Here’s Why You Should Do It My Way: A Teacher’s Response - PHH 230

Fingering is perhaps the biggest thing that I am. Well, you can tell I'm sort of passionate about it, can't you? So when a student says to me, oh, I don't know, this fingering just doesn't seem to work, I'll investigate. But there are some very clear reasons, at least clear to me, that I want to convey to a student that says, I know, I know you're not comfortable with this now, but here's why I want you to use it anyway.

Welcome to the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast. I'm Ann Sullivan, a harpist on a mission to empower every harpist to experience more harp happiness. Over my decades long harp journey, I've had lots of successes and more than a few failures. And I know firsthand what it's like to feel that playing the harp the way you want may not be possible for you. Now, I play and teach all over the world, and I know what most harpists are never taught the secrets to gaining the skills and confidence you need to play the harp with beauty, freedom and joy. That's what the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast is all about. Showing you simple steps to help you play the music you want the way you want. If you're an experienced harpist looking for that next level, or a harp newbie anxious to avoid the pitfalls, or a harpist who just wants more fulfillment and a little encouragement, you're in the right place, my friend. So let's get started.

First, I want to let you in on something special. I think the most important thing you can do for your harp playing is to develop the habits that lead to success. Whatever that looks like for you. All of us want to learn how to play the harp beautifully, how to play with confidence and enjoy making music. And if you really want to learn those things, videos are great. But live learning is essential. You need to be able to ask questions and get answers. You can't do that with just a video, which is what makes the Miharp Mastery community so special. My Harp Mastery membership is for those who really want an online experience that lets them learn at their own pace and learn what they want and be able to learn live from expert coaches every single week. Plus, you get to connect with other harpists in the community who have the same desires for their playing. This is not only a powerful learning platform, but it's also the most generous community of harpists and anywhere on the planet. They're harpists with a positive outlook, a growth mindset, and a spirit of support for their fellow harpists on the journey with them. We're ready for you. Join us just go to harpmastery.comjoin-now that's harpmastery.com join now. Welcome to the show. I once had a student say this to me, but it doesn't work when I do it that way. We were trying to fix a passage in a piece she was learning, and when she played the passage for me, there was an obvious stumble spot and I had a very definite idea about what was wrong and how to fix it. But after a week of trying to implement my suggestion, she came back to me saying that her old way, even though it wasn't really working, worked better than mine. And so she was sticking with her way. Now please understand, the student didn't doubt the solution I was offering. She tried it, just as I suggested. She had confidence in my ability to help her surmount this difficulty. But the frustration for her was not just that the solution I offered didn't work, it was that her old way was actually better for her, at least at that moment. Now, at that point in our lesson, I could have responded with the all time favorite response of music teachers everywhere. Well, you have to give it some time. That that certainly would have been a correct response and that it was true. But that doesn't mean it would have been very helpful. But if I didn't want to trot out that old standby answer, I had to provide a different one. It was clear to me what she needed to know. She needed to know why. Now this was years ago. I hadn't published all the resources that I have now. I didn't have the teaching experience that I've garnered in the years since then. But even back then I was a good teacher. One who not only knew the right way to do things, but but was skilled at seeing the underlying problem that a student needed to address. What I needed to learn, though, was how to communicate my methodology. I'm not talking about a technique method necessarily, but how I knew my way of solving the problem would be better in the long run. So when just trust me on this or because I said so aren't good enough answers, the better response lies in the reason, the explanation. And that requires a teacher to dig deeply into her own expertise. After all, it's likely been a long while since we teachers asked for those explanations ourselves. We are at a point where we simply know. And that's good for us, but less helpful for our students. So today I'm hoping to share with you the reasoning behind some of those potential because this is the way it works Answers. Whether you're a student or a teacher or just a harpist who has an inquiry mind, I'm sure at least one of these will click for you. Of course, this is just one category of things that teachers know and have learned over their years of experience and playing and learning and teaching. But one of those things that we often forget to share or sometimes that we don't even know how to talk about exactly or how to explain. And one of those other things that falls into that category is this bridge this gap between the skills that we practice and