Tag Archives: Practice

Clear vision for 2020

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It is now 2020 – Welcome to the new year and the new decade!

Just like every new year, we are encouraged from many sides to develop resolutions – to define those things we need to “fix” to improve ourselves.

How about this – in 2020, the year of clear vision – just give it a rest.  Resolve to make no resolutions. Don’t set any goals.

After all, if the goals were important, you’d have set them right when they became clear.  If you need to work on specific things, you would have started right then – if you wanted that to become a goal!

There’s nothing special about short cold days for achieving anything.  Up to 91% of people who set resolutions drop them, most before the middle of January!  So, setting resolutions is really not a useful thing to do, unless you like to set yourself up for failure and to give yourself a specific thing to beat yourself up about not accomplishing.

New Year 2020Then what should you do? How about you take on just these four things:

  1. Just Stop. New Year’s resolutions really seem to be about false notions of self-improvement and possibly about self-aggrandizing virtue signaling. And really, unless you made a significant wager with someone, no one else really cares if you make it, so stop pillorying yourself about having resolutions, goals, visions, whatever.  Use that energy to – just play!
  2. Be Nice. Be kind to yourself – if you’re not where you want to be, you probably not only know it, but you likely also know how to get across that gap.  You might just not be ready to spend that energy. And if you are not sure how to get there, work with your teacher (or me!) and keep reading (because you know that here, we’ll talk about ways to improve!).
  3. Take a smarter path. The path forward that begins by recognizing the reality of your life will be a smarter path. And possibly there’s more to your life than playing the harp – like family, friends, day jobs, other hobbies, other instruments, and myriad other things you prioritize ahead of the harp (otherwise, you’d have more time to practice).  By examining your real life – and using that as the foundation of your thinking about your playing – you will be more likely to be able to find the time to practice and to better fit your harp playing into your reality!  Your life is a system and it needs to be kept in balance so that you can accomplish the requirements of each of its parts.  That balance starts by understanding where all the pieces lie.
  4. Practice! You know it will all come down to this – but you need a wider definition – you have to practice:
    • Practice the instrument – probably that old saw of spending at least 30 – 90 minutes a day (depending, again, on where you’re trying to get, your level of performance and development, and your real life)
    • Practice fitting everything else in too (you know, like dinner, exercise, sleep, work, chores, etc.) (after all, 3 above will not happen by magic, it will take a little work to analyze what will fit, where it will fit and how you might have to adjust things to get it all into the day).
    • Practice having balance
    • Practice being kind to yourself
    • Practice stretching
    • Practice learning
    • Practice spending time away from your harp productively
    • Practice being present
    • Practice practicing – you can’t just sit on the bench and have magic pour out your fingers – you know you need to warm up, work on fundamentals, analyze music, think about your approach and strategy for new music, work on learning, learn new things, develop musicality, hammer out new burbles, etc.
      • Practice the tunes you love
      • Practice the tunes you don’t love
      • Practice the way you play and developing your technique
      • Practice becoming more accomplished
      • Practice sharing your music
      • Practice being better
      • Practice enjoying the process
      • Practice capturing your progress so you can see your improvement
      • and practice identifying where you need to improve and practice

It’s going to be a busy year, and you’ll do exactly as much work as you fit in (and no more).  Setting improbable or impossible goals will not help and could actually get in the way (by making you feel like you’re failing or not making progress when you actually are).

What will you do with all the energy you have from not developing resolutions or goals that won’t work for you?  Let me know in the comments!

Starting again, again

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I’m on that high you get when you’ve had a great lesson where you’ve worked hard, learned a ton, enjoyed receiving information, knowledge and wisdom from a good teacher, had a genuinely good time, and are now exhausted!

Woohoo!!

What? you want to know why I would be taking a lesson?

That is an easy answer to give – because I needed to start again, again.

Start again, againThere is so much to know and to learn.  We all have some of the pieces, but none of us has all the pieces.  However, I keep working on the puzzle, so I gathered more pieces from another source – and I think the picture in the puzzle is starting to take shape and be visible!

