Having started the cello much later to most other musicians, I found myself battling the fear of performing at the same time as facing an insecure self-image that often comes with being a 12 year old. I believe this made the issue far greater than it would've been, had I been performing at an earlier …
Category: Practice
Music, Philosophy and Jeanette Winterson
For Christamas this year, I bought Jeanette Winterson's semi-autobiography, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, for my pianist friend, Jasmin. I thought I would interest Jasmin because of Jeanette's inspirational story and her connections with Oxford, (Jasmin is awaiting a response from her Hartford interview!) and so it did. So much so in fact that …
Always choose the better life- mental health and musicians
Sometimes our thoughts can be far more destructive than the events surrounding us. Of course these two things are often interlinked, but not exclusively. If we have a specific worry plaguing our minds, no matter how laid back our life may seem, often the internal anguish can be far more warring and destructive. On …
Continue reading Always choose the better life- mental health and musicians
Sometimes we all get in the way of ourselves
http://youtu.be/GNc6qTwC7OY I've never experienced a relaxed performing experience. It's always been a matter of hoping and praying that practice will have been enough and that my performance will be a quarter as fluent as it was in practice. This has really frustrated me. How is it fair that I become a completely different musician when I'm …
Continue reading Sometimes we all get in the way of ourselves
The Performance Mind
Hope you're enjoying my crazy little poems- I write them as an attempt to iron out the anxieties and thoughts in my head and hope they may provide a different perspective for other artists/ musicians. I'm aware how many people suffer from performance anxiety or stage fright and how often the remedies we are given …
Should I practice or should I just be?
I am much more relaxed about my practice now a days. I have enough time to do everything and can wip out some constructive practice when needs be. But the rest of the time I've found to be a struggle. I understand that the time you spend mindlessly repeating a certain phrase can translate into …