the music that we play. If you've ever wondered why your technique practice doesn't get you to the music, then you need to come to our arpeggios with Ease Quick Study course. This is a course that is starting very soon. It's starting Monday, October 20th. And in this four days of study, we're going to be working using arpeggios. Yeah, but we're learning a bigger skill. We're learning about how to get from technique practice to music. And in studying arpeggios, we're going to look at the things you need to know about playing arpeggios that fit in that skill category and then how to apply those skills in the actual pieces that have lots of arpeggios that you want to learn. Pieces like, okay, the Walls of the Flowers cadenza. But if the cadenza isn't your thing, we're going to be looking at pieces like the little fountain, like the Linda Wood processional, like all kinds of pieces, pieces that have arpeggios that you like to play. And we're going to be looking at how this works, how the technique applies to the piece. Because the fact is that if you just practice the arpeggios, they might or might not actually work in the piece. So we need to learn how to bridge that gap. That's what this course is about. Now, there are lots of people that have already opted into this course because it's a great value at $47. But if you're still not sure, if you're one of those that still hasn't jumped on board, I would invite you to the free that's free webinar that I'm giving this Wednesday night, October 15th. That's in two days. That webinar is called It's Not Working and How youw Can Finally Fix It. Whatever it is, this webinar is sort of a double duty call because it's also the get ready kickoff call for our arpeggios course. So the students who are already in the arpeggios course are going to be learning about how this course works, how we're getting from point A to point B, and how that's going to work in the course. But there's lots of information about.

This kind of thing that, you know, if it's not working, how can you fix it? That's the name of this webinar. Right? It's not working and how you can finally fix it, whatever it is. And it's about those skills and how to apply them to music. So if you're, if you've been thinking that the arpeggios course is just arpeggios, let me tell you, we're using arpeggios. Absolutely. But you're going to learn a much more important overall concept that you can apply to all kinds of areas in your harp playing. And a perfect introduction to this is this free webinar that I'm giving Wednesday night. So you will find links in today's show notes for both the webinar, which is free, and for the course. If you haven't joined us yet and you're ready to take the plunge, this is a great time to get in because you'll be able to take all this information that I'm sharing with you Wednesday and apply it to what you're going to be learning inside the course. If you're not ready for the course yet, the webinar is still really valuable. And as I said, that's free. All you have to do is use the links in the show notes to register. And if you can't find the show notes, go to harpmastery.com go to upcoming events, and you'll see on that tab a link to the webinar where you can register for that. Or if you're ready, just register for the course and we'll send you all the webinar information, too, and get you registered for that as well. So I would urge you to take me, take me up on this offer because I've never taught this course before. It's not scheduled to be taught again. I usually only teach these courses once. So this is what I'm offering right now, and it's coming up really soon because the course starts a week from today, the day the podcast goes live, that is starts October 20th. So as you can tell, I'm really excited about teaching this. I think it's going to make the difference for a lot of people. So do check it out, look at the webpages, and if you're not sure about the course, just join me for the webinar on Wednesday. One more important thing. The webinar will be available as a replay. So that's there. And if you're thinking, well, I can't join the course because I can't do those calls live, everything is recorded. All those replays are available for you, and we're not doing a cutoff date for those replays, you will own this course forever. So I think that makes it even more valuable. Right? Okay, so enough about the course, but get in there if you haven't already. Okay, so today's podcast episode is really about, I don't know, the other side of the coin. Instead of talking about being able to bridge that gap from point A, where the skills are, to point B, where the music is, where really talking about those moments where the teacher feels like they know the path, this is how you need to get there. You need to hold your elbow up. You need to have your thumb work better. You need to have a different, I don't know, posture, whatever it is. There are things that we are pretty firm about when we look at a student. We can say, ah, this is what's going wrong. And I always was mystified when I'd be playing something and my teacher would be, I don't know, looking out the window, just listening to me play. And she would almost have her back to me, and she could say, ah, you're not closing. Well, when I was a kid, it was like, well, how did you know? How did you know I wasn't closing? And if I asked her that, she'd say, well, I can tell the difference in the sound. And she had me listen to the difference in the sound. So I learned to hear the difference that that made. Oh, closing is a good thing.