I have a beautiful Wurlitzer Starke.  I am so fortunate and grateful to have it.  But, to be honest, it has been collecting dust in the corner.  Of course I play it – occasionally.  But I didn’t play it enough.  And I was making no movement toward the music I got it to work on – music I insisted I needed to play!

I have a confession to make.  I don’t just like Scottish music.  I love music.  I particularly like Baroque, Classical, and Romantic music.  I’m also a picky taster at the modern table.  But it was hearing Faure’s Impromptu on the radio that compelled me to venture into the pool of the pedal harp.

Yes, I heard that piece and I was smitten!  Just one teeny-tiny problem – I didn’t actually know how to start.  Because, while yes, a harp is a harp, I was a little bit afraid of my pedal harp.

So, I needed to start again.

In that weird way the world works, just before all of this, separately, two of you mentioned needing to start over again – in the same week!  So, I’ve had this idea of starting again, again in mind as I headed out to my lesson.

Do you need to start again, again?  It’s not a bad idea, and here’s why:

  1. Beginner’s Mind.  You might have heard this concept of keeping a “beginner’s mind” – holding curiosity forefront, being eager to learn, being grateful for each step forward no matter the size.  And perhaps most importantly, the beginner’s mind has no expectations of performance – no disappointment on not getting something right the first try or impatience that it’s “taking too long” to learn something.
  2. No matter where you go, there you are (but you’ve worn down your shoes!) – you might want to start again again just to get a “tune-up”. I’m always amazed how quickly small bad habits can build (and band together!) – a little slump leads to a little neck craning leads to dragging your arm on the sound board and a one way ticket to poorer playing and possible injury.
  3. Someone out there knows something that could push you just a little farther along on your path.  But if you don’t ask for the help and information, you might never get that little shove you need!  And you never know who will have it or what it will look like, so you need to pay attention.
  4. No one wants to become stale.  And it’s easy to do.  It’s so much easier to play the same ten tunes forever, but it’s very motivating to have new repertoire the next time you see your harp buddies.  Whether you have a lesson, go to a workshop, or find new music to learn, you’ll prevent yourself from becoming musty and have an opportunity to start again.
  5. Something worth having is worth fighting for.  It is easy (as in the above) to become complacent, but you know you want to be as good as you can become, and while it might not be a “fight” per se (although that might depend on the tune!), working for something you want has it’s benefits while not working will have significant drawbacks (like being disappointed in yourself!).

Taking the perspective of starting again, again can be freeing.  Of course, we’re not always in a place where we need to start again, again so if you’re not there that’s great!  But if you find yourself thinking that starting over might be the best way to move forward, really step into it and begin again…again!

Have you found yourself in this place? How did you know?  what did you do? Was it worth it? Let me know in the comments!

 

When injury strikes – plow on! (but carefully and smartly)

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One of my students recently broke her arm*.  Really broke, with surgery and plates and screws, and other barbaric medical necessities.  It was not pretty.  She needed time to heal, and I encouraged her to take the time to recover so healing would go faster and more successfully. 

And with good care and physical therapy (and more patience that I would have shown), she’s been on the mend.  I’m delighted to have her back at the harp (with clearance from the physician and the physical therapist).

But, she’s a trooper and while she was recovering, she didn’t lay on the couch and moan!  Nope – she plowed on!

When injury strikes - plow onNow, let me explain what I mean by “plowed on”.  What she did not do is ignore the physical therapist or the physicians.   She did not just sit around.  So, what did she do?  She did the work she could do – carefully and smartly.

