Kim Collins, Flutist - Teaching Artist
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Flute Studio Blog

Thoughts, information, and inspiration about playing and learning for students and parents.  

Suggestions and requests for topics are welcomed.​

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If Things Usually Come Easily for You, This is for You!

12/15/2015

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As a student to whom academic endeavors came quite easily, I can say that when I entered the world of instrumental music, I lacked the dedication and perseverance required to learn an instrument.  (Yes, it's true.)  

I know there are many factors involved in successful flute playing, but some of the very most important ones are perseverance and an ability to practice in a way that assesses issues and addresses them methodically.  This, coupled with a little patience and a desire to never give up when faced with a challenge is a great recipe for success.

Personally, I was used to remembering something nearly as soon as I heard or read it.  I was used to being able to recall what I needed easily with limited study time.  I was able to write reports the night before and get an A even if they were assigned weeks in advance.  I could read quickly and I devoured literature at an astounding rate.  I was fairly athletic and coordinated.  I was even pretty good at the flute right from the start.

So where did things go awry?


Well, things went south when I tried to approach my flute playing like I approached everything else that came easily to me:  to do it quickly, assume I knew it after one pass, and to wait until the last minute to put it all together.  I did have that "love" of playing the flute that sometimes caused me to play endlessly just for the fun of it and I'm sure I was getting better while I was doing that, but once I began serious flute study with a serious flute teacher, I approached my actual assignments in the same way in which I approached my academic ones.  And this simply didn't work.

Because I was used to quick success in most endeavors, I had not developed much of a process for problem-solving...mostly because I never really had to.  And so, I would sort of gloss over any issues that came up.  I was still really successful at the flute, and excelled at my lessons and auditions, but when something came up that was really difficult to solve, I would feel like giving up.  Sometimes I would just give up.

I had developed no tools to fix what was not working.

It wasn't my fault; it was the result of the relative ease with which I had conquered everything else in my life.  Yet it was still something that would need to be addressed in order to truly succeed.  I had to learn that moving more slowly was sometimes a necessary part of progress; that repetition was not a sign of lesser ability or weakness.  That processing music in the brain doesn't always translate to motor skills without some mindfulness and, again, repetition.  I had to learn that when something did not happen on the first few tries I might have to develop and implement a plan, over the span of time, to achieve something.  

The two things I was lacking most were patience and perseverance in the face of adversity.  Oh, I could persevere with the best of them when I was already at the top of my game but when I was feeling like an underdog I didn't always find that place of devotion to the process.

I needed to learn that the way I learn and process musical challenges might require more effort and thought and more time than the way I processed most other things.  And to stop being completely flummoxed (I just love that word!) when I wasn't immediately masterful of...well...everything.  I had a bad case of I'm used to being good at stuff and failure is for the birds.

Obviously I did develop a process over time, but it was quite a journey to get to that point and I honestly don't think I really achieved a good formula (or a good outlook in the face of adversity) until after I had graduated from music school.  One of the ways in which I was able to gain great insight into the process was through teaching all different types of learners.  I learned that learners come with many different needs and "processes," and I did also observe two repeating trends among various types of learners.

Over time I noticed:
  1. Many (not all, but many) of my students to whom academic endeavors came the most easily have been less successful than they should have been at playing the flute.  And more frustrated when they didn't immediately do well.  Some of them were the least dedicated practicers.
  2. Many of the students I've had who have had to work very hard for everything they've achieved in school (ie., who have developed many methods of problem-solving and perseverance) have ended up being the most successful at the flute.  They also were usually better at handling disappointment.

Now, this doesn't mean that if you are one of those "quick learner" types that you won't succeed!  But it does mean that you may have to develop a bit more patience and a bit more of a process.  It's hard to excel immediately at everything flutistic in nature because muscle development and awareness and cognitive understanding have to find a place where they meet.  Sometimes our mind understands but our mechanics need more repetition for success.  And we can't get pompous about that because understanding something doesn't equate to executing something.  Our mind, always ahead of things, needs to learn to be patient while our muscles may need various techniques to catch up.

We need to be OK with moving at a slower pace occasionally.  At patience.  At consistency (meaning:  no more cramming for lessons the day before!  Or possibly, remembering to practice the same skill all week or month or year instead of just once or twice).  We need to practice stopping and thinking.  Basically, we need to be OK with trying and trying again.  At being mindful and developing a plan.  And at accepting that the plan may take time to unfold.  

