The Bulletproof Musician

Having difficulty getting younger students to do anything more than simply running a piece and calling that "practice?" The case study of "Clarissa" might help...

As part of a 3-year study on musical development, Australian researchers (Renwick & McPherson, 2002) followed the practice habits of 157 elementary school-aged students.

Some agreed to videotape their practice sessions, so these were meticulously coded and every practice behavior was analyzed.

One participant, “Clarissa,” a 9 1/2-year old clarinetist, became the subject of a case study. Where researchers analyzed two practice sessions in her first year of playing and two practice sessions from her third year of playing.

So…did anything change from Year 1 to Year 3?

Some of her thoughts about practicing did evolve - she went from wanting to avoid difficult pieces in Year 1 (“I don’t like learning hard pieces because I find it annoying.”) to liking the “challenge” of taking on difficult pieces in Year 3.

But her actual practice behaviors didn’t change very much.

Mostly, she just played through each piece before moving on to the next - except when it came to one particular piece.

For one, Clarissa spent waaaay more time working on this particular piece. Eleven times longer, in fact.

And beyond the time she put in, there was a dramatic change in how she practiced this piece relative to the others too.

Unlike the other pieces on her list, Clarissa suddenly began using more advanced practice strategies like:

-fi*****ng silently
-pausing to think silently
-singing
-varying the tempo
-doing repeated run-throughs

So…what was it about this piece that seemed to unlock these practice skills that she clearly had in her toolbox, but didn’t bother to use on her other repertoire?

This was the one piece that she picked out herself.

Of course, this is just a case study. And students can’t pick out all of their own repertoire all of the time. And this is by no means the only way to increase a student's motivation.

But it was intriguing to me that Clarissa was capable of practicing more effectively - but only when it came to a piece or set of problems that she cared to solve. Have you noticed this in your teaching too?

Click through for all the nerdy details and a link to the full case study: https://bulletproofmusician.com/what-changes-when-a-student-selects-their-own-repertoire-a-case-study/

Are you a mental health professional or graduate student interested in performance psychology and working with musicians, military, business, and other non-sport performance domains?

APA Division 47 Section II is hosting a quarterly member chat today at 4pm Eastern, with guest speaker Jessica Bartley (senior director of psych services for the US Olympic & Paralympic Committee).

It's a chance to meet other folks in the performance psych world, learn from our guest speaker, and ask questions and let us know how we can help support you, whether you're a member of APA, Division 47, or Section II or not! 😁

Register here for the Zoom link: https://forms.gle/yfvdPvr33eBZ4bno9

Does staying positive ever get exhausting?

Turns out there may be such a thing as being too positive. Learn how to embrace a more resilient mindset when navigating frustrating setbacks, both in and out of music, in today's free workshop which begins soon (noon Eastern)!

(This is part of a free series of workshops hosted by Novo - which provides my business banking services - to support solopreneurs and small business owners)

Reserve your spot and join in here:
https://community.novonauts.co/c/upcoming-events/workshop-the-problem-with-being-too-positive-better-ways-to-navigate-frustrating-setbacks

There are lots of etude and technique books out there to help students develop their technical chops.

But what about the musical or expressive aspects of their playing? Is playing expressively something that can be taught?

And if so, how?

Music education researcher Robert Woody (2006) recruited 36 undergraduate and graduate pianists to study three strategies that teachers often use to enhance the expressiveness of a student’s playing.

Students were presented with three melodies to learn, and given a little time to practice and get comfortable with the short excerpts of music.

When ready, they recorded a performance of the melodies, and asked to play them in a “normal musical way, without doing anything special.”

Then, it was time to practice each melody again, but with instructions on how to play the melodies more expressively.

Some of the students reworked the first melody with the help of an auditory model, a recording performed by a faculty member.

Other students reworked the first melody with the help of concrete musical instructions instead. Specific cues and instructions like dynamics, hairpins, accents, dots, tempo markings, etc., that provided guidance on what to do with the passage to make it sound more expressive.

And then there was a group of students who reworked the first melody with a mental imagery prompt – a verbal description of a character like “Bouncy and happy. Rustic, as if you’re a happy peasant, with no cares or worries, strolling along, singing a song.”

So…which method worked best?

Well…all three types of instructions led to positive changes in expressiveness.

And there wasn’t one that was necessarily “better” than the others.

