Relax, Review, Enjoy - PHH 031

Welcome to Practicing Harp Happiness, the Harp Mastery Podcast. My name is Ann Sullivan and I'm a harpist, teacher, and founder of Harp Mastery. I'm all about creating more harp happiness in the world by helping harp players like you play the music they want the way they want. But as a harpist who nearly flunked out of one of the most prestigious music schools in the world, I although later not only graduated, but I went on to teach there. I know from personal experience that learning the harp is way harder than it looks. Here, each week on the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast, I show you how to solve the challenges of practicing and playing the harp. Whether it's about making your fingers behave or learning music faster, or getting your piece's performance ready, or just learning to enjoy your playing every day. Sounds great, doesn't it? Let's get started.

Welcome to the show. I was in the checkout line at the grocery store the other day and so of course I was reading the headlines on all the magazines that were displayed there. Now one of those headlines really caught my attention. It said, enjoy a guilt free holiday. Well, the thought that immediately ran through my mind was this. Why should a holiday have guilt attached to it Now? I think the magazine article was talking about how not to put on extra pounds during the holidays. You know, not anything music related, of course, but the idea crossed that line in my mind. Do we set ourselves up for holiday disappointment or even guilt in our harp playing?

Obviously, that's not at all what holiday heart playing should be about. But in the spirit of wanting to make everything sparkle and be just right for Christmas, I think it's so easy for us to fall into that guilt trap. Whether it's that you don't have enough time to practice, or your piece for that special performance isn't as polished as you would like, or you're worried that all the progress you were making on that piece you were learning is going to disappear over the holidays. There are plenty of musical things that we could fret about just when we ought to be having the most fun. Now you know me. I am not going to let you fall into one of those traps. We are all about harp happiness here, and even when the pressure starts to build, we don't want to let it get to us. You work too hard at your harp playing all year to waste a single moment feeling guilty about it now.

But how do you conquer those holiday I don't have enough practice time worries. That's what we're going to talk about today. I will share my favorite practice plan for keeping that guilt grinch away. It's super short, super easy and geared for your personal enjoyment. Now what better holiday gift could you give yourself, right? And what better reward for all your dedication to your harp this year than to enjoy a harp filled and happy holiday. Now before we get started, I wanted to give you a quick reminder that as of the time I'm recording this, there are still just a few openings left in our certified coaching program. This is the the 12 week program where our students work one on one with one of our certified coaches. Now these coaches are harpists I have hand picked who are not only talented and accomplished performers, but are experts at working with adult students. They have the insight and the patience to help their students develop the skills and the confidence they need to play the harp the way they want. Whether that's on lever harp or pedal harp, whether it's playing in public or in a hospital setting, or just for their own pleasure and satisfaction. So in this program, each student has one hour individual sessions with their coach. Either five sessions or ten over the twelve weeks, depending on the program they select. And while these sessions are truly lessons, the essential difference maker is that the entire program is designed around two or three goals specific to each student that are carefully chosen or with the coach. This isn't just learning the harp. This is achievement and growth and progress. And our students love the results they get. They accomplish so much in such a short time span. Plus they learn about how to set goals and what to do to make those harp dreams really happen. But registration will be closing in the next couple of days, so you can. You need to sign up for your planning call with me today. I will help you choose the right coach for you and we will get some clarity around your goals and you'll be ready to start working with your coach after the first of the year. But to take advantage of all this, you need to do it today. Just click down to the link in the show notes and that'll get the ball rolling. And now if you are ready, let's talk about that guilt free holiday practice plan before we can start talking about what you can be doing with your harp over the holidays. And I'm on purpose avoiding the word should. We're not. We're taking all that sort of onus off of your harp playing. You get a two week moratorium, certainly till at least after the first of the year. But I have something that I need you to do. I need you, before we start talking about any of the practicalities, I need you to make a Deal with yourself. Promise yourself solemnly that you won't look for, expect or try to make progress during the holidays.

This is about the holidays. It's about family and friends. It's about celebration. Whether it's a religious holiday for you or not. It's about being a person more than even being a harpist. So no one expects you to make progress over the holidays. Well, no one, except for maybe you. And I want you to let go of that idea. Now, if you try to make progress now, it's going to really be just forcing an issue. But if you can let yourself relax and give your harp playing a holiday.

That break is going to be good for you. It's going to be good for your harp playing. It's going to clear your mind, refresh your spirit and let you come back to the harp and to all your pieces with new energy.

But only if you let go of that now.

Now, this doesn't mean that you need to abandon your harp and let it gather dust for the next two weeks, but it does mean that it's time to enjoy the fruits of your hard work during the year and to enjoy the music that you can make at your harp.

