Jump Ahead or Fake It

For the past couple of weeks, my students have heard me tell them to "jump ahead" or "fake it" (i.e., "make it up) when they do a run-through of their festival songs for me. Those are really a musician's two options on stage when we have a memory lapse. Asking for the book and running off the stage aren't acceptable options.

And now, here we are. It's Music Festival Week. Basically, this is a warm-up for my students gearing up for piano exams in June - a chance to air out their repertoire, get valuable feedback and see where the kinks lie.

Things are at the stage where we have to stop psyching ourselves out at weak spots by making them stronger. As Irina Ginzburg, my former piano teacher, said to me many a time, "You have to get it right eleven times out of ten at home to get it right ten times out of ten on stage."

I should add that since perfection on stage is fleeting, delivering a convincing performance becomes more important. A friend of mine told me once that she "faked" the middle of one of her jury songs at university one semester. She knew the beginning and the end. Unfortunately, she caught the chicken pox shortly before her piano jury and was unable to properly learn the middle.She kept in the style of the song and lucked out by having an obscure piece that none of the jury members were familiar with. She delivered such a convincing performance that she garnered a "B".

Back to my students and I. We've been practicing (some harder than others) on our trouble spots and our memory by using the following techniques:

• hands separately
• analysing the chords and patterns
• "eyes closed" practice
• "eyes open but looking away from the piano" practice
• playing with distractions
• drilling beginnings and endings
• drilling problem spots
• coming to the piano in between other tasks and starting up partway through one of our songs
• practicing at "nervous" tempo (for most, it's faster than normal)
• practice performing
• practice "faking it" at weak points

Hopefully our hard work will pay off over the next week-and-a-half.

(c) 2007 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Music Festival Time

The APTA Festival begins tomorrow. Visit their APTA Festival website for information and the performance program.

The High River & District Lions Music Festival kicked off earlier this week. Information can be found at the Town of High River website

Audience members are welcome.

Here's an article on a talented pianist, Kandace Deacon. She's one I can say, "I knew her when she was this high." She was a little sprite when her sisters, my brother and I competed at the High River Festival. Now look at her - 18 and picking up awards left, right and centre. Story is here.

(c) 2007 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.

Music and Med School

One of my piano parents inquired what makes music lessons so attractive to university faculties such as medicine and engineering.

In the 1990s, Lewis Thomas, a physician and biologist conducted a study on undergraduate majors of medical school applicants. Of all successful applicants, 66% of them were music majors.

Closer to home, I can tell you that many of my former teacher's students have gone on to study engineering, another demanding program. One of the best pianists from my university piano class went on to be a surgeon. Another friend earned the Gold Medal in his graduating class at the University of Lethbridge and later went onto become a Rhodes Scholar, completing his Ph.D. thesis analysing the works of writer James Joyce, while playing trombone in community orchestra - for fun!

Music study involves so many parts of the brain, teaching everything from creative expression to analysis, ingenuity to working under pressure and from self-discipline to project management. And much more. These are all skills that are valued in medicine and engineering.

I have done a couple of blog entries on how "music lessons make you smarter" ("A New Study on the Benefits of Music Education" and "Why Study Music"). But don't take my word on it. Check out this latest set of articles:

• Will Piano Lessons Make My Child Smarter?
• Keyboards for Kids: Teaching Music, Building Brains
• Can Music Really Make You Smarter?

(c) 2007 by Musespeak(tm), Calgary, AB, Canada. All rights reserved.