiful instrument that (at least to the people I talk to) we really enjoy playing. Even when it’s hard. Even when we don’t have it quite right. Even when we think e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e else is better, more experienced, more competent than we are – we still enjoy playing.

So, keep playing. Enjoy. Savor learning and growing and experiencing.

Now, GET BACK TO WORK!