I stumbled across the following quote while scrolling through my Facebook news feed and I think it fits the process of learning a musical instrument perfectly.

"Impatience is only resistance to learning. It means we want the goal without going through the process. We need to let ourselves learn, step by step. It will get easier as we go along."
- Louise Hay

(Side note: Louise Hay is a wonderful author and an incredibly inspirational person whose works have had - and are still having - a great impact on my life. I highly recommend her!)

Let's read that quote again. Read it slowly to yourself. Read it out loud. See if anything speaks to you in particular or jumps out.

"Impatience is only resistance to learning. It means we want the goal without going through the process. We need to let ourselves learn, step by step. It will get easier as we go along."

Often, as violinists and as people, we want to rush to the end result. We have an image in our imagination of us standing in front of an orchestra playing our favorite concerto, or sitting in the concertmaster seat of a professional orchestra. And that image doesn't fit with our reality, which is that our teacher has asked us to play a G Major scale three times a day, with a tall violin and a curved bow thumb. Right? We want to play the Tchaikovsky (or Mendelssohn, or Brahms, or Sibelius, or Beethoven...or all of them) concerto, but we don't want to put in three or four hours of practice every day for ten years. We want the goal, but we have neglected to factor in the process that will lead us to our goal.

When we are impatient, and we think more about getting to the next step or to our ultimate goal rather than focusing on what we are accomplishing in the present moment, we actually hinder our own learning. Someone who talks about how much they want to get to the next piece in the Suzuki book but who has neglected to learn the correct bowings or to memorize the final piece in the book they're in is actually making it harder for themselves! Someone who persists in playing through the next piece in the book without fixing their bowhold is only teaching themselves bad bow habits. We might get depressed because we're not "there" yet, wherever "there" is. We might spend time talking about how much we want to be a violin soloist - and spend more time talking and thinking about it than actually practicing! 

The truth is that the path to any one of those major concertos, or to being a successful soloist, or concertmaster, or to being a fulfilled and happy amateur musician, or to doing anything that involves playing the violin starts with that first violin lesson, and learning to name the parts of the instrument. It starts with learning how to hold the violin, and practicing that over and over, every day, until it is natural and balanced and free. 

The fastest way to get to where you want to go is to live fully in each moment of your practice sessions. Be aware of those little (or big) adjustments your teacher is making in your playing. My students always have exercises to help develop some skill or another. Practice your exercises consciously and consistently. Talk to your teacher about your goals and ask them to work with you to create a plan to reach them. And then live fully in each step of that plan, mastering the violin one small step at a time.

"Impatience is only resistance to learning. It means we want the goal without going through the process. We need to let ourselves learn, step by step. It will get easier as we go along."

(updated and reposted from an earlier post)

As a teacher, I know that my main job with a young beginner is to instruct the parent. Often, parents apologetically say to me, "I have no musical talent." And I say to them, "That's okay!" Because it is. It is really okay that you don't have a musical background. There are plenty of things you can do to create a home environment that nurtures your child's musical ear and creativity. Here are some of them:

1. Have music on in the home and on the go. Switch your car radio to the local classical station (90.9 FM, if you're in the DC area). Stream it online. Ask your child's teacher for some of their favorite composers and look them up on an online streaming site. Many public libraries now have online access to streaming music - check out yours! This doesn't have to be serious "It is now time to listen to classical music" time. Just turn on the radio, find some CDs, go on a little violin-themed iTunes shopping spree, and fill your house with music!

2. Go to concerts. Go to concerts. Go to concerts. Check out the Concert Attendance page of my studio website for a list of venues and groups in the DC and Northern Virginia areas. Going to concerts doesn't have to break the bank! There are plenty of free concerts available. And in my studio, going to two or more concerts a semester will get you one discounted lesson.  Going to LIVE concerts is so unbelievably important. Your kids will love it. You will love it. Your kids will get to watch professional musicians at work. You'll experience sound in a completely different way. This can become a great thing for your family, if it is something you enjoy doing together. Some of my favorite childhood memories are of going to the Kennedy Center (by the way, they have free concerts there EVERY DAY at the Millennium Stage) with my parents. Concert tickets can also make great birthday or holiday presents. So I repeat: Go to concerts. Go to concerts. Go to concerts.