  1. She listened to music – because she knows this is a good way to perform mental practice.  You may have heard the old saw, “if you can sing it, you can play it”.  Listening to the tune helps you get the melody in your head, learning the patterns of the notes, the relationships of the phrases, so that you can anticipate what comes next – in your mind!  So when she was healed up, she had a lot of the brain part of learning already done and she was ready to go on to the finger part.
  2. She did her physical therapy – She told the PT that she’s a musician so the therapy could be tailored to her needs.  And she actually did the exercises her PT taught her – both during their sessions and as prescribed between those sessions.  She knew that although the exercises were no fun, they were fun-damental to her recovering and being able to get back to playing sooner.
  3. She continued to play with the other hand.  My students know that we will work to play the melody in both the right – and the left – hands.  Sometimes we also ask the right hand to play the harmony.  We do this both to exercise the left hand to make it more limber but also to make our brains more limber by switching the roles of the two hands.  She was able to keep that up throughout her injury.
  4. She rearranged some tunes – when you can only play with one hand, you rethink your harmonization.  This is an interesting exercise in inversions and it’s a good opportunity to think about the shape and structure of the tune.  Earlier work on hand shapes also meant that she was comfortable building harmonies in one hand…and she knew these would help transition to two hands when the time was right.
  5. She thought before she played – asking so much from your hands really does mean that thinking first makes sense to save unnecessary movement and work.  She analyzed the tune before playing to figure out how to accompany with harmony in just one hand.
  6. She thought after she played – gaining a new perspective from playing with one hand results in new possibilities to analyze your playing, the structure of your practice, and the outcomes.
  7. She rested – after all, your body needs time to recover so resting is certainly necessary for recovery.  And practicing in a new way meant becoming more tired sooner.
  8. She was patient – she understood that this was a serious injury and that, not being a child, it would require time to heal and to knit back together.

Being injured is never fun and injuring yourself may impact your playing.  But once it has happened, it is what it is – so take care of yourself while you heal – but don’t abandon your harp!  At a minimum it might soothe your hurt to play what you can!

* like any good article, this is based on a fiction derived as a composite of students.  But if you break an arm – I’d suggest you be smart – just like my composite student!

Harp Room Bling

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Sometimes you just need a little, visible nudge to remind you of what is important to you.  So this week – a downloadable poster.  Print it out (up to 18 in x 24 in) and hang it up near your harp so you remember each time you sit.  Yes it’s goofy – but if it makes you focus or makes you laugh, at least you’ll already be at your harp – so you might as well play a little.To get your copy – just let me know you would like to have it – leave me a comment and I’ll get it to you!

If it was easy, it would be easy!

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I have told you before that I find many parts of making music are relatively easy.  I would say that it’s easier to play the harp than to calculate cubic roots in my head or to determine the easiest way to teach unified field theory to toddlers. 

But not everyone agrees – especially less experienced musicians who often express frustration and dismay over how hard it can be to play the harp.

To less experienced harp players, ease seems to be either a sadistic ploy to make them feel badly about their level of experience (it isn’t, I assure you – we’ve all been there at some point) or a cruel twist of fate that leaves some people finding it easy, with others finding it impossible. I will not take up the nature/nurture question vis a vis musicianship, but I will tell you something that will (upon reflection) not surprise you –

That apparent ease that you see in experienced players – especially in professionals – is a result of (you know what I’m about to say…)…PRACTICE!

The more you practice something – the more often you perform that skill – the easier it becomes. Continued, focused practice can result in the task itself becoming automatic.  You can do that thing without even thinking about it.  In fact, if you think about it, you may not be able to do it!  The more you practice something, the less you have to consciously think about it to make it happen. And that comes about through practice.

If you practice anything accurately you will become better at it (of course if you practice inaccurately, you will become better at doing something incorrectly!). If you practice counting, you will get more proficient at counting. If you practice reading you will become better at reading. If you practice making hand shapes and blocking, this will become second nature – it will become just the way you do it.

Even beginners have developed some skills.  If you’re more experienced, you have already mastered many activities and made them automatic.  Complex tasks can like walking, jumping, writing, etc. all once required a great deal of concentration and effort but are now automatic. If you think this is not the case, I recommend you spend more time with very young children – you can watch them find behaviors and practice them. When walking is new, you don’t just wish to walk better – you walk and walk and walk, and fall down, and get up and walk some more – until you can do it all by yourself!