Now, I know that there are some of you and maybe this applies to a lot of harpists. We're all that, you know, that overachiever type, right? So I know that there are some of you who are going to find this task really difficult. I mean, maybe you think that, that letting go of, of progress and stuff doesn't apply to you for whatever reason. Oh, you can still practice even with all that holiday stuff. You still have time or you can make time, or maybe you're just afraid to let off the gas for a little while. I mean, I know you. I know that you're out there. You can't hide and you can't fool me because in some respects I'm just like you. It's hard to let go of that practice habit. It's hard to think that, well, if I don't play at all this week, I going to lose everything.

You know. But remember, please, you are the one who puts that pressure on yourself. You're the one, therefore, who can take that pressure off yourself. So whatever kind of a deal you need to make, even if it's, you know, the deal that, well, I told you you should do this and said I should not practice today. I don't care what kind of deal you make with yourself, but you need to, to relax about your playing. Don't worry about your usual practice plan. Just Let it go. It won't hurt you. It will only benefit you. I promise.

Wow. How does that feel? Does that feel good? To think that you have permission to not practice over the holidays?

I'm going to tell you how you can still stay connected to your harp. It doesn't mean that you have to completely put your harp on a shelf or close it in a closet someplace. No, we're going to stay connected to the harp, but the practice stuff is something we don't have to do right now. I mean, imagine this for a moment. Suppose you didn't have any music that you needed to learn, Nothing that you needed to learn, right? What would you do with your harp?

I mean, if practice is all about learning music and you don't have any music that you need to learn, what would you do? Ooh, that sounds like fun. Doesn't opens possibilities, and this is a great time to explore those possibilities. So one of those possibilities for you might be to read. To read music, to sight, read new music, read through some old pieces you haven't looked at in a long time.

But to just put on your music stand anything you feel like you might want to play, Want to try out warts and all. We're not going for perfection here. We're just reading through it, just playing for fun. How foreign does that idea feel to you? How different does it feel to think that you could just play? You don't have to practice anything. You don't have to get in there and work out those trouble spots. You don't have to get in there and work with the metronome. You could just read through new music. And maybe the new music you'd like to read through is, you know, that book of new Christmas carol arrangements that you haven't looked at yet. Maybe you got some of my 12 days of Christmas sheet music earlier this month. Great time to just put those on your stand and just play through them. Even if it means you're reading one hand or, you know, whatever it takes. But to sit down there and read now, you know, that sounds to me like a lot of fun. And I actually do that over the holidays. I like a break, too. So I love to read through music. New music, old music, just pull it out, put it on the stand. It's like, ooh, whoa. I'm, you know, I would have to work at that if I were going to practice it, but since I'm not, I can just kind of humdy hum my way through it, and that's fine. I love doing that.

And maybe that idea appeals to you. But if you feel like you are, you know, if your conscience is stricken, that you might not be practicing. One of the big benefits you can get from this is that you're working on your sight reading. Oh, look at that. So it. You could consider it fun with a purpose.

But you don't have to think of it that way. It can just be fun. Okay, so that's one thing that you could do. If you didn't have any music you needed to learn. What else could you do? Well, maybe you could take that to the next step and you could actually review music that, you know, you could review maybe repertoire pieces that you want to bring back. You know, they. They used to be things that were familiar to you a year or two ago, but you haven't played them in a while. Well, let's review them once again. You don't have to work on them. Just bring them out and play them through. There's, there's time for working on them later. You don't have to work on them this week or next week. There's time for that. But just bring them back, play through them. Maybe there are pieces that you haven't refreshed in a little while. Maybe there are pieces that have been gathering dust for a long time and you think, you know, that would be fun to play again.

Bring it out, put it on your stand, play through it. How much fun is that? Once again, you don't have to practice it. You can just play it. And once again, it can be fun with a purpose. Right, because you're enlarging your repertoire. You're bringing back pieces that, that you'll be able to play for someone, somewhere, sometime, or just for your own pleasure as well. But you're not, you know, letting all that hard work you put into those pieces go for nothing. We're bringing them back. We're going to review it.

I love that idea. And once again, this is something I like to do, too.