3. Find a good teacher. You might not be sure your child wants to pursue music seriously. Your child might not know if they want to pursue music seriously. And that's okay. But a good teacher is a must and a very worthy investment. The right teacher will give your child the fundamental skills that they need to have whether they go on to become a professional musician or whether they just want to have the joy of really playing an instrument well. Also, your ears will thank you, as the child with a good teacher will likely produce a better sound on their instrument than the child who experiments unaided. 

4. Trust that teacher once you find them. Trust that they know how to teach violin and help support them as they teach your child. In violin, we learn certain skills in a certain order, and a little impatience is expected. However, it's important that you, as the parent, help your child understand that they need to master one skill to their teacher's satisfaction before they will learn a new one. If your child throws a temper tantrum because their teacher hasn't let them go on to Lightly Row and insists that they play all the Twinkle variations with their violin tall and their pinky curved first, then please support the teacher. I promise: your child's violin teacher wants your child to advance just as much as you do. 

5. Enable your child's practicing. Create a space for them in your home that is exclusively for their practicing, and make sure all family members know not to intrude during that time. Gently remind your child to practice from time to time. Parents of children from ages 3 to 10 or so should be practicing WITH their child or at the very least overseeing that practice time. Make sure there is time in their schedule for practicing. Some students are in so many different activities and they come into lessons and tell me they only have time to practice a few days a week. While I do respect every family's schedule, it's also a simple fact of violin life that the more consistently you practice, the more progress your child will make. 

Also, make it possible for your child to practice even when they have friends over for playdates - suggest that their friends watch television for half an hour, or have your child play some of their pieces as a mini concert. It's also important to take the violin with you on extended vacations if your child is really quite serious about playing. It's okay to leave the instrument for a weekend trip, but for longer vacations, it's important for them to keep practicing, even if it's just for fifteen minutes a day.

6. Be interested in the learning process. Attend lessons with your child while they're young and, once they become a teen and a more independent practicer, engage them in conversation about their lessons. Ask what they learned, and how the teacher is working on it. I find that students with parents who take an active interest in their music-making make faster progress and have more success than students with parents who just drop them off once a week.

If you're reading this and you play a musical instrument, or sing, or do any activity that you wish to excel at, just go practice. And do it again tomorrow. And the next day.

This is my blog post for today: NOW is the perfect time to practice. So go do it!

As a teacher, I'm constantly amazed by my students' busy schedules. They swim, dance, play piano, sing, and soccer, among other things. They take lessons in public speaking and are in numerous clubs at their schools. AND they take violin lessons. I'm rarely surprised, then, when students come into their lessons and explain that they only have one or two days a week when they have time to practice. 

I'm not going to launch into a lecture here about how violin should be the most important thing in your life. If you want to have a career in music, it is, and you should be practicing 2 - 4 hours a day by the time you're in high school. If you're taking auditions for District or Regional orchestra, you should at the minimum be practicing an hour a day. That's just what it takes. You simply won't be accepted to these orchestras or to music school if you're not practicing this much, because believe me, your competition is practicing even more.

But this post is for all the students who love music, who love playing violin, and who know that they probably are going to do something else with their careers. And to them, I say this: Even on your busiest days, you can find ten minutes for violin.

Ten minutes might seem like nothing, but you can pack in a lot of practicing into those ten minutes if you plan it right. And, believe it or not, a student who practices ten minutes every day will make more progress than a student who practices an hour one day a week. That's because when it comes to developing the skills needed to play the violin, consistent repetition is key.