So, if you are working hard to play – whether it is counting, or blocking, having consistent fingering, sitting up straight, or reading – you now know that you just need more practice with those basic behaviors. Strong practice of these basic skills – making them automatic – frees up your brain to do other hard work, like learning new pieces, adding appropriate dynamics, or writing your own!

There are no short cuts.  If it was easy, it would be easy.  Now, go practice!

Are there things you find easy? Things you find difficult? What are they? Leave a comment below!

 

Better get moving – 10 steps to get ready for the holidays!

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It’s nearly October (yikes!), the summer is over, the kids are back to school, the days are palpably shorter.  And you know what that means – the holidays are nearly here!

There are only 12 weeks to go – but you know that festivities will start in about six to eight week so there will be plenty of time to fit in all the parties, pageants, festivals, parades, celebrations, get-togethers, gift exchanges, as well as gatherings.  And each of those will be an opportunity to share one of your greatest gifts – your music!

Better get ready – but how?  Here are ten (relatively easy) steps:

First, manage your expectations.  Be realistic.  You might want to capture all the things you will be doing during the run up to the season as well as the season itself.  You know you will have work and practice, and family traditions, and social events that you anticipate you will be part of.  You can make a list or pencil them into your calendar or make a spreadsheet.  What you really need to know is how much time you actually have.  How much time do you really have to practice?  How much time do you have to prepare?  How much time do you have to share?

Second, manage other people’s expectations.  If you want to be playing for others, let it be known so you might be asked.  Not interested in playing for an event?  Just say no.  It is, however, the season for music and people will try to be persuasive (or maybe they will gently bully you into trying to get you agree).  Worried about saying no?   Ask someone you know who does want to be playing.  Be prepared with their name and contact information.  It will be a win-win-win: you don’t have to give a flat no because you have a referral ready (you win).  The referred harper gets a gig they might not have been positioned for otherwise (harper wins).  And the audience gets a willing performer (so they win too).

Third, make a list of the tunes you have played in the past.  These will likely come back quickly and can be the backbone of your playing.

Fourth, make a “learn these” list of the tunes you want to play but haven’t learned yet. These will be work, but they will be worth it!  Be reasonable given the amount of time you have to practice.

Fifth, if you will be playing for others, estimate how much music you will need.  I usually guestimate about 6 – 8 tunes to 15 minutes.  This might be conservative, but it assures that I don’t run out of music before I run out of time.  I also suggest you build two set lists – because I like to be overprepared and having too much music means I can pick and choose once I get there depending on how the audience is responding.  It also means that I won’t have to play something that feels shaky or just hasn’t come together enough yet.  Remember that you can insert other music into the list – include the winter themed tunes or favorites to make an enjoyable performance.  Especially later in the season, people will begin to fatigue of holiday music so some other tunes will wake them up and keep them engaged.

Sixth, now that you have a list and know about how many tunes you’re looking for, play through your old tunes and critically (but not harshly) determine what work is needed to get them up to scratch.  Revise your list as needed (move anything that feels like it might be a train wreck to the “learn these” list).

Seventh, make a schedule to get the new music learned and ready to go and to make the old stuff polished and shone.  This will be a plan to structure your practice between now and the holidays.  Be realistic!

Eighth, schedule your practice time.  Write it in your calendar.  Make a date with your harp every day.  Keep practicing your “regular” music too – although they come quick, the holidays are here and gone – so you might as well stay up to date for January!

Ninth, keep an eye on your plan and revise as necessary!  Update your lists, adjust as needed, keep the end in mind.  Remember the goal is to play well and feel comfortable when it’s time to play.

Finally, have fun!  You’re going to make so many people happy when you share your gift – make sure one of those is you!  The holidays are a time for joy – share yours!

Follow these ten steps and you will be well on your way to sharing your gift!  How do you prepare for the holidays?  Share your tips in the comments.

Expand your musical reach – another stretch (or 7!)

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We have talked about stretching through making art and stretching our bodies.  There’s another place we need to stretch and that is in our music.  And it’s the perfect time to think about it – it will be the winter holidays and all the lovely opportunities to play will be coming.  I mention the holidays because they are the perfect foil for stretching our music.