The third thing you might want to do is to refresh, refresh your technique. Now, I know for some of you, this does not sound like fun. This sounds like exercises, and it sounds like, you know, work. It doesn't seem as much fun as playing pieces. And if it doesn't seem like fun to you, don't do it. I mean, there, there's my, my rule right there. If it doesn't seem like fun, don't do it. But, you know, your technique can always use a little refresh. And when you don't have a lot of time to practice, or any time to practice. Sometimes it just feels good to sit down and do some scales or arpeggios and look at your fingers. I mean, after all, if you don't have any music that's pressing music that you need to learn right now in these next two weeks, then what a great opportunity to just check in with your fingers, to calm them down, to relax them, to get rid of some tension, to make sure those bad habits aren't there. You could play something. It doesn't have to be exercises. You could take a piece, maybe even a Christmas carol, if you like that, and just play it very slowly. Choose something easy, because we're working at your fingers, not at notes. So just choose something really easy. Play it very slowly. You could choose a favorite exercise or a favorite etude. A holiday piece played really slowly is great. The idea is to just pay attention to your fingers, to how your fingers are working. Let them calm down. Especially if you've been doing a lot of holiday playing, this is a great way to just start to get your fingers back in shape, to relax them. This is the few days in between that last big weekend of holiday performances and the big Christmas Eve performances. And so if you have five minutes during the day to just do some slow technical work, it's going to help make sure that everything is in place and that your fingers are not stressed out, but they're working their best.

So those are the three things that I think you can do anytime, in any amount of time you have, or not do it all, if that suits. But remember, you can read, read through new pieces or old pieces. You can review repertoire, repertoire that's been current or repertoire that's been, you know, gathering dust for a long time, bring it back and just review Once again, you're not practicing, just playing, and you can refresh your technique. So if you have or can find five minutes in a day, do one of those for five minutes, play a couple of Christmas carols, or play a little bit of exercises, or play one of those repertoire pieces you haven't played in a long time. Five minutes, that's it. Or 10 minutes, or 15 minutes, or half an hour, if that's what you have. The time isn't important. I mean, just five minutes in a day is going to keep you connected to your music. It's going to keep the dust off your heart sharp, and it's going to keep the rust off your fingers, and it's going to keep those little. Those little guilt bubbles out of your brain. Right now. If you have more time More than five minutes. That's wonderful. Go ahead and use it. But don't feel you need to practice. Just keep playing. Now this is the the one time of year when I let myself play just for fun. I mean, I'm working plenty hard and I'm playing lots of performances. But at home at this time of year, I play just for me. Sometimes it's pulling out. You know those books of Christmas carol arrangements that I need to sight read because I've never played them. Other times it's playing through pieces that I love but haven't played in years. And believe me, they are rusty. They're far from smooth and flowing. But it feels really good to immerse myself in different music for just a little while.

Often after a busy weekend of playing a 20 minute. For me, I do 20 minutes. A 20 minute finger refresh with the conditioning exercises or a Bach etude is just what I need. Clears my head, cleans up my fingers, makes me feel really good about my playing and it relaxes me in a way that just about nothing else does.

Now this whole idea of relaxing and refreshing, this may be an important.

Thing for you. Think about it this way. Think about what you need, about how your music can refresh your spirit or bring you joy. Don't let the shoulds and the have to's and the really ought tos creep in, right? Let this just be for you.

But I can hear you. You say, well, but I have music I need to practice to play on Christmas Eve. I can't stop practicing it. Okay, well, let's just relax because I can tweak this plan for you too. If you have music you need to practice and you can't just let it go. I'd like you to tweak your practice routine along the lines that I was talking about before. But we're going to keep that. We're going to keep the time frame loose, but we're going to allow you to do what you need to do with the music that you're going to need to play. Now, I'm hoping that you have your music fairly ready to go and that you're not trying to cram practice. If you haven't discovered that already, and believe me, I speak from experience here, cram practice does not work. I mean, I've been there. It's no fun. And here's a quick tip. If that's where you are right now, trying to cram practice for Christmas, stop. It won't work. It will. And it will only make you crazy. So stop the Cramp practice and instead create what I call a minimum necessary result plan. In other words, you may need 20 to reduce your expectations somewhat so you can be more successful. Now, hopefully that's, you know, that's a really nice way of saying, look, it's only going to get so good or so much better in the amount of time you have. So don't try to make it the world's greatest performance if you don't have the time to do that. You're going to have to figure out what really needs to be done and do that and call that a success.

We've talked before about personalizing your music. This may be a great instance for that. For instance, can you play the piece more slowly than you might have liked or would otherwise have intended, maybe giving it a more thoughtful mood so it's easier to play correctly? Right. If you were to slow that tempo down just a little bit, would that help you relax more? Would it help you play more of the right notes? I mean, after all, a meditative mood is always good for a Christmas service anyway. So consider just relaxing the tempo if that's what would make it easier for you to play. Can you leave out some notes so you don't have to stress about a couple of really tricky measures? Could you find an easier version of the piece? Maybe one you already know?

I have been in situations before where I've, you know, told a choir director, yes, I'm going to play, I don't know, I'm going to play green sleeves for part of the Prelude on Christmas Eve. And then I'm working on that really hard, green sleeves, and it's just not coming together. Well. Nothing says you can't substitute another version of green sleeves, maybe one you know better and feel more comfortable playing. Feel free to make the swap. You know, it's not the time to stress out over it. If there's a solution to make it easier for you.