Each strategy had its pros and cons.

Aural modeling seemed to help students get closer to the expert model.

But it could be easy to get kind of lazy and simply copy the model, instead of using it to inspire your own interpretative ideas.

Concrete musical instruction seemed to help produce a more expert-level expressive performance.

But it tended to take more time and repetition than the other strategies.

Mental imagery was also quite helpful in facilitating more expressive performances, and led to “considerable” changes in many cases.

But the changes weren’t necessarily always musically appropriate!

So what are we to do with all of this?

The author notes that the “best” strategy probably depends on the situation.

There are times when an aural model might work best to help students hear a specific sound. Times when mental imagery could help add expression to an otherwise dry performance. And times when concrete musical instructions could provide a few last details to level up a student’s playing.

For more tips and details on how flutist Keith Underwood and horn player Julie Landsman use the aural model and mental imagery strategies in their teaching, click through for the full article (and look for the "Takeaways" section):

https://bulletproofmusician.com/a-comparison-of-three-approaches-to-teaching-expressiveness/

It can be tempting to give in to our perfectionistic tendencies, not just in music, but in our lives outside of music too. Which can be exhausting, of course - but could this also be holding us back?

I've partnered with Novo Bank (what I use for my business banking) to put together a series of workshops on ways to apply performance psychology to our everyday "performances" in life.

If you're wondering if you're the "good" kind of perfectionist or not, or would like to learn a mindset shift that can help take away some of the pressure to get things right and make the "correct" decision al the time, check out the first one on "Why Perfectionism May Be Holding You Back (And What to Do Instead)" right here:

Webinar: Why Perfectionism May Be Holding You Back (And What to Do Instead) | Novo Community Whether in sports, music, business, or life, it often feels like there’s zero margin for error, and we need to make all of the right decisions and perform to the highest standards when opportunities present themselves. However, this session with perfo...

I recently stumbled across an old video of me practicing as a teenager. It was pretty cringey on multiple levels, but a part of me continued to watch anyway, much as one might look at roadkill on the side of the road. 😂

Because it was sort of fascinating to see the level I had gotten to – even though I clearly had no idea what to do with my practice time!

What could I have done differently?

A 2021 study (Suzuki & Mitchell) of piano performance majors at an Australian conservatory provides some clues.

The researchers selected two short pieces by Faure for the pianists to learn in two one-hour practice sessions split over two days.

At the end of the second day of practice, the pianists recorded a performance of the two pieces, which was evaluated and scored by three members of the piano faculty.

And did the top rated pianists do anything different in their practice?

One of the big themes that emerged was that the top two pianists did a lot more practice planning than the others.

The “planners” sight-read through both pieces first and the highest-rated pianist made sure to identify the parts that were “difficult” and “harmonically interesting.”

The “non-planners” mostly began working through the pieces page by page and tended to practice more reactively.

Either they’d just play things until they ran into a problem spot, at which point they’d stop and work on it. Or, they’d just repeat the difficult parts without any particular plan.

All the pianists focused more on notes and technical issues on Day 1, but the top pianist began focusing on expressive musical elements on Day 2, like “shaping, dynamics” and more.

They even played through both pieces slowly, while “[over-exaggerating] all the articulations and dynamics and expressive things.”

All of the pianists alternated between moments of active playing and “non-playing” in their practice. But the lowest-ranked pianists tended to spend more of their time just playing continuously without any pauses or breaks.

The top-ranked pianist spent significantly more of their time engaged in non-playing practice – 24% to be exact, or almost a quarter of their total practice time!

They marked up the score (45 markings vs. 5 for the next-highest pianist), they did some singing, they were the only pianist to do any score study, and they were also the only one to record themself and listen back.

For me, the big takeaway is how important goal setting is to the whole practice process.

Before you start practicing, see what happens if you take a moment to look at the music, and put together a rough plan for what you can get done in the time you have. Even if you don’t follow the plan exactly, it’ll still probably put you ahead of where you would have been without it! 😅

There were actually a lot of differences between the top and lower-ranked practicers beyond the few points above. Click through for all the nerdy details!

https://bulletproofmusician.com/how-do-effective-practicers-make-the-most-of-their-practice-time/

Have you ever felt burned out by the time the day of a performance or audition arrived?

I was a chronic under-practicer for most of my life. So practicing too much was uncharted territory…until the time in grad school when I crammed for a competition.