The holidays are great from a repertoire perspective.  There is a relatively small set of tunes to work from and each year, those that have been on our set lists for a while seem to become easier to prepare and to play.  It’s also easier to knuckle under and practice – we know it’s coming; we know we’ll be playing; and we know the bulk of what we’ll bring to each performance.

That doesn’t exactly sound like stretching.

And that’s why it’s so great!  There are loads of holiday tunes – so you probably don’t know them all.  But you know some and so each year you can add another one or two to fill in your set list.  But we have to fight the urge to be lazy and just play all the same stuff. 

I don’t know about you, but I really like hearing new (to me) stuff at the holidays.  From countries whose music I don’t know well, from new sources, and from the set of those songs that hardly anyone records but are just so good. 

So, the holidays are an opportunity to stretch ourselves – musically.

What does stretching musically mean? Trying new things!  It can be adding techniques we don’t usually use, playing music we don’t usually play, finding stuff we didn’t know existed and fitting it into our lives, arranging music we like (from other instruments) and playing it on the harp, or more.

How is stretching musically good for us?  Here are seven unsurprising ways (some of these might sound familiar since they are as with making art)

  1. Stretching is (still) the opposite of static!  Static is not moving or changing.  Static introduces b-o-r-i-n-g into your playing.  It also means that you’re not growing as a musician.  So, learn how to do some effect you think is cool…and actually use it in your playing!  Do the work of technique practice.  And after learning some new technique, actually add it to your playing!
  2. Stretching makes you more flexible.  By adding new music, new sources, new techniques, new practice approaches, just new stuff to your playing, you will begin to explore yourself more and bring that into your playing and performance.  And you will be free to do more than you thought you could when you were less flexible.
  3. Stretching helps defeat stress.  The more you stretch your music, the more comfortable you become with playing it – because you’ll become more accustomed to being stretched.  In your practice, in performance, in ensemble, in sessions – no matter where you’re playing you will be more relaxed, able to enjoy the process and product of making music.  That comfort is an indication of your reduced stress.
  4. Stretching helps overcome pain and discomfort.  You might decide to stretch your music when you feel the discomfort be becoming bored.  Of course, once you decide to stretch your music, you might feel self-conscious, uneducated, or ignorant.  The music activities that stretch you might make you feel uncomfortable in and of themselves.  But keeping at it – a little bit each day – will help you be more comfortable and soon, you’ll be interested in the flexibility of trying new music.  I’d suggest adding time for creativity in your practice each day so you will be able to stretch musically with less (perceived) “stiffness”.
  5. Stretching helps you focus.  You can be mindful when you are stretching your music.  Mindful of what it is about the music that attracts (or repels) you, what technique elements you need to work on, what your harp really shines with.  In addition, a broader repertoire may help you to feel more accomplished and allow you to comfortably book gigs previously out of reach.  Be sure to pay attention as you’re stretching your music to identify what to keep on doing.
  6. Stretching improves your range.  As you add music to your toolbox, and include the listening, reading, technique and effects the new music might require of you, you will become more able to do more things with greater musicality – and add new things more quickly.
  7. Stretching stretches you.  There’s nothing like playing something you never thought you’d be able to (or possibly even that you never thought about adding) to boost your confidence and encourage you to try even more new things!

Stretching – the gentle kind that broadens your abilities, and leaves you relaxed and enjoying making music, is just what you need.  With these seven stretches you might become a better musician!  What kind of music might you add to stretch yourself?  What else might you do to stretch yourself musically?  Tell me in the comments – I can’t wait to hear!

Now what?

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Hopefully you believed me and at least started making your index card file. If so, you’ll have started the cards going, and once you’re caught up, adding your new material will require a less herculean effort!

But you’ve asked – now what? What are you supposed to do with this?

