Monthly Archives: August 2020

You are filled with a sense of urgency. Be patient.

Posted on by
8

– thus spoke my fortune cookie

It is the end of August, that magical time of year…when it has been so hot that it is nearly impossible to believe the winter will ever come.  When the holidays feel so far away that you can’t even think about them (even though Halloween candy has been on shelves since the afternoon of July 4th).  And this year, any planning will be done while wearing a mask, contemplating how to have your usual holiday celebration while everyone is inside small boxes on your phone screen.

So, it is exceedingly difficult to get motivated to begin to practice holiday music!

But really, it’s already September, and with accelerated schedules, some might normally be expecting to play Christmas music by early November.  Of course, this year, everything is off.  But even that isn’t much comfort – because people are trying desperately to be out and about and back to normal and we don’t know when what we have always considered to be normal will return.  Which means that just when you’re sure you’ll have nowhere to play, someone will contact you begging you for help!

Any of these can really tarnish your willingness to bring your holiday repertoire up to snuff while simultaneously possibly putting you in the situation of not being ready when the call comes.

And no matter what angst others have expressed, I’ve also heard a lot of people saying some variation of, “I’ve had all this time, I should have already mastered an entire new repertoire, but I haven’t even warmed up!”  And that’s about when the Fortune Cookie seems to be prescient!

It’s entirely possible that you will have absolutely nowhere to play holiday music in 2020!  It’s also possible that – even if you only play for the cat and the curtains – they won’t be really up for holiday music this year.  And although I don’t have many, I am already booking for holiday events, so –

2020 is definitely going to be a test of your internal motivation!  Here are a few reasons that I’d like to encourage you to start working on holiday music now:

  1. You already have most of it!  One of the best things about holiday music is that, after the first few holidays, you pretty much have the repertoire licked.  That isn’t to say that you don’t need to take it out and dust it off and give it a good polish.  But you really don’t have to start from scratch – score!
  2. Since you’re only having to polish and shine, you really can use this part of your repertoire to both evaluate your growth in the previous year AND to work on expanding what you already know.  If you’re not struggling to remember the melody and the chord progression, you can work on new bits of arrangements, adding introductions and codas, making holiday mashups, etc.  And with most of the tunes already in your memory, you can select a few to add for this year.
  3. Think of it as an easy exam!  This is rep you play every year!  You can use it as an opportunity to see how you’ve grown over the year.  (If it helps, pinch your own cheek while saying “My, how you’ve grown” in a sing-song-y voice).
  4. Fake it ‘til you make it.  I don’t usually run into the holiday season squealing with glee…if I could drag my feet any more on it, I totally would.  But the reality is that the tunes are friendly and that can be uplifting.  And while playing holiday tunes doesn’t make me giddy with excitement, they do help propel me out of the darkness of the expanding night.  So, practice the rep, paste a smile on your face, and I’d be surprised if you didn’t start to get the holiday spirit (no matter how hard you try to avoid it).
  5. You really may have no where to play this year – but that’s ok.  Having a package of holiday tunes will give you the opportunity to play for yourself.  I don’t know about you but, especially in the busy holiday season, it can be really nice to reconnect with your instrument…and remember why you fell in love in the first place…and easy, well-learned tunes can help with that.
  6. And, if you are socially distant from everyone you love, like, or tolerate – you can have a ready-made gift from the heart!  Even I have managed to make a ton of videos – mostly for students, but some for other things.  If I can do it, you can do it.  Prop your phone up on your music stand, turn on a lamp, and make a video to share.  It’s easy to share with those you love/like/tolerate – and it makes a lovely holiday gift at a very reasonable price!

So, throw off the ennui, plaster a smile on your face, dig out your holiday standards, and blow off the dust.  Be patient as you work through the doldrums of the time and allow yourself to have enough time to do the work.  What are your favorite holiday tunes?  Do you feel like you comfortably know how to make a video and share it?  Am I fishing for ideas for upcoming blog posts?  Let me know in the comments!

When practice time is fundamentally inadequate

Posted on by
2

Do you know anyone who feels like they’re not getting anywhere with their harp playing?  Someone who practices and practices and practices.  That person believes themselves to be the poster child for getting enough practicing.  Yet, despite this, they feel like they’re not making any improvement. 

Sound like anyone you know?

Sometimes, it isn’t your practice time itself.  Sometimes it’s what’s happening during that time.

Some people use a brute force approach to practice.  They sit on that bench and whack away.  They do things over and over and over.  They end their practice exhausted and frustrated.  All that time and the needle hasn’t moved, the tune isn’t any more aligned with their vision for it, and it’s certainly not any more ready to be performed!

No wonder they’re frustrated!  If you keep that up long enough, you wouldn’t want to play either!

