The Bulletproof Musician

When I praise the family dog for doing a good thing, I'm not sure if it matters what words I say to him. He seems equally excited and happily wags his tail whether I say "good boy!" or "bad doggie!" …

I think we would all say that we value creativity and would enjoy having more creative students. But is this actually reflected in our actions?

Research suggests that we may not be as appreciative and…

You know that famous quote attributed to Debussy? The one that goes something like "Music is the space between the notes."?

I don't know about you, but I was certainly guilty of compress things and ru…

The legendary Italian tenor Luciano Pavarotti famously had a quirky backstage ritual that he needed to complete before he could go on stage.

Apparently, he would wander around backstage, scanning the …

The other day, I had to parallel park in a crowded neighborhood with narrow streets. I’m usually pretty good about getting it right the first time, but this time, I was feeling a bit of pressure from…

In the previous episode we looked at at study which suggested that having goals is good - but we’re more likely to achieve our goals if we write them down and create action plans as well (you can che…

'Tis the season for New Year resolutions. Which means your inbox and news feeds are probably overflowing with articles about effective goal-setting and how to form new habits.

So I thought it might be…

It's not great to make mistakes on stage, but how big a deal are mistakes when you're learning something new?

Is it best to avoid them right from Day 1?

Or is it ok to set the bar a little lower in th…

In last week's episode with clarinetist Jason Shafer, we chatted about the value of focusing on our strengths when performing - and not just our weaknesses (you can check that out here if you missed …

Is it possible to truly rid yourself of performance anxiety? Is practicing less as you get closer to a performance really better? How do you get past doubts and other mental roadblocks when returning…

When you put a lot of time and energy into preparing for something that’s important to you, and things don’t go the way you hoped, it’s pretty natural to feel deflated or discouraged afterwards. And …

The winter holidays are just around the corner, which means family, festivities, food, and lots of good things. But it also means end-of-semester projects and grading, holiday recitals and gigs and p…

In last week's episode, we looked at a study which tested a particular sound for its ability to decrease our anxiety. (Which you can revisit here if you missed it.)

I figured we might as well stay on …

Managing pre-performance nerves on the day of a performance or audition can be a real challenge. And it can get even more difficult backstage as the moment draws nearer.

Should we study the score some…

In an ideal world, we’d be building confidence in the practice room from one day to the next, but sometimes that can be easier said than done. It’s easy for the voice in our head to get very judge-y …

In many areas of our life (surgery, aviation, and dealing with bedbugs are a few things that come to mind), I think it’s fair to say that having really high standards is a very good thing.

Intuitively…

Other than putting our instruments down, what should we be doing during our practice breaks to mentally recharge our batteries and prepare ourselves best for the next chunk of practice?

Watch cute ani…

3-time Olympic diving coach Jeff Huber once said that he would get really excited when one of his athletes would approach him and say "Hey coach, I've been thinking..."

He explained that this phrase …

Have you ever wished audiences (or your teacher) could hear the awesome private version of yourself that you hear in the practice room, instead of the slightly less awesome public version of yourself…

If you’re reading this, I’m guessing that you have pretty high standards of performance in at least one area of your life. I mean, you probably wouldn’t be interested in a performance psychology podc…