And so, if you find you don't need much of a Process or Plan to learn many things, and if you find yourself frustrated any time you don't get something as quickly as usual, this post is for you, from one Reformed Quick Learner to another.  It's totally OK to have to learn music differently or more slowly or more methodically than you have ever had to learn anything before.  It's sort of normal.  And necessary.  :)

To succeed we need to understand our own self, how we learn, what motivates us (it's different for everyone!) and also to be willing to learn in many new ways to see what works best.
​
Please comment if you have anything to add, frustrations to share, or success stories to share!








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Willingness to Experiment

12/6/2015

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In a previous post, I discussed the "Rule of Seven" and how repetition can be of great benefit during practice time.  The key to repeating well is to repeat mindfully, using an approach or combination of approaches that help avoid mistakes.  

With that in mind, this next bit of advice is going to seem in contrast of the Rule of Seven, but it's really not.  There is a time and a place in practicing, most particularly in the early stages of practice, when making many rough or failed attempts is an essential part of expanding our knowledge and comfort.  I have been wanting to write about this for a while, and I was spurred to do so by a recent post on The Bulletproof Musician by Dr. Noa Kageyama.  (I love his blog!)  This post was titled "Perfect Shmerfect:  the Stage of Practicing When More "Mistakes" Could Improve Learning."  The gist of the article (and I highly recommend you take a few minutes to read it) is that, as we are learning to apply something new, we will need some room for error and experimentation in order to figure out which of the infinite possibilities available to us will actually work.

So according to the Rule of Seven, we repeat passages, notes, shifts between octaves, attacks, tongue strokes and the like mindfully many times to try to harness the "correct" feeling on command...but when we are trying to figure out what works in a new situation, how do we do it?

We must be willing to experiment.  We must be willing to step outside our comfort zone, to try new things, to stay longer and longer outside that place which is familiar.  Because outside of our comfort zone is where learning takes place.


One of the key elements in learning is a willingness to ​potentially fail; ​a willingness to mess around with something until the right elements combine together and create success.  It's important to realize that "messing up" is not something to avoid when it comes to learning a new technique.  I often praise students on an attempt to try something new that yields an extremely rough-sounding result, not because of the result, but because, through their willingness to sound rough, they are able to explore their options.  They are stepping out of their comfort zone.  I consider stepping outside one's circle of comfort to be one of the most praise-worthy, most valuable traits in a student and I praise this more frequently than any moments of perfection.

During my horse riding and training days, I stumbled upon a great book by Dr. Stephanie Burns titled:  "Move Closer, Stay Longer."  Dr. Burns has devoted her life to helping people understand the learning process and how our fears and/or discomforts affect our motivation.  I love her authentic, conversational writing style (very easy to read, not too cerebral) and her willingness to use herself and her own fear-based experiences to deliver a sound message about learning.  While this book is based on Stephanie's experience at conquering her fear of certain aspects of horse ownership and riding, her immense knowledge of the learning process comes through with flying colors.  This book has been sitting on the shelves of my music studio for years and I lend it out often.


She writes about moving more often toward the edge of one's comfort zone and staying there for increasingly longer increments of time.  Of course, much of this is discussed in terms of "fear-based" discomforts.  It's easy to say "the flute doesn't scare me!" but it's important to understand that any unwillingness to try and experiment is based on some sort of discomfort (i.e., a fear of some sort).  We are often unwilling to sound bad; to sound as if we have ​failed.  One of the most astounding points that she drives home is that going to the place where things are no longer good is not a failure, and it is not a place to fear; it is the catalyst for our own growth.

She writes (p. 73 of Move Closer, Stay Longer):  
​"When it comes to taking action, humans are notoriously good procrastinators.  Because we are designed to avoid discomfort, pain and fear and because many normal activities related to goals are boring, frustrating, painful and frightening, our brain is constantly engaged in the process of figuring out how to keep us away from experiences that lead to these emotions.  And, never more so than when fear awaits us."

Intrigued?  Read the book!  I promise you will find her strategies really interesting when you translate them to your own flutistic learning process.  Heck, they are interesting even when you translate them to life in general.  After all, this willingness to go toward and retreat from a place of fear or discomfort is how we get to where we want to go.

In a nutshell:  while we must repeat while fully in control to learn to execute certain techniques or passages on command, in order to learn something new or to expand our possibilities, this must be coupled with a healthy willingness to go to that scary place where we are no longer the master and to take some stabs at it until the dust clears and we realize it wasn't so bad to try something new after all.  
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