Struggling With Getting Back Into Practicing After a Break?
Struggling with getting back into practicing after a break?
Me too! Here are three tips to make the transition easier.
Leave your equipment alone! One mistake I commonly make is to start fiddling with my reeds before I start. I think most classical musicians struggle with perfectionism. For me, putting off practicing and chronically messing with my reeds is just my fear response to not feeling good enough.
Give yourself a creative start. Here I am practicing with my puppy, Clover. I hadn’t played oboe in a bit, didn’t warm up - just grabbed an old reed out of the box, and sat on the floor so I could be near her. Then I started with a bit of improvisation. Actually, that sounds pretentious. What I really did was just make stuff up - a simple little melody in C major that didn’t have to go anywhere.
Being away from my normal practice space and sitting on the floor allowed me to get out of my box of habits and explore moving my joints easily while playing. Interacting with Clover kept me from getting bogged down in judgment. I paid attention to the way my body felt and enjoyed the ease and smoothness of my fingers. While I was playing, I got curious about starting low notes at the beginning of phrases - a skill I normally have some trouble with. I began to play scale fragments starting on low notes, alternating starting on different parts of a beat. I noticed, because of the freedom I felt in my body, this was so much easier than normal and I focused on memorizing that feeling so that I could repeat it. It was fun and Clover seemed to enjoy it too!
Make it short! My little 20 minute session was nice. I felt free in my body. I practiced a skill I usually had trouble with. It was interesting. I didn’t have a goal that I had to achieve. And I stopped when my embouchure got tired, before I would normally start tightening or pushing to keep playing.