But with things like that, fingering is another example. It's not always easy for us teachers to explain to students why it's so important to do it this way, when that way feels uncomfortable or feels slow or feels like it's just not the right way to do it. This is particularly true, I think, with adult students, because adults understand that it's worth taking time and trouble to do something the right way, even if it's harder at first. I mean, we know we don't want to have to relearn the fingering or the notes or the rhythm or when to push our pedals. We don't want to have to go back over that. And so when something feels wrong, when it doesn't feel like it's the right way, to do it or it's uncomfortable or it makes things harder. We don't want to step outside that place where we know how to do it because we think it's going to work better that way. But that's not always true because as students, we can't always see the longer term perspective. And that's what I want to help you with today. So in those moments when you're really questioning and you probably have from time to time why your teacher is telling you to do something a particular way, hopefully I can give you some of those answers today. So you can see a little bit, a little glimpse into the future. You can see a little bit of that long term perspective and why we're saying this.

So let's take one of the easiest and still most frustrating areas to talk about this and that is fingering. I think fingering is a tricky area because our fingering becomes part of our habit, part of what we want to instill and become automatic as we're learning a piece. And so I think that that aspect of it makes it really hard to think about changing fingering. Fingering also is one of those things that teachers want to wean a student away from. I mean, yes, following a fingering, a fingering is important, particularly in a tricky passage. But as you become more adept at playing, you don't need so much fingering direction. First of all, your fingers have learned the common patterns and they sort of know that when those are the notes on the page, this is how they're going to do it. These are the fingers you're going to use. So your fingers actually start to figure out on their own what strings they're supposed to be on and what order to play in. That's a wonderful thing. And that's where we as teachers want you to get. So we want you to write in less and less fingering as you go along. Just the fingering, you're going to need to get through particular spots like, ah, I need to have my third finger there. That's what we want you to do. So fingering becomes more automatic. That's a little bit scary. But fingering has a couple other issues, right, because everyone's hand is different. And what is a comfortable stretch for one person is not a comfortable stretch for another person. So fingering in that sense is a little bit individual and personal. So if I tell you that this is the best fingering, you may say with absolute justification that, gosh, that doesn't feel good in your hand. So we may need to talk about it. That's certainly true. And then of course, fingering there, there seem to be rules for fingering. Okay, if it's a third, I'm going to play it with one and two. If it's an octave, I'm going to play it with 1 and 4. If it's a sixth, I'm going to play it with 1 and 3. But in real life playing, we sometimes have different fingerings that we need to follow because of this situation. So even though there seem to be rules, and we might even talk about them that way, when a student is just coming to the harp and just brand new, those rules are really just sort of the usual practices and the various. And there are many various situations that occur in real music. Those might require us to be more flexible with our fingering and use unusual combinations of fingers and use them in different ways. This is what we talk about, this is what we mean when we talk about independence of the fingers. They need to be able to step up and work in all kinds of different ways. So if there's a fingering on the page and the student says, you know, that's not a very comfortable fingering for me. I don't like the way that is. It doesn't work for me, then we have to do just a little bit of investigation. Is it really because your hand can't manage it, or is it just because your hand doesn't like it? It's not as comfortable, it's not used to it. If it really doesn't fit your hand, we can look for an option. But if it's just that it doesn't feel right, then we have to really weigh the value of the fingering and why it's there in the first place. And this is what we teachers often do a bad job of explaining to our students. One reason that a fingering might be in the music and seem awkward to a student is because they haven't considered the overall efficiency of motion that needs to be built into a harp playing. After all, we need to be efficient with what we do. There's a lot of real estate to cover on the harp, right? High notes, low notes. We've got to get around the harp. And particularly I'm thinking of a left hand example here. Think about when your left hand has to dive down for a low note, maybe a low octave, or particularly just a single low note, or a low fifth, like a G to a D. And maybe it's playing an accompaniment that's like a chord on the first beat that's low, and then a Couple of higher chords and then so you know, 1, 2, 3, low, high, high. And so your left hand is jumping back and forth. Well, it can be very tempting to go for that low note with your second finger because your second finger is used to sort of pecking at the. At the strings. You know, it's a great grabbing kind of a finger, isn't it? It's our pointer finger. It points and it goes. But the fact is that our fourth finger of our left hand is perfect for those low notes. First of all, it's used to playing them. And the thing is, if we dive with our fourth finger, our hand is actually closer to those high notes that we need to get back to. So playing those low notes with our fourth finger gives us.