I waited way too long to get serious about preparing. So as the day of the competition approached, I forced myself to practice way more than normal. I ate, slept, and breathed music, the intensity of my preparation increasing with each day.

By the time the week of the competition finally arrived, I was emotionally and physically exhausted. I needed a break.

The first round came and went, and when I found out that I had advanced to the second round, I experienced an odd mix of feelings.

Part of me was obviously excited, but a bigger part of me wanted it to be all over.

I still remember feeling overwhelmed at the idea of having to prepare for the second round. I cared about sounding good, but also felt a strong sense of apathy.

In the years since, I’ve heard others describe a similar sort of apathy before big auditions and performances.

Or difficulty getting back in the practice room after the big event, despite feeling guilty and anxious about not doing so.

Why does this happen? And is there anything we can do about it?

A group of German and US researchers conducted a study of 109 individuals (Sonnentag et al., 2014) to explore the relationship between psychological detachment (our ability to disengage from work during our “off”hours), exhaustion, time pressure, and
enjoyable leisure activities.

And what did they find?

You’d think that emotionally exhausted folks would be more detached and disengaged from work in their off-work hours. But actually, it’s the opposite!

When we’re exhausted, we tend to do subpar work, which makes us worry more and expend more energy, effort, and time trying to make up for our subpar work - which keeps the cycle of worry and exhaustion going.

The researchers also found that time pressure seems to make detaching from work more difficult if you’re already feeling exhausted.

This makes sense too, as the less time we have to prepare, and the closer we get to a deadline (like audition day), the more likely we are to worry, stress, and obsess about things, even when we’re not practicing.

So what can we do?

Olympic marathoner Keith Brantly once said: “Any idiot can train himself into the ground; the trick is working in training to get gradually stronger.”

In other words, taking time away from practicing doesn’t mean that you’re not taking your preparation seriously. Done deliberately, it actually means that you are.

Try making it a habit to intentionally disengage from work, recharge your batteries, and do what you need, so you can approach your practice time with a full tank of enthusiasm and focus.

For instance, one of my teachers advocated for a weekly 24hr period of no-practicing-allowed time. (I often rounded that up into something more like 36-48 hours, but that’s a story for another day 😅)

Click through for all the nerdy details: https://bulletproofmusician.com/pre-performance-apathy-or-the-importance-of-mentally-disengaging-from-work-and-practice/

In the world of college and professional sports, some coaches are notorious for using what some would consider a punitive (or abusive) style of coaching.

The music version being J.K. Simmons’s character in the 2014 film Whiplash.

But for better or worse, some of these high-profile coaches (or teachers) seem to get results. Which makes one wonder…

Is it possible that punishment could (…gulp) result in better learning than a reward-based approach?

A team of researchers (Galea et al., 2015) recruited 42 participants to compare a reward and punishment approach to learning on a video game-like learning task (it was sort of like a simplified version of Fruit Ninja 😆).

Participants were divided up into three groups – a reward group, punishment group, and control group.

The reward group started off with no money, but was able to win money based on their score.

Those in the punishment group on the other hand started off with some money, and would lose money each time they missed the target.

The control group also could win money, but they were awarded points at random, not at all related to their performance.

After a bit of practice to get used to the controls, the game began. But when there was real money at stake, the researchers suddenly altered the calibration so that the hand motion which used to make the cursor go straight up, now made the cursor go 30 degrees to the right instead!

Want to guess which group learned this new skill the most effectively?

Well, the negative feedback/punishment actually led to faster learning.

However…

Though the reward group might have been a little slower to adapt, they retained their new skills for significantly longer, so came out ahead in the end.

So what are we to do with all of this?

Well, to be clear, the results do NOT suggest that yelling and abusive coaches are right to do what they do. But the authors do suggest that there may be times when thoughtful and appropriate “negative” feedback (not yelling, but more like a frown) could be ok or even helpful in accelerating the rate of learning – after which rewards could be implemented to help cement the desired behavior into place.