Well, there’s a reason I suggested this card catalog rather than just a list (however, if you opted for a list, that’s ok too – keep reading, it’s down below!). If you’ve made a card catalog, no matter if you are sorting by title or by tune type – you should also include another set of divisions:

Know |  Don’t Know  |  Needs Polish

(you can also add additional dividers if you want to be more specific or to fit the way you think about it)

At each practice, you can pull the cards you need. Clearly, you will put the things you are actively working (from the “Don’t Know” section). The tricky bit is what else to pull. It is tempting to think the “Needs Polish” should come out infrequently, but you’d be wrong. These should be in your regular rotation for practice.

“Needs Polish” is code for, “I’d like to think I know this, but if push came to shove, I’d have to admit that I don’t really know it cold”. So, add those tunes to your regular practice. Also acknowledge that “Needs Polish” may be the weirdest/broadest category, so don’t despair. You will get there if you keep working on these tunes!

But how do you use the “Know” cards? Pull one at random from the box at each practice. Play the tune and see how it goes. If you play it well – Yea! and put it back into the box. If it is wobbly when you play it, it goes into the “Needs Polish” section so you can get it back to scratch. And if it is a struggle (or you don’t remember large chunks of it*) put it back into “Don’t Know”. The number of “Knows” you pull out in each practice is up to you (and typically based on how much time you have each day).

If you’ve made a list (or set of lists) here are some other ideas. I’d suggest you use a spreadsheet (so you can move tunes easily from one section to another), but any format that works for you is the right one! You’ll still need to identify your categories and all that is above still applies.  When it comes to choosing a tune from the “Know” pile, just close your eyes and point to a title. Or use a random number generator. Or roll some dice. Whatever works – just so you can select a tune to include each day.

No matter if you make cards or lists, you might want to make another, more flexible category and label it ❤ – these are the tunes you’re currently in love with (or just infatuated). We all have them. They are like summer loves – they make your heart go pitter pat just thinking about them. You play them obsessively and to the exclusion of many others. They quickly make the “Know” category. You can even put a ❤ on the card – you love them that much! I suggest this because, as so often happens with summer loves, they flame out quickly, only to be forgotten. When you pull one of these out, it is fun – like pulling out old summer photos. You can play these with a bit of wistfulness, and a chuckle at what you had become so obsessed with at the time. Some will make it back into your repertoire which will be fun. And even if you don’t put it back into your regular repertoire, it will be fun to see how you’ve grown!

You need to manage the number of pieces you’re working on at a time. It is very easy to attempt to work on too many tunes (especially after a great summer event like Ohio Scottish Arts School when you come home with boatloads of new tunes!). You want to work on them all – but you need to pace yourself or you’ll end up with nothing.  Using the cards gives you an easy way to keep track of what you need to work on, what you need to polish, what you need to review, and what you want to get to soon.

If you make a plan for each practice you will be able to add tunes, move them along in learning and make strong additions to your repertoire. What are you adding right now?

Stay between the lines!

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I was driving down the highway the other day. I was going about 1000 miles, so on one particularly long, straight stretch, I started remembering when I learned to drive.

For me, one of the hardest things to learn was staying in the middle of the lane. When you start to drive, you know you need to stay in the lane – and between the lines. The lane is defined by the lines, so I looked at the lines – constantly. But you know how that goes – the more you look at the lines, the farther you are from your desired position – in the middle of the lane. The best advice (or training) I got was to look down the road – look way down the road. After I (finally) learned that, staying in the lane was so easy. Now, as an experienced driver, I don’t even see the lines close to me and keeping the vehicle in the middle of the lane is something I take for granted.  It seems that I just go where I meant to be.

The reality is, no matter how good a driver you are, you will never stay in your lane to get where you’re going if you don’t look ahead.  So, what does that have to do with playing the harp? Everything!

When you’re learning a new tune – what do you do? I don’t know about you, but when I’m having trouble getting a tune into my head, I naturally narrow my thinking down to just what comes next – what’s the next note. But this doesn’t actually help me learn the tune. It just frustrates me (thus drawing my focus away from what I’m trying to do – learn the tune). If I lift my head and keep my focus “down the road”, then I can think of the phrases (as phrases, not as a trickle of sounds). When I can hear the tune in my head, the notes that come next become so much easier to remember.