An advantage in terms of where we are on the harp. It will let us play faster and more accurately when we need to because it reduces the distance that our actual hand has to travel. Our fourth finger can reach out further, you'll see. If you do this experiment right, hold your hand out, stretch out your fourth finger, you've got another few inches and your hand hasn't had to move. But with your second finger, you're going to have to move another inch or two further away from you. And sometimes that inch makes a big difference when we're talking about playing quickly. If you have a low fifth on the harp, it's tempting to do it with a one and a three. But the same thing applies here. You can get another inch closer to those higher notes if you play them with 2 and 4. Not only that, but 2 and 4 down there gives you the. The option to add that octave above with your thumb so that if that octave comes into play at some point, your hand's in exactly the right place to be able to do that. So even though playing two and four down in that low register doesn't seem comfortable, it's like, oh, it doesn't work for me. I can't grab as quickly and it's not as good. Yeah, it's not as good today, but. But it's going to be a terrific fingering for you to learn and get comfortable with. It will be faster, it will be more secure, it will be more efficient. So the fact that it doesn't feel comfortable today, I'm going to tell you every time you need to learn this one anyway, because it's going to serve you in the long run. One of the other reasons that I might insist on a student learn a fingering that doesn't feel comfortable for them. And this is Assuming that it's not a problem for their hand, that we're not overstretching it or causing too much tension. But if it's just a comfort fingering issue, and they're like, oh, but, but it's just so much nicer for me to use these fingers, I might insist as much as I can that they use the fingering that's printed or the fingering that I suggest, because it's going to work better at tempo. There are lots of fingerings that can work for any kind of passage if you're playing it slowly. But if you want to play it at the appropriate tempo, many times you will find that the fingering that's written in there is going to work at the tempo, even if it doesn't seem to work slowly. The masters of the harp understood this. So when you're looking at fingering in a piece by maybe Hasselman or Regnier or Salzato or Grandigny, you're looking at people who wrote in fingerings that are going to work at the tempo you need to play the piece. And lots of times a fingering that seems to work when you're playing slowly just won't cut it when you play fast. So if you want to play fast, let's learn the fingering that's going to work instead of having to relearn that later. So that's the other reason that I am going to insist that you learn the fingering that's on the page. Because it's going to get you the speed you want. It's not going to be a fingering that slows you down, and you're not going to have to relearn it. Remember too, when we're talking about fingering, lots of times what feels comfortable is because you're used to using a particular fingering. And lots of times this can lead to a finger that just gets underused. Often it's our third or fourth finger, or maybe both. Think about all the pieces you might play that have three finger chords, and you're used to using your third finger for those chords. But your fourth finger, especially in your right hand, doesn't get quite so much practice. And so when you actually have to use it, it's not as adept. If you have that kind of weakness built into your fingering, then you've got fewer options. Your fingering is going to be less flexible, less adaptable, and in fact, your hand might be imbalanced or not centered, and that might cause other technical issues. So if it's just a matter of, well, I don't like using my fourth finger or I don't like using my third finger. Well, maybe it's time we trained it so that it was used to playing. So as I said, fingering is perhaps the biggest thing that I am. Well, you can tell I'm sort of passionate about it, can't you? So when a student says to me, oh, I don't know, this fingering just doesn't seem to work, I'll investigate. But there are some very clear reasons, at least clear to me, that I want to convey to a student that says, I know, I know you're not comfortable with this now, but here's why I want you to use it. Anyway, fingering is a big topic like this in the. Well, it doesn't work this way for me or it feels better when I do this. But of course there are others. Our posture is one, right? Oh, but it feels more comfortable when I sit this way. I can't sit this way. It doesn't feel good on my back. I don't want anybody to hurt when they play the harp. But your posture at the harp, the way you sit, the way you are at the instrument, the angle of your body, all those things, that's the support system for everything that we do. That's where our relaxation comes from. That's where our strength comes from. It comes from the way we sit. Now, of course, the actual specifics of your seated posture at the harp can be harp specific. Depending on the size of your harp, whether it's a lever harp or a pedal harp, how high you need to sit at that particular harp, that's all player specific. My body is built this way. And harp specific. It can also be method specific. Things like part of your posture being your elbows up, your elbows down, how your arms, your upper arms particularly are part of that support system. So all of that is a little bit dependent, right? I can't