Maybe you can, you know, maybe you can come up with another kind of a compromise. If it's a piece you're playing with other people, maybe you just don't have to play all the notes that are on the page.

I mean, I can tell you, and once again, this is firsthand experience here. The best last minute practice strategy is to figure out how to make the music work for you. It's much better than trying to work really, really hard, get really frazzled and still not play well. Make the choices that you, that you need to, to lead you to success. That's the goal here. So if that's where you are. That's my best strategy. But let's assume that you don't have to cram practice. You're not doing that last minute stressing out, but you do still need to keep the music that you need to play on Christmas Eve in your fingers. So here is a super paired down practice plan that should do the trick for you. There are essentially three different focus ideas in this practice plan. One is that you might need to practice spots in the music. You know, those couple of hard measures that place where the pedals or levers are really tricky. The place with the big chords. Whatever it is, there are probably some spots in the pieces that you have to play. And so one day between now and Christmas Eve, you're going to just practice the spots in those pieces. And you'll have to practice them. How much you have to practice how much time you're going to have to spend. Only you know that I can't, I can't judge that for you without, you know, without a lot more information. So. So you'll have to decide how much time you need to do that. But you know, today, tomorrow, whatever it is, just practice those spots that you still need to work on. Then the next day. Day two, we're going to practice playing it at tempo. And this is playing it at tempo. We want to see how it's going to go. We want to experience it in sort of, you know, real life circumstances and we want to give it some really good test runs. So you're going to play it through at tempo and maybe you know each piece two or three times, maybe even five times, depending on the piece, but you're going to play it through at tempo. Now you don't need to work on spots today. You don't need to do anything else but play it through at tempo. Give yourself the experience.

Now this will also show you if there is a place where you still need to do some, some editing, some personalization. I'm going to need to leave that left hand cord out or I'm going to need to leave that note out of that left hand cord. Takes me too long to place those four fingers. But I can get to three fingers in time. So this will help you. But making sure that you have, you know, a couple days before you have to play it some really good practice where you're playing through the piece the way it needs to go. That's very powerful preparation and is really important to do. So that would be a second day, then on a third day, you're going to still Play through your piece, but you're going to play it through at only 2/3 or 3/4 tempo. Your idea is to make it calm, make it correct and absolutely smooth.

So that first practice focus. Day one, you're practicing the spots. Day two, you're playing it through at tempo several times. Day three, you're playing it through several times, but at, you know, 2/3 or 3/4 tempo. So that it can be calm, correct, controlled, musical, smooth, all those things. And you can rotate between those three depending on how many days you have between now and your performance. But I suggest that on the day of your performance.

Only play the piece slowly.

By the day of the performance. You know, say you're playing Christmas Eve and it's Christmas Eve morning. Just play the piece through slowly. You don't want to start worrying about what might not work for Christmas Eve. So play it slowly so that you get a chance to review all the notes, to play the entire thing through smoothly and correctly and expressively, but without struggle.

This is not just my own idea, of course, you know, this was something, this is a strategy that I was taught by my teacher, she was taught by hers. You'll find it in, you know, in all kinds of wonderful method books and technique books. So this is a great strategy. Just slowly on the day of the performance. And that way you'll be fresh and you'll be relaxed and you'll be energized, happy instead of worried and nervous when you get to the performance. So that's the super paired down practice plan. If you still have pieces you absolutely need to practice, but if you don't, I just want you to relax and enjoy this time and let your harp give you pleasure at the holidays. Let it give back to you. Before we wrap up today, I just wanted to wish you all a very merry Christmas and just a wonderful holiday, no matter what holiday you choose to celebrate. I also wanted to thank you because you are the best Christmas gift I could ask for. The comments that you send me, the, the compliments just warm my heart. And the stories that you share with me of your, you know, your aha kind of light bulb moments and you know, the, the breakthroughs that you have, these lift my spirits in a way that nothing else can. You are a treasure and I so appreciate your listening and you're letting me speak into your harp playing every week here on the podcast. Now next week I'm going to be sharing quickly. We won't have a long podcast next week, but I'm going to be sharing with you my 2022 HARP happiness list the things that I'm doing to help put a lot of harp happiness into 2022, or at least the things I'm hoping to do. And I'm hoping that they're ideas that will inspire you too so that you can get yourself thinking ahead and planning and can get you excited about the possibilities for you and your harp in the new year. I know I am excited about the possibilities for me and I want to be sure that you are for you and as well. So until then, please I want to I wish you a very safe, happy, healthy holiday, a very blessed Christmas and a season of lots of peace and joy and music. Not to mention harp happiness. So until next week, take care, have a wonderful holiday and I will be talking to you next week. 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.