When you’re reading music, the notation (the lines and everything else) are helpful – but can be distracting. Again, sometimes just having all that ink only serves to draw your attention to the individual blops – and you lose track of where you are on the page, in the phrase, in the music. When you lose your place, your hands may not end up in the right place, or they might be going the wrong direction or be overstretched! Keeping the long view will allow you to read the music rather than focusing on the ink and better allow you to be more able to play.

When you’re playing, you have learned the tune or become familiar with the dots on the sheet. When you’re playing, you want to be “in the moment” – and that is important. But remember that music isn’t static or fixed.  Music is serial, it comes out over time – like the road!  It can’t come out all at once (although there are some composers who clearly do not agree with me on that!). So being in the moment has to include the plans for this moment, and then for the next moment, and then the following moment, and on and on until the end of the piece – as a flow. This is not contradictory, rather, you need to hold the music in your head as a piece rather than as a set of notes. Looking at the whole of the music, rather than on just it’s representation (that you learned or are reading), will help keep you on track.

When you’re performing, you really are taking all that you have learned and putting it out there in the world to share. This is more than just playing in that now. Because now, in addition to being in the moment with the music, you must also be present with the listeners. Whether there are 2 or 200 or 2000 in the audience, your focus has to be “farther down the road” to include not only the music but also the hearers and what your message to them/with them is. Here, your long view includes them, the music, and the presentation.  Keeping an eye on where you want to take them with the music, what it is you want to share, and how you mean to do that will help give you a smooth ride.

Of course, this is a simple analogy.  There are many things on the road that require attention (like stop signs, traffic, pedestrians, etc.).  And just like that, music (written or aural, practice or performance) has details (like dynamics, tempo, timbre, etc.) which enrich the ride and improve the experience.  But, just as staying between the lines becomes second nature, learning, reading, playing and performing can also become second nature so that your music grows, flourishes, and delights. And just like any journey, when staying between the lines comes naturally and effortlessly, you can enjoy the journey so much more easily. What are the lines you have a hard time not looking at? How do you stay in the lane? When you look down the road – what do you see? Leave me a comment and share how you do it!

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas –

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It’s barely begun to cool down, the days have hardly gotten any shorter and the trees haven’t really begun to show their colors. It’s October! But it is also definitely time to start preparing for Christmas! From parties to church services, from fundraisers to celebrations, ‘tis the season to be asked to bring a little joy to people by playing for Christmas. Will you be ready? Here are 8 things you can do to be prepared this season:

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  • Start now – Christmas is right around the corner, but the holiday season is even closer. Holiday decorations had appeared in big-box retailers before Labor Day and the Christmas events will start after Thanksgiving if not before so you need to start now to be ready.
  • Make a preparation checklist – write down those things you need to do to be prepared (some of the items in this post might be helpful for that). Use your checklist to help yourself prepare.
  • Budget your time – be sure to manage your time effectively – refreshing tunes you’ve learned before, learning new material, whatever you need to spend your time on – arrange to have that time available.
  • Select your tunes – know what you are preparing for and use that information to generate a solid set of tunes (and specific tune lists).
  • Schedule practice – not kidding. The holidays are notorious for days filled up beyond reason, earlier than expected, and with way too much to do. Be sure to schedule your practice time in – or you won’t get any!
  • Use your practice time wisely – because your practice time will be at a premium, be sure you plan for that time so you can get the most out of every moment. No shillyshallying at the harp, no unfocused playing through – actually practice when you’re practicing.
  • Make notes for next year – some of your preparation will be very good, some will be no help whatsoever. Make notes to yourself for next year so have even better preparation in the future.
  • Enjoy yourself – the preparation is challenging, and the added stress of performing may get to you, but be sure to enjoy yourself. And also be sure to acknowledge any improvement in your performance, the level of difficulty of the music, the speed of refreshing tunes you had learnedin previous years – all those positive indicators that arise from your preparation.

Christmas comes but once a year – fortunately, it stays for a while and provides you a great opportunity to prepare and to play for family, friends, and customers.