I think of my former teacher Burton Kaplan who says, "Your body is a dog." He means that you need to train your body the same way you would train your dog. If we only asked our dogs to sit and stay one or two days a week, we wouldn't expect them to learn those skills, would we? Your body is the same. If you practice for an hour on Thursday, and your lesson is the following Tuesday, it's simply not realistic to expect your body and brain to remember what you worked on or to play it the way you practiced it. 

Where do we find these ten magical minutes? It could be ten minutes as soon as you get home from school so you get it out of the way. It could be ten minutes right after dinner, before you start your homework. It could be ten minutes first thing in the morning. But find ten minutes. Put those ten minutes in your planner, and set an alarm on your computer or phone for five minutes before your ten minutes start so you know when it's practice time.

What do you do with those ten minutes once you find them? For a beginning student, practicing might simply consist of taking the violin out of the case, going from rest position to playing position ten times, making a bow hold ten times, and calling it a day. And the student who does that every single day will do better than the student who just does it one or two days. That process might take maybe five minutes.

For the more advanced student, who wants to learn skills like shifting and vibrato, consistency is again key. With your ten minutes, do any finger slides, wiggles - any of the little exercises your teacher has you do as you're learning these skills. As you do this, check to make sure your body is relaxed and poised and that your violin and bow position are good. Do these exercises in the mirror so you can see what's happening. After your exercises, play a scale with at least two different bowings (ask your teacher for specific directions). Then, if you have any time left over, play through your pieces.

4 minutes: Exercises in the mirror
3 minutes: Scale with two different bowings
3 minutes: Play through a piece.

And that's it! This ten-minute plan is only for your busiest days. If you can find more time, then go for it! Try it for a week and see if you notice any differences in your playing.

Remember, it's better to practice for only ten minutes than not at all. With creative scheduling and practice planning, you can really improve your violin skills. Give it a try!

Jazz music and classical have always been closely related. Composers and performers in both genres frequently borrow from each other. Some classical pieces may have a little jazz influence; some jazz performances may be classical inspired. And then there are the true crossover artists, the ones who successfully straddle the line between the two genres in a uniquely entertaining blend.

I offer for your listening pleasure classically-inspired jazz performances, jazz-inspired classical works, and classical performers attempting to perform jazz.

Let's start with one of the best-known classical violinists of all time, Jascha Heifetz, known for his impeccable technique and his restrained performance style. Here he performs "It Ain't Necessarily So," from George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess.

If you enjoyed that, you might investigate some of George Gershwin's other works, such as An American in Paris and Rhapsody in Blue. 

Next, the jazz singer Cleo Laine gives a performance of "Turkish Delight," her delightful arrangement of Mozart's "Rondo Alla Turca."

In the next video clip, famous jazz violinist Stephane Grappelli and famous classical virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin perform a duet. See if you can tell which violinist is which, just from the style and comfort of their playing in this particular style.

I'll leave you with a movement from On The Town, by American composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein is a classical composer who frequently drew from other genres in his compositions. You might also enjoy Overture to Candide and Westside Story

We all want to get the most out of every experience we have, and music lessons are no exception. In order to make the best progress, we need to be well-prepared for our lessons and willing to communicate clearly with our teachers! I'm offering some suggestions here to help you improve your lesson experience. Some might seem like no-brainers, but hopefully everyone can find at least one tip to try.

1. Arrive five minutes early. One of the simplest things you can do to maximize your time with your teacher is to ensure that you get to your lesson on time - which means early. I know that most lessons take place after school and during rush hour when traffic is at its most frustrating. It is definitely worth it to find the best route to your teacher and to plan your schedule so you can arrive a few minutes early. This allows you to catch your breath, focus your attention, and unpack your instrument so that your lesson can start precisely on time. Most teachers won't give you extra time if you arrive late. In my studio, if you're scheduled for an hour-long lesson but you arrive 15 minutes late, you only get a 45 minute lesson. So, ensuring that you are on time and present for every scheduled minute of your lesson is one of the easiest ways to make the most of things.

