The Protocol Newsletter
Pressure doesn't erase your skill. It moves your attention.
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Pressure doesn’t erase your skill. It moves your attention, off the music and onto yourself. This week’s post is about why that happens and how to practice for it. But first, a story that isn’t in the post.
The night I prepared the wrong way
I’d been invited to play about two and a half hours of Motown with a group at a casino. Not on drum kit, which is where I’m most at home, but on flute. I’m classically trained on flute, which means I can’t really improvise on it. On drums I can improvise, read and do all sorts of things. On flute, I play what’s on the page.
I agreed anyway. It sounded like a fun gig. We rehearsed twice, and it went well. I practiced every song in the key it was written in.
When we got to the gig, they decided to change the keys.
So at the start of each song, I stepped away from the microphone and worked out three to five notes I could play, transposing my part in real time. That’s a lot of pressure. And I sounded terrible. I knew I had prepared, but I had prepared the wrong way.
It was also the very last day of my addiction. I knew that if I hadn’t spent so much of the previous 14 years in it, I would have had the time to practice things like improvisation and transposition. They were very kind about it, and they paid me. Of course, I never heard from them again.
Here’s what I took from that night: you have to practice in the environment you’re afraid of. Not just more hours of the same thing, but practice that looks like the stage.
This week’s challenge
Perform one piece for someone every day for seven days. A friend, a family member, a roommate. If there’s no one around, record it as if someone were listening, and keep the take, mistakes and all. Notice where your attention goes when someone’s listening, and bring it back to the music.
The whole idea, with the research behind it and three things to try before you play for anyone, is in my post:
Read the post: Why Pressure Steals Your Best Playing If auditions, recitals or gigs are where your playing falls apart, that’s the work I do one-on-one in My Private Studio. Everyone starts with a Discovery Session.
Keep pressing on,
Jake
If you’re rebuilding after addiction, or supporting someone who is, Recovery Resources lists free, confidential help available today.