sit here and say, well, it's always going to be this way. You, because your body is your body and you need to be comfortable, your harp requires you to sit in a way that my harp might not. So these things can be harp specific and harp specific. But the fact remains our body needs to support our playing, so it needs to be aligned. And our posture at the harp needs to be designed for strength with relaxation and yes, some comfort. But if the correct posture means that your core muscles or your upper arm muscles are going to get developed a little bit along the way, I don't think that's a bad thing. I think That's a win all the way around. I don't want you slouching at the harp. And if that means you're going to have to learn to sit up a little straighter, that's great. I don't want your back to hurt or your shoulders to hurt. And that's where some of those player specific recommendations will come into account. Because we need harp playing to be comfortable for you, that doesn't mean that we can ignore those basic rules of posture. And that's something your teacher is going to be able to guide you with. But just seeking comfort might not be the way to go. The same thing applies to our hand position or our finger motion. Yes, everyone's hand is different, but the basic principles of technique will work for you. They are possible for you. Things like closing, things like centering your hand, spacing your thumb. And this is something that every harp method talks about a little bit differently. But across the board, hand position and finger motion is essential. That's how we play. It is essential to everything about our playing, whether it's technical facility and speed, or musicality like our tone, our dynamics, our expression, all of that is related directly to how our hands are positioned at the strings and how our fingers work. So ultimately, the correct position and the correct motion will feel comfortable. It will be correct for whatever technique you are learning. And ultimately it will feel comfortable. I mean, it should never hurt, even while you're developing it. We're not looking for, you know, pain. It's not, you know, no gain without pain kind of a thing. That's not what heart playing should be. It should not hurt. But just because it doesn't feel comfortable or right or it's like, oh, it'd be so much easier if I could just do it this way. Our playing, I hate to tell you, isn't about taking the easy way out. It's about learning the technique that's going to serve you over time, not just today. So as your teacher is working with you to develop that technique, remember that there are certain elements of that that are non negotiable. Even if it doesn't feel comfortable. We do it this way because as I said, it's method specific, it's harp specific, it's player specific. So she'll help you with that, or he'll help you with that. Your teacher will help you. But there are certain aspects of it that you're just gonna have to deal with, even if they're not the way you'd rather deal with it. Right now. There is one last Area that I want to talk about when it comes to, oh, well, it just doesn't feel good when I do this. It doesn't work when I do it this way. I prefer doing it this way. And this is perhaps the end area where students can get pretty set in their ways and can resist the solutions that I'm offering most adamantly. And that's actually in the area of practice.

I know that there are ways that we learn and ways we like to learn. I'm not really talking about personal learning preferences, except that I'm talking about personal harp practice preferences. Lots of times they're rooted in early learning, like the kind of learning that we did when we first started harp lessons, or maybe when we were very young and we first had piano lessons or instrument lessons of some kind. These are old habits that we need to readjust because we're not at that stage anymore. And sometimes they're just habits that keep us comfortable and they're not going to serve us in terms of actually playing the music. So let me explain. The first one that I want to talk about is the student who says, well, I don't really want to work hands together right now because I like to learn hands separately first. I get it. Hands separately learning is easier because we can concentrate on less. And there's a place for that. But when I'm encouraging you to learn hands together right at the beginning of a piece as well as hands separately, I'm encouraging you not because I want to make life more difficult for you, but because I know that when you get used to hands together learning, also you will learn how to sight read faster. Your learning of that particular piece will go faster. Hands separately only. Learning just keeps all that slower. We want to develop your hands together coordination. And I know that it's a struggle if you're used to learning hands separately. Putting hands together can be really hard. But the more you do it, the easier it becomes. So even though it doesn't feel good now, I want you to start working at it. Because your hands together coordination won't develop if you're not. If you're trying it and doing a little bit of it all the time every day as you're learning a piece. Even from day one of learning that piece, you're going to be helping yourself all through your heart playing. You'll get used to playing hands together. That coordination will develop. If you're not working at hands together playing right away, you're saying, well, I just want to learn hands separately first and I'll get to Hands together. You're almost deliberately slowing down your learning