Preparing For Concerts and Recitals

Spring has sprung and for many of you, the crush of auditions may be blessedly in the rear view mirror. But you might now be gearing up for spring recitals, chamber music or orchestral concerts. So many notes! So little time!

Organizing your time, whether or not it’s for an audition or a recital, is paramount to having a successful performance. Knowing what you need to work on, and how to effectively practice is a skill in and of itself.

Here’s a suggestion of one way to approach an upcoming audition or performance. Sit down with your recording device and play your pieces/excerpts in one fell swoop. No turning off the recording, no stopping and starting over. What you want is a snapshot of what it would be like to go out and play your performance RIGHT NOW.

While we can rarely accurately simulate an actual performance in the practice room, this is a great way alternative. I don’t know about you, but that red blinking light makes my heart race! So put yourself under pressure and see what works and what doesn’t.

When you listen back to the recording, note what passages need work. Make sure you target just those passages in your next practice session. Be sure that you work slowly and think analytically. Why isn’t that shift working? Why does that one spot sound uneven? Are you rushing a phrase more than you thought?

Being intentional in our practice sessions will help solve a lot of those problems more quickly than just playing something not cleanly over and over again. And the great thing about this kind of practice is that it actually works in less time than you think!

So organize your practice sessions and get the most effective bang for your buck.

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