But why is that happening?  Aren’t the 10,000 hours needed to “master” this gained on the bench?  Shouldn’t more practice lead to more accomplishment?

Wellllllll…. It depends.

It is really easy to focus on the pretty, complex, moving parts.  To try to play faster.  To try to play complicated harmonizations.  To smell the sizzle but not see the steak.

You need to include your fundamentals.  In – every – practice.

Harp is seductive like that.  Unlike the piano, all our scales and arpeggios are the same, no matter what key we’re in.  I see a lot of harp players turn that simple truth into this internal conversation, “since all the scales are the same, I only need to do them the one time, learn them, and I’m done – easy peasy!” 

And yet, it’s not that simple.  We need to continually work on the fundamentals.  We need to keep them sharp and ready to go. Why is this?  Well – simply –

FUNDAMENTALS ARE THE BEDROCK OF ALL YOUR PLAYING!

You cannot do anything well without those fundamentals – that’s why they’re called fundamentals! 

If you critique your hours on the bench – what will you find?

Is your fingering shoddy?  Do you chase the strings, using “just in time” as your placement strategy so that you’re never really confident that you’re where you need to be?

Do you have “roach antennae” fingers? Or do you close and relax your hands when you are between finger shapes?

Are you a slouch?  Or do you have strong posture that allows all of your body to support your music?

Are you breathing?!

Are you critiquing your work without being judgmental?  You can pay attention to what you’re doing, be critical, and only accept good complete work as “done” without condemnation!

If this is new to you, start simple.  Can you play a well-executed one octave scale with quiet strings, and accurate fingering?  Can you do it in both hands?  Can you then do a two-octave scale?  Can you play scales the length of your harp?  Can you do it in time, on tempo, without errors?  If not, start there!  If so, go on to add the chords, inversions, arpeggios.   Remember that you’re focusing on the fundamentals of playing the harp.  While you want this to become automatic for your fingers, you don’t want your brain to be on autopilot!

There’s no need to face these elements of your practice with dread.  I said you needed to do them.  I didn’t say they had to be boring or horrible!  You can spice them up – work in complementary keys, around the circle of fifths, bring over activities from other instruments you play (I’m always recreating my piano practice on the harp). Just do it in a way that allows you to pay attention, learn, improve.

It is worth scheduling time in your practice to work on these (and other) fundamentals every day.  By doing this you will not only improve the specific activities but also help them to become habitual and automatic.  Only then will you have the mental bandwidth to work on the “fancy” stuff!

By adding this bit of fundamental work to your practice, you’ll find that you are able to improve your tune acquisition and retention.  Need help with your fundamentals?  I’m happy to work with you!

What fundamentals are you going to add to your practice?  Let me know in the comments below.

Stringing along…

Posted on by
8

This week two different people asked me pretty much the same question.  That usually tells me that something “everyone knows” is actually not something everyone knows!

The questions were about replacing strings.  Not how to replace them, but tips and tricks for replacing them more easily.  Broken strings are a fact of life for harpers.  And needing to change out dead or “thuddy” strings is also something every harper has experienced (or will) – necessitating changing strings or completely restringing the harp.

Like any activity that is essential if not fun, it helps to be prepared.  I have restrung my harp (that could be a whole other post!), but I am mostly prepared for having to replace a broken string at a performance.  I have a handy-dandy kit just for that!  I made it for my harp case pocket, but when I’m home in my studio, I have it on the shelf.  I’m pleased with my set-up and I think from the reactions I’ve gotten from other people at workshops, competitions, and schools, many others think my set-up is pretty cool.

So, this week I’m going to share it with you.  As with so many things, this is my way.  It is, by no means, the only way or even necessarily the best way.  But it has worked for me for a long time.  It also makes me smile when i see it.  Silly, yes, but so what?!  This set up not only keeps all the things I need close to hand, it also keeps everything organized, clean, and unbroken.  Is everything you might ever need for a broken string at a gig in there?  No, but there’s enough to get out of trouble.

This all started because I would toss my tuner into my harp case pocket and then worry that it would turn on and run the battery down, or get broken, or just come apart.  So I started looking for a way to protect it.  Then I realized that I also wanted to carry the pickup which is also somewhat delicate.  That’s where the box came in.  But that was a lot of room, so the other stuff slowly joined in!

Note that these are all items from my set up – this is not an endorsement of any product or brand.  Use what you have and stock your kit with what you like.

Let’s get started on our tour.

First, the outside.  I use a sandwich box.  There’s nothing special about it.  It’s just inexpensive – grocery store bought sandwich box.  I like it because it fits everything I want to have without taking up a lot of volume in the pocket. What’s really important is that the lid fits and stays closed and that it has enough room for what you want to carry.  This assures that the tuner ON button doesn’t get accidentally pushed which is really my biggest concern!

