Old Habits
They say old habits die hard. That’s a good thing!
Practice
At The Mercy Of Your Calendar
Being at the mercy of your calendar can be a great gift – if you only choose to see it that way. As summer ends, teachers ramp up. I don’t know any choir teachers who aren’t at the mercy of their calendar from August to June. Concerts, rehearsals, trips, personal […]
Disposable/Recoverable
Failure isn’t a sign to quit. It’s a sign to rebuild. I found a rusty cast iron skillet on the street a while back, by a trash can waiting to get picked up. Knowing the way to fix it, I carried it the rest of my walk; not very long […]
Do I Have What It Takes?
Sometimes questions are meaningless.
Who To Listen To When You’re Learning A Song
It matters who you choose to listen to. When my students are learning a jazz standard, I work hard to impress on them the importance of targeted listening. This is, after all, an oral tradition, and we can only sing these songs well if we understand that tradition. Even as […]
Overprepared
Overprepared is a myth. There is prepared and there is unprepared. Any preparation beyond the baseline of prepared simply moves you farther beyond the average level of preparation and into excellence. Come see my students tonight at 7pm (or if you’re not in West Michigan, watch online) as they show […]
Integral Practice or Side Habit?
Is each part of your practice integral, or are some things just side habits along for the ride? My writing practice is to simple: sit and write daily. But recently I find it hard to begin my writing except at the end of the day. I can sit and not […]
Skill Durability
The only way to develop durable skills is repetition over time. I beat my son at tennis today. That’s rare – he’s better than me. But neither of us had played tennis since the fall, and I had one (temporary) advantage. Skill durability. My skills, meager though they are, are […]
Essential But Not Sufficient
Follow your passion? Yes. Passion is essential but not sufficient. In addition to passion, these are essential for success: Helpful but not essential traits include: What’s missing from your essential arsenal? That’s where to focus your efforts.
Unmemorizable
Some pieces just…resist memorization. In my experience, the toughest pieces to memorize are not necessarily the most complex, or longest, or difficult. Indeed, it tends to surprise me when an ensemble struggles to put down their music. For the piece that my ensemble is dueling with at the moment, I […]