2. Practice. This might seem obvious, but you would be surprised how many students show up at lessons without having practiced. A good teacher won't let you get away with this! I had a student last year who absolutely hated practicing her rhythm exercises. She wouldn't practice them at all at home, and in lessons she would often try and steer me away from the rhythm book. However, because I knew that developing her sense of pulse was necessary for her playing, I didn't let it slide. I gave her two options: either we would spend a lot of time practicing rhythm in her lesson and have less time for her pieces OR she could practice her rhythm at home and spend less time on it in the lesson. She opted for the second one once she realized that there was no way out of it.

Everyone wants the student to improve quickly and learn new pieces and new skills. This will only happen if practicing is happening consistently at home. Otherwise, the teacher will spend valuable lesson time explaining the same concepts over and over, which will lead to the student and their parents becoming very frustrated.

3. Record your lessons and watch them at home. Ask your teacher if you can record your lessons. I keep a digital video camera in my studio for my students' use. They can bring their own memory cards and record their lessons. Watching your lesson back at home will help you by allowing you to hear the teacher's instructions more times and by letting you see yourself playing from the outside. In your lesson, you might really feel that you are using a lot of bow and wonder why your teacher is so insistent on you trying to use even more. However, when you watch yourself, you may see that you really aren't using much at all.

4. Tell your teacher how you feel. Despite how it may seem at times, your teacher can't actually read your mind. If your teacher says that you don't understand, say out loud to your teacher, "I don't understand what you're saying." It is your teacher's job to find a way to explain things to you in a way that makes sense for you and your learning style! Don't just nod and smile - say what you're thinking and feeling. If your teacher is going too fast for you, say "Can you give me a second to process what you said before? I'm still trying to figure it out." 

Two other important things to tell your teacher: "This makes me feel really uncomfortable"  and "My hand/wrist/finger/back/neck hurts when I do it this way." Teachers are trained to be on the lookout for tension in your playing, but it makes things go a lot smoother if you can communicate with them clearly.

It is especially important to communicate clearly and directly with your teacher when you are new to each other. The teacher might use a metaphor that doesn't work for you, or they might start changing aspects of your playing that you thought were just fine before you came to them. Please don't just go home and complain to your parents about it. Give your teacher a chance to explain something in a different way or to tell you their reasoning behind something. 

5. Write down questions for your teacher as you practice and bring them to your lesson. As you practice during the week, keep a notebook or a practice journal and write down questions for your teacher. If you run into a problem area, such as a shift that you consistently miss, or doublestops that just don't feel right in your hand, write it down and ask your teacher about them in your lesson.

6. Clarify any confusion with your teacher before your lesson. If you're unsure about a fingering, or even just an illegible word in your notebook, send your teacher an email or give them a call during the week to ask. Don't practice confused! 

7. Keep your instrument in good working condition. It's critical to keep your instrument in shape just for your own playing. This means changing strings and getting your bow rehaired at least twice a year. It means taking your violin to the shop and having the pegs worked on if they're consistently slipping or sticking, and having any other needed repairs completed promptly. Chances are that your teacher is not a repair technician. Speaking from personal experience, I can put on strings and fix a bridge that's fallen over and that's really about it. Time that your teacher has to spend fighting with your instrument to tune it or fix anything with it is time taken away from your lesson. I've had experiences where a student purchased a very cheap instrument that had horrible pegs that wouldn't hold a pitch. I routinely spent 5 to 10 minutes of his 30 minute lesson just trying to get his violin to stay in tune, which wasn't how either one of us wanted to be spending the time. So, schedule repairs and maintenance in a timely manner!

I hope at least some of these tips are helpful to you as you continue your studies! Feel free to comment with any of your own suggestions for getting more out of your lessons!

In the process of writing a blog post, I stumbled across this one and thought I'd share it!

http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2013/09/03/216906386/10-easy-ways-to-optimize-your-music-practice