The Box of stuffNext, let’s take a look inside!  Under the lid, you can see that it takes a little bit of finagling and tessellation to get everything in – but it works!  I do capitalize on the flexibility of some of the items to overcome the limitations of the inflexibility of the others.

Peek insideSo, let’s unpack so you can see what’s in there.  Remember too that this is a gig bag item, so it has to serve both tuning and string replacement.

First I have a pickup.  I know this is likely not strictly necessary, but my sound board is beautiful and responds to just about everything.  I think using a pickup helps me tune faster and better – so I use it.  I keep it in the box because it is somewhat delicate and the wires can be broken and I don’t want to have to be buying another one every time I turn around!
Next is the tuner itself.  In all honesty, I have another tuner but this is my favorite…and you can see that it’s small and flat and fits into the box really well (I keep the other tuner in a different box – mostly because although I like it but it wouldn’t fit in this box!).  Additional bonus?  Not having to fish around in the case pocket trying to find this tuner – the sandwich box is big enough to easily grab from the pocket.

Now we get to the accoutrements!  These are things I have added over time because they came in handy! They all either are essential to replacing a string, or just make it easier.  Because remember – this is in my harp case, so I’m not at home, and I may be under time pressure to get the string changed before I have to perform!  So I have:

  • String ends.  String ends are used in a harp knot to give it a little more structure against pulling through the sound board.  I have two types of string ends.  The first are the traditional ones – bits of an old string cut into 1 inch pieces.  These work and if you don’t have any, you can make some from a thicker nylon (or gut) string (preferably one that has broken) or you can buy them from reputable string sellers (some string vendors will send them gratis if you buy a lot of strings).  But I also have a leather shoelace – the kind sold for boat shoes.  They can be cut to the same one inch length as the bits of old string.  The benefits of the shoelace are that they are a little easier to hold onto while tying the knot and they are soft and flexible which means that you don’t get buzzing which sometimes happens with the harder string ends.  I keep the whole lace, but it would be more space efficient to make some cuts and keep them in the box.
  • Candle Sticky Stuff.  I got this tip a long time ago.  Putting just a little bit of candle adhesive onto the knot after you tie it makes it so much easier to seat the knot and get on with winding the string.  This small tin holds wax.  Just work up a small ball (like a pearl) – just enough to give you just enough tackiness to hold the knot together while you feed it through the soundboard (especially on the very thin strings at the top).  It does save you a great deal of frustration and swearing!  You can find this online or in hardware and craft stores and there are multiple brands available.  
  • Major nail care.  I don’t know about you, but there’s something about having a gig that seems to make my fingernails grow!  They can be fine when I leave but when I get ready to play, they have magically gotten too long!  So I have this little cheap nail kit – I wouldn’t want to use it for day-to-day nail maintenance, but in a pinch, I can be sure that I feel confident that I’ve gotten my nails short enough.  Bonus – I use the nail clippers to cut the string after I’ve gotten it wound on.  I got this at a drugstore or a large square footage discount department store.
  • Minor nail care.  I found this little “matchbook” set of nail files and they have been in this box ever since.  I prefer emery boards over metal nail files but have also used them to smooth chapped fingers as well. I got this at a drugstore or a large square footage discount department store.  A single emory board would also work, but I thought these were cute.

Thanks for taking a tour of the box!  I hope it helps you plan something similar for your harp case.  Do you have a similar box?  What do you have in yours?  What’s really worked for you?  Let me know in the comments!

Practice Gratitude

Posted on by
10

I hear that we should all be practicing gratitude.  Especially now.  The sentiment seems to be everywhere. 

But I’ve heard it so much that my mind started bending it a little – shifting the emphasis.  I can’t hear it the way everyone means anymore because in my head it’s:

PRACTICE gratitude

As in, be grateful for your practice time.

Hmm.

Practice GratitudeWhy would we be grateful for practice time?  I can think of a few reasons:

  • It’s time we spend on ourselves to grow in an area we find important
  • It creates a little oasis of time in our otherwise busy days
  • It provides an element of normality when things around us are unpredictable or uncertain
  • It is a moment of self-development (and not a self-indulgence)

So, we can pretty much dispense with the any puerile comments on how we “have” to practice “again”.  Instead – we “get” to practice again!