process. Hands together. Playing Hands together. Sight reading. This is a skill we need to develop because it's going to let us play more music and learn it faster and play it better and enjoy our harp journey more. That's why I want you to do it, even though it's not comfortable. And the other thing I want to talk about with practice is. Is the person who says to me, well, but I like to practice it all slowly until it's completely correct. I don't want to speed it up now because every time I start playing fast, it gets a little bit messy. And so I just want to get it all right at this slow tempo, and then we can talk about speeding it up. The harpist who says that to me doesn't know how speeding up works. And that's what I want to tell you just a little bit about right now. Remember that playing fast is different from playing slowly, not just because it's fast, but because it requires all the processing that we do to work differently. We can't keep all those bits of control, those little informational bits at the forefront of our mind. When we're playing faster. We can't say, okay, second finger, go to this string, and this is an A we. You can't be doing all that kind of managing at a fast tempo. Playing fast is different than playing slow. Okay, you get that. But just because it works slowly doesn't mean you can keep everything working well as you speed it up, because all those processes are going to change so that working slowly and working faster at the same time will help you achieve that tempo much more quickly. Is it a little bit messy? Yes. And does that kind of mess feel uncomfortable? Yes. Would you rather work it the way that is comfortable for you? Of course you would. Who wouldn't? But this is why I'm telling you to play it fast. Play it faster all the time. Even when you're working at it slowly, you won't get in bad habits. You're just going to experience the music the way it needs to go. And the sooner you do that, the quicker you'll get there. That's all it is. So if that's something that's really out of your comfort zone, I want you to think about it. But I'll tell you that if you were my student, I'd be helping you do that right now, today, right in our lesson. Absolutely. So if I've encouraged you to try that, then I've done my job today. Now, you don't have to follow my advice, but bear in mind where it comes from. A lifetime that's nearly 60 years of playing and studying and teaching. I've been doing this harp thing a long time. I don't want you to take the harder path if the easier path works. I just want you to be able to play everything you want to play and to play the harp for your lifetime. A lifetime of harp happiness. It's just that sometimes what feels easy right now isn't going to serve you throughout that lifetime. So those are the reasons behind my suggestions today. Now here's the deal I eventually made with the student that I talked about at the beginning of the episode. Here was the deal. I said, if I can't explain why you should do it my way in terms of long term benefits, then you can do it your way. I thought it was a pretty fair deal. It put me on the spot. I had to be able to tell her why and how it was going to serve her heart playing for her lifetime. I felt pretty confident making that deal because I know why these things are important. I just needed to explain them. So we made the deal. And needless to say, in the words of the song, we did it my way.

So what points in our discussion today really clicked with you? What was an aha moment for you? Like, oh, that's why I'm supposed to do it this way, Even though it doesn't feel good, did it give you some ideas for asking your teacher about those questions that you have? Or maybe making different decisions in your practice? Or if you're a teacher, did it give you maybe some words that you can use to explain to your students what the reasoning is behind some of your instructions? I certainly hope so. I think this kind of a discussion can be really, really helpful between teacher and student and it can make a difference in how fast a student progresses, that's for sure. Next week on the podcast, we're talking about your six week holiday performance preparation plan. Here we are. It's the middle of October already. Can you believe it? The holidays are coming up quickly. So if you have performances you're preparing for, even if it's just playing one piece on a Christmas Eve service, I want to help you know how to prepare, how to plan these next six weeks or so so that you can be ready for what's coming up. So that's what we're going to be talking about next week. Something super practical. No matter where you'll be playing or what you'll be playing, we'll talk about your six week plan. Don't forget we've got our arpeggios course starting a week from today. That's Monday, October 20th. And of course we have the Getting Started call which is our webinar and that's coming up in just two days, Wednesday, October 15th. So all those details are in the show notes or on the website and I know you can get in there and take advantage of that. I certainly hope that you will until we're back here next week on the podcast. Remember, every day is a day you can add more harp happiness to the universe, to your world and to your spirit. And all you have to do is play. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.

Thanks for tuning into another episode of the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast. I release a new episode every Monday morning so you can hit your practice week running. Until then, remember to practice your harp happiness every day. See you next time.