Skip to main content

Working On It

I am still thinking about a method for getting my energy and focus better directed so that I might finally win a big audition. 

Several people have recommended books - Zen and the Art of Archery, The Inner Game of Tennis, Performance Success, The Power of Full Engagement - and these are all books I own and have read before, enjoyed, and drawn inspiration from.  I've got them pulled out and ready to refer to.

My December has not been generous with time either for practicing or for reading and intellectual speculation.  So many Christmas concerts, so much travel, so much stressing out over the phone with Steve in Tennessee, so many reeds due.

But what I am doing is performing.  I've had a Nutcracker or a Pops concert or at least an orchestra rehearsal almost every day since the 1st of the month, I'm treating this as an opportunity to really analyze what's going into my performances.  How often do I really focus well, and what did I do to get there? 

Here are some things I have noticed so far.  Things I can physically control. 

Posture actually makes a dramatic difference. If I slump in my chair my mind wanders. Not that I slump in  auditions, but I love my new awareness that I can control that tendency in rehearsal or performance.  

When I am at my best my actual focus is broader than I had assumed it would be - I see more of the page than just the line I am playing, and hear more than just myself.  Knowing that, I can choose to force that wider lens when I am feeling overwhelmed. 

I'm experimenting with deep controlled breathing between pieces to maximize my recovery and stay present in my body. 

I'm also trying to manage my coffee consumption.  Not to eliminate it, no, no, NO.  But to be aware of how many cups I have and how long before I play and what seems to be optimal.  I've found on previous occasions that I can be too calm for a concert.  Because stage fright is not fundamentally a problem for me I normally have some coffee on the way to a performance.  I figure that a paying audience is entitled to a slightly heightened version of me.  I'm not sure I've drawn any conclusions yet, besides that multiple cups on an empty stomach are not a great choice. Duh.

This is obviously analysis I could have done 10 years ago - but I've always basically been good enough.  Good enough to get where I am, good enough to not worry about the nitty-gritty of performing. It's easy to play exactly as well as I play and hard to be better. But now I want it.  My self talk has always been that I am constantly driven to improve, but I am beginning to think that sometimes I work very hard to stay in exactly the same place. I needed that recent kick in the pants to get moving again.

At any rate, I am committed to my new project.  I am teaching myself to trigger the time warp I need and to stay out of my own way so that I can perform more consistently than before.  I am enjoying dipping back into my performance books and paying attention to my process more than I had been doing.  I am inspired by the work I am doing.  I love my life.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

IDRS 2014 - Day Two and OUT

I'm writing my Day Two report while all of my colleagues and friends, new and old, are well into their Day Three experience.  I was terribly sad to leave NYC, and IDRS.  In past years I've found myself sort of oboe-ed out by the third or fourth day, but I was nowhere near that point last night when I had to begin my schlep to the airport.  On the up side, I am home and spent the morning with Zoe and Steve, and I'm safely on the correct side of Lake Michigan well before my concert tonight, which was the important purpose of my travel plans - but there are SO MANY MORE great events happening at NYU.  Best of luck to everyone performing! Yesterday, among other performances, I enjoyed THREE recitals featuring music for oboe and bassoon.  Be prepared for a husband-wife recital coming down the pike in the next year or two, as I loved much of the new music that I heard.  First I enjoyed hearing ToniMarie Marchioni and two of her colleagues from the University ...
4 comments
Read more

Practice+ App - and my FIRST EVER GIVEAWAY

You know how, when you are practicing, you need to have your metronome on your stand and turn it constantly up and down as you work through a technical passage?  And you also want to play in tune, and make sure you are staying consistent with your pitch.  So while your metronome is clicking away on your stand, you also have to turn half-way around to look at the screen of the big tuner which has to be plugged into the wall because it eats batteries otherwise.  And if you also want to record yourself to listen to your progress, you have to have your laptop on with the big mic plugged into it, and that’s on still another surface, so you have to move your stand around so you can orient to all three, and then your giant stack of music-in-progress falls off the stand and onto the floor and out of order and the next ten minutes are spent not practicing at all but just trying to return to normalcy. Does this sound familiar? I was sent a free promo copy (full disclosure) of an...
4 comments
Read more

Beauty of Sound

In our dress rehearsal Saturday afternoon, the conductor did exactly what I often do to my students - he asked the violins to play more beautifully, and they did.  He didn’t tell them how, or give them a flowery expressive speech, he just asked for more beauty of sound, and they immediately gave it to him.  To a great extent the sound we produce is set, based on our equipment and the shape of our mouths and our bodies - but it can be altered, too.  Adjustments in reeds and instruments can go a long way, but the key change we can make is in our own minds. I don’t know how to explain it physically, but if you determine the sound you want to make you can produce it.  Or at least you can lean in and approach it.  This is something I’ve been paying a lot of attention to lately in my own playing.  As I prepare the Saint-Saëns Sonata to perform on our Oboe Studio Recital (tonight at 7 - details HERE ), my approach is largely about beauty of sound and vibrato....
7 comments
Read more