Practice is clearly not only good for us, but something we want to do, no matter how it might not feel like it in the moment. How might we do that?  Here are 15 ways we can practice and enjoy the time and be grateful for our practice time:

  1. Enjoy the ritual of tuning. Rather than seeing it as a chore, take the time to slow down and reconnect with your instrument.
  2. Don’t waste your time doing garbage practice. When you’re practicing, focus.
  3. Don’t accept anything less than your best effort.
  4. When something is not coming, reframe that frustration as gratitude for the opportunity to learn.
  5. Enjoy the little things – each time you practice, remind yourself of at least one thing you enjoy about playing.
  6. Take note – identify the progress you’re making and notice the improvement day on day.
  7. While you’re practicing – breathe!
  8. While you’re practicing – smile at least once.
  9. While you’re practicing – feel it. Enjoy the touch of the strings, the sound of the music, the feel of the harp as it vibrates on your shoulder.
  10. Practice with an aim to being able to share – this can be with your cohabitants, your neighbors, or the world at large – but keep it in mind.
  11. After you have worked on something particularly tough, whether you’ve gotten it or if it still needs some time – provide honest praise for the work. Yes, I mean tell yourself you did a good job!
  12. No matter how little time you have, end each practice with a tune you know and love and like to play.
  13. Take a moment in each practice session to tell yourself something you enjoyed or are grateful you can do.
  14. Take a moment at the end of your time to jot down what you’re grateful for in your practice journal.
  15. Find time to play every day.

I’m sure there are a zillion other ways we can be grateful for our practice time and express that gratitude.  What do you do to Practice Gratitude?  If you haven’t been having Practicing Gratitude, which of these will you start to get you on your way?  Let me know in the comments below!

Take it in smaller bites

Posted on by
4

My good friend and I were chatting the other day and she asked, “What’s the tune of the week?”  To which I replied, “ummmmmm” (because I’m a clever conversationalist like that).  And because I had started working on five tunes all at once, I couldn’t answer the question because I wasn’t really learning them very well.  Ok, really I hadn’t learned any of them (up to and including not being able to remember any of the titles!).

That got me to thinking – when you’re trying to learn new music, do you often have that sinking feeling that you are never going to get it?  Does it seem like every tune you learn is longer than you thought (or maybe the harder you try to learn it, the more the number of phrases telescopes!).  Do you laugh inside your head and blame increased age?  Do you secretly think maybe it’s just going to be too hard to get into your head?  Does it seem like everyone around you is always learning about 50 tunes really quickly while you struggle to get just one?

Asking for a friend.

Smaller bitesSo, how can we make the whole process of learning a tune a little more palatable? Take smaller bites!  You’ll enjoy it more.  And it’s better for you.

There are so many ways to get the music into your head but you can be sure that the “all at once” approach is one of the most frustrating.  Let’s think about this.  Ok, I really mean, let’s extend my eating metaphor.  For your next tune,  try taking “smaller bites” and like fine dining, arrange your learning into “courses”.

First, we’ll have the Appetizers – Study the music.  No matter if you are ingesting the tune from printed music or learning by ear, take time to actually study the music.  Analyze it.  What is the structure?  Where is it?  What type of tune is it?  What are the small motifs? Are there larger patterns or “story arcs” (if it were a TV show would you know who did it at the end of the episode or the end of the season?).  Do not skip this course – it may feel like all you’re doing is killing time, but it is actually the start of learning.  This is also when you might start listening and beginning to try to sing along.

Then we’ll have the Entree – Bring out the knives!  We know that music is a collection of patterns.  But also keep in mind that it is a bunch of small patterns that banded together to make bigger patterns and those bigger patterns banded together to make up the tune.  The smaller patterns might be phrases and the larger patterns might be the parts.  And of course, the biggest pattern is the overarching tune.  While the smaller patterns maybe be easy to find, these larger patterns may be difficult to discern (or to remember) as patterns.  So if necessary, break those larger patterns into smaller bites.  And just like the entree, you need to be sure not to eat one thing at a time on your plate before going on to the next – DO NOT spend all this time playing from the first measure – break it up and work on the parts that need work.  Start at the end and work backward, or pick a measure in the middle and start there.  This is, of course, where the bulk of what feels like work will occur.  Do not be fooled…the other courses are also work – value that time!

Like any fine meal, no matter how tasty or satisfying the Entree is, one simply does not leave out the finale. 

Dessert!! – How sweet it is.  If you have taken the time to do the work of the previous courses, you will find that the music has become easier to learn and that you learn it more quickly – what could be sweeter than being able to play the music you like so well!  However, this is just as much a part of the meal as the other courses – the sweet stuff is when you are polishing, finishing, and finalizing your music.  Be sure to include the dynamics and expression, develop your accompaniments, and put your touches (or interpretation) on the tune.  Really enjoy – no, revel – in the dessert!

Once you’ve tried this bite sized approach a few times, just like meals, you’ll find you have favorites – those approaches that you enjoy and get the most from.  That’s a great idea – these are the “macaroni and cheese” of your practice, but be sure not to stick just to the comfortable dishes – be sure to have a balanced diet of techniques, analysis, and thinking about the music as you continue to grow.

Of course, like a full course meal, you want to take your time, savor the delicacies, and really enjoy the process.  Unlike a fine meal, when you are practicing, you don’t have to worry about which fork to use!