This is obviously a much more nuanced and complex issue than can be explored in a short social media post, of course. For key details on why the punishment led to more rapid adjustments, and why learning quickly shouldn’t necessarily be a goal, click through for the full article: https://bulletproofmusician.com/reward-vs-punishment-which-results-in-better-learning/

Also, if you’re interested in learning more about trauma, especially as it relates to high performance, stay tuned! I’ll be releasing a conversation this weekend with sport psychologist Mitch Abrams who specializes in trauma and high performance, and we get into this topic in much greater detail. To get this interview right in your inbox, become a subscriber (it's free) right here: https://bulletproofmusician.com/subscribe/

We’ve all heard stories about super intense sports or music parents who end up becoming more invested in their kids’ activities than their kids are…

Of course, it’s not always so clear where the line is between supporting and pushing.

So a 2014 study (Kaye et al.) took a closer look at 73 competitive young athletes and their parents, to see how the parents’ goals for their child might influence their child’s performance anxiety.

The athletes were given an assessment to learn more about their athletic goals. To find out if they were more focused on mastery goals (doing one’s best) or performance goals (doing better than others). Or on approach goals (performing well) or avoidance goals (not screwing up).

The parents were also asked variations of these same questions, to find out what their goals were for their kids.

Like, did they just want their kids to perform up to their abilities? Or did they want their kids to perform better than the other kids?

The athletes were also asked to take a competitive anxiety assessment designed to measure several components of anxiety in advance of their next competition.

And were the parents’ goals related at all to their kids’ anxiety levels?

Yup!

Parents who had more performance goals for their kids (wanting their kids to do better than others, or avoid doing worse than their peers), tended to have kids who worried more.

Parents who expressed more mastery goals (simply wanting their kids to do their best and perform up to their abilities) did not seem to contribute to increased worrying by their kids.

Why is that?

The researchers explained that when children feel like success depends on how they stack up relative to others, they may worry about not being able to live up to these expectations. After all, they have no control over how others will perform, so this just adds to the uncertainty and stress of the situation.

This study offers just a small glimpse into a much larger and complex issue, but it suggests that educating parents about how their approach to mastery and performance affects their children could help them be better supporters and cheerleaders. 😁

Click through for more details and specific examples of what performance vs. mastery and approach vs. avoidance goals might sound like in the context of music:

https://bulletproofmusician.com/the-relationship-between-parents-goals-and-their-childrens-performance-anxiety/

Have you ever struggled to stick with the goals you set for yourself? Like, maybe your goal was to do more metronome practice this year. Or maybe to eat more veggies. But these things just have a way of getting away from us, no?

Researchers have been curious about “linguistic framing” and how different words could have different effects on how persistent people are in pursuing their goals.

Meaning what exactly?

Well, try saying “I can’t skip my scales today” or “I can’t look at Instagram during my practice break.”

Now say “I don’t skip my scales practice” or “I don’t look at Instagram when I’m practicing.”

Do those feel any different?

Ok, but how much of a difference could a simple word swap like this really make anyhow?

Well, “don’t” suggests that we have made a personal choice and commitment.

While “can’t” suggests that some external force - and not our own internal priorities - is stopping us from doing what we would otherwise want to do.

So in a 2011 study (Patrick & Hagtvedt), 30 working women who signed up for a health/wellness program were asked to submit progress reports for 10 days.

One group used the “don’t” approach, while another used the “can’t” strategy.

And was there any difference in the number of these busy participants who made it to Day 10 without dropping out?

There absolutely was!

The “can’t” group did poorly. Only 1 of the 10 (10%) participants made it to Day 10…

Meanwhile, the “don’t” group had an 80% (8 of 10) success rate!

So the next time you feel discouraged or tempted to stray away from the goals you’ve set out for yourself, take a quick listen to what the voice in your head is saying, and try to use the word “don’t” instead of can’t.

Like, I don’t miss a day of practice. I don’t practice with the TV on. I don’t skip scales and warmups. I don’t skip leg day. 😅

Click through for all the nerdy details: https://bulletproofmusician.com/boost-the-odds-of-achieving-your-goals-by-replacing-this-one-word/

“You seem so calm on stage – how do you not get nervous?”

“There’s nothing to be nervous about – you’ll be great!”

We often say things which imply nerves are universally bad, and that being calm is the goal for peak performance.

But is that actually how things work?

In 1975, Yuri Hanin, was invited to work with a group of Russia’s top divers preparing for the Olympics. At the time, a moderate amount of anxiety was thought to best for optimal performance. But what he observed amongst the elite athletes at this competition did not fit.

Some athletes were relaxed and confident, but did not perform up to their abilities. While others were extremely successful at relatively high levels of anxiety.

