As you have probably noticed, I often quote professor, author, and vocologist Lynn Helding in this blog, and for good reason. She is widely recognized in the field of voice pedagogy for her work applying cognitive science to singing.
One of the topics I have seen her discuss many times is the difference between learning (or practicing) and performing. As she says:
Learning is…
-A process that takes time (weeks, months, years)
-Dynamic (requires effort and attention)
-Messy (doesn’t follow a straight line)
-Destabilizing (as old habits are undone)
Performance is…
-Refined
-A display of what we can do
-A reflection of where we are at one moment in time
-Prepared with an audience in mind
This distinction is crucial, particularly because I find that singers often approach practice sessions as performances as opposed to opportunities for exploration and learning.
For instance, if your practice sessions are all about making beautiful sounds 100% of the time, you may be performing instead of practicing. If you are overly conscious of the fact that your roommate or family member in the next room can hear you when you're singing, you may be performing instead of practicing. If you're running through your songs without going back to work on trouble spots or to explore different sounds and intentions, you may be performing instead of practicing.
Of course, we do have to practice performing. When you have a performance coming up, you probably need to stop exploring new options, start settling into your choices, and begin refining what you're doing. Your practice sessions then should be about consistently repeating the choices and intentions you will use in your performance. That's the best time for full run-throughs of your songs.
But when we are practicing with the intention of building skills and capabilities, THAT'S when we need to address long-standing inefficiencies, work systematically on all aspects of technique, thoughtfully problem-solve, and have the patience to stick to the frustratingly long road to progress.
Then when we do perform, we can step away from this tedious but necessary process and lean into what we CAN do at that moment.
In your practice sessions, do you ever catch yourself performing when you mean to be practicing? How can you bring yourself back into the concentrated, effortful work of practicing in those moments?
Now go practice.
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| Sometimes practicing can be like walking through fog, when the goal in front of you is difficult to see. But consistent steps forward will lead you to the destination. |
Absolutely! It feels good to sink into what I sound good on, and I have a tendency to do so. I can't wait to live in a space where I am not worrying about interrupting any of my roommates naps by singing Oklahoma 6 times in a row- and to know that no one can hear my mistakes. That way i'll be more free to make them. The freedom to make mistakes is KEY in any practice/rehearsal process.
ReplyDeleteThere are plenty of times when I feel that I am performing instead of practicing. One thing that I do know about myself is that I happen to have a tendency to perform. So I know that I need to be a lone, in a practice room, or even in my room with the door closed, to get in that mindset. I don't think that I can get back once I've gone to that mindset, but I know that and always try to set myself up so that doesn't occur.
ReplyDeleteThere are a lot of times that I feel like I am performing instead of practicing, especially in the practice rooms when I see people walking past. What I do to get back into the mindset of practicing is I remind myself that this time is for me, not for them. It can be for them later, but in order for me to give them the best performance later on, I need to spend the time on myself practicing.
ReplyDeleteYes yes yes!! Impatience has always been a bad habit of mine and I am gradually getting better at it! I’m beginning to start warming up more in the mornings to have a better start for the day! My previous habit is to just start up running through my rep without truly working on the technique for the piece, so I understand your distinction between performance and practicing. I never realized that I sometimes fell into that trap. There are occasions that I do work specifically on how to do a specific section, but sometimes I just want to run it through a couple of times and call it done. In the event that that does happen, I go back to the sheet music and start thinking more about breaths and actable verbs within the music.
ReplyDeleteI definitely used to be so hard on myself when my practice sessions were "messy" even in voice lessons with you. But as I've gotten older I've realized that's part of the process. I still haven't gotten into the habit of practicing performances though. I've dipped my toe in it but I still need to start doing that in lessons more.
ReplyDelete-Myles Davis
There have been SO many times when I've done this. This goes along with my problems of wanting to get straight to the end result and not putting in enough time to the process it takes to get there. Even during voice lessons I find it hard trying not to be a perfectionist the whole time. I probably don't give myself enough time to explore and be "messy" because I always just want to sound my absolute best at all times. I need to stop doing that and not worry about everything being perfect all the time.
ReplyDeleteI often feel that I can be performing when it is not needed, just recently I was thinking about how I differ in my headspace and tendencies when practicing and performing. I think I have a good divide of what I do when practicing but often I feel I throw that out the window during a performance, so maybe for me it has to do with my mind’s way of going about performance.
ReplyDelete- Tate Foshay
I frequently find myself performing more often then practicing. That is probably a result of living with roommates. But also because I think it’s natural to not want to bother people or to perhaps embarrass yourself with something you’re not quite ready to share with others. I see her point though and the fact that if I’m practicing it doesn’t all have to be perfect and performance ready. Much like in basketball if I’m shooting around and practicing I’m definitely going to miss more shots that I make, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t shoot the ball just because it’s at a public gym, where other people are also at, if I were to only shoot when no one was watching I would hardly get anything done. I think the best way for me to keep focused on practicing rather than performing, is to begin to take my work seriously as a profession and career and not be embarrassed of what may happen when I’m practicing that craft ,after all why should I care what they think in the first place.
ReplyDeleteJosh W
It is very important to make sense of what is practicing and what is performing. I know that a lot of times I am worried about how somethings sound and how I perform it when I should make sure that I stay in the process. I know that I can do a better job at focusing the practicing aspect and then making solid decisions when it comes to performing.
ReplyDeleteAlex Fish
I think I need to do a much better job at distinguishing the two. Especially since we are practicing to perform. I need to get better about focusing on the areas of improvement in practicing, and focusing on areas of excellence in performing.
ReplyDeleteSincerely,
JT Kaufman