He found that there was no one-size-fits-all rule. It all depended on the individual athlete.

The data suggested that every athlete has a unique optimal zone of anxiety, and what matters is not if you’re calm or nervous per se, but if you’re in your optimal zone or not.

And calm is not always better!

For instance, a 1993 track & field study (Raglin & Turner) found that about half of the athletes actually had their best performances at a high level of anxiety.

But does this IZOF theory apply to musicians too?

A 2022 study (Yao & Li) of college piano majors identified 30 students’ optimal zones of functioning (ZOF), and then looked to see if there was any relationship between their anxiety scores and the jury performances.

And was there a connection?

Yes! The students whose somatic anxiety, cognitive anxiety, and self-confidence were inside their ZOF (innies? 🤪) had the highest jury scores.

And the students who were outside of their ZOF (outies? 🤣) on all three subscales had the lowest average jury scores.

(couldn't resist the Severance reference 😅)

Learning about IZOF theory can be really freeing, because it means that at the end of the day, the goal, physically, mentally, and emotionally, is not to calm down, but to try to replicate whatever unique mix has been optimal for you in the past. And fortunately, that is often much more achievable than trying to achieve zen-like states of calm!

If you’re wondering how you could identify your own Individual Zone of Optimal Functioning, there are more details in the full article, plus a link to the assessment used in the piano study to help students identify their ZOF (the Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 or CSAI-2). Click through for all the nerdy details:

https://bulletproofmusician.com/what-does-it-mean-if-im-nervous-before-a-big-performance/

One of my formative childhood teachers once said something like “If practicing feels easy, you’re probably doing it wrong.”

At the time, I was like, “wait…what? 🤨”

Eventually, I understood that he was talking about something akin to the “zone of proximal development” which is the area of skill just beyond what you can currently do, and represents the sweet spot for learning.

And where is that Goldilocks zone exactly? Well, last week, we looked at a study which suggested that this might be in the 85% success range, at least for perceptual skills (like differentiating pitches, sharp/flat, etc.). But would it be the same thing for motor skills? Like actually playing those pitches - and getting them in tune?

A team of Yale researchers (Al-Fawakhiri, 2023) developed a modified version of the video game Pong, to see where this might be for motor skills.

Everyone started with a baseline test of 10 trials where the speed and paddle were kept constant.

Then, participants did 70 practice trials, where the size of the paddle would change, making the game more or less difficult.

Participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups. And each group was kept at a particular success rate – 85%, 70%, 50%, or 35% – to see which would lead to the fastest learning.

And were there any differences?

Yes! Each of the groups improved, but the group that successfully completed the task (or Ponged?) ~70% of the time, and failed ~30% of the time improved the most. Significantly more than the 85% success group, and marginally more than the 35% success group.

So what does this mean for our practice?

Well, this study does NOT suggest that it’s ok to be sloppy and mindlessly make more mistakes and lower your standards of excellence. (Or that you should aim for a C in school and cite this study as evidence. 😅)

I think it’s more about making sure that you’re challenging yourself enough from one repetition to the next. That you’re really exploring the range of what’s possible - dynamically, expressively, etc. And not just putting practice on autopilot, where every repetition is technically fine but meh.

As in, if you can play something "perfectly" 10 times in a row, maybe you're not challenging yourself enough with each successive repetition?

It’s also a reminder that some errors can be useful, and help us pinpoint the specific adjustments that can help us get closer to our goals. Because when something is too easy, there’s very little information available on how to improve. Like, if you can nail a tricky run at 90bpm, that’s great, but it may not help you identify the adjustments you’ll have to make for it to sound effortless at 120bpm.

Of course, before you start aiming for a 30% error rate across the board for everything, don’t get too attached to that number, as there are a couple caveats to keep in mind. For one, the motor task that participants in this study had to practice was a relatively simple one. So the authors note that more research is necessary to know if this “70% rule” would maximize the learning of more complex skills with more variables involved.

Also, this study looked at the early stages of learning a new skill, where it’s helpful to experiment more freely and try new things to see what works best. The goals in this stage of learning can be very different from the performance preparation stage of practice, where there’s more of an emphasis on getting things right the first time, especially under pressure.

Click through for all the nerdy details:
https://bulletproofmusician.com/the-70-rule-why-practicing-shouldnt-be-too-easy/