once more into the breach…

I’ve been thinking a lot about practicing lately. Maybe that’s because I’ve actually been practicing lately. Or not. But I’ve been thinking about the process of practicing, and it’s really quite militaristic!

Most often, if I have lots of time before I have to perform a piece that I haven’t studied before, the practice scheme takes on the form of a major military campaign.

First, I find out what I can about the piece. I buy or check out recordings to see what some of the major artists of my time have done after their process of wrestling the piece to the ground. I find no shame in this – it’s my way of putting the adage “those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it” to work. I might also get some human intel by asking my colleagues if they’ve done the piece, if it’s worth the trouble, etc. That’s my reconnaissance phase of the operation.

Next comes what is usually, if I’m feeling especially limber and lucky, called the banzai attack. I try to read the piece down no matter how terrible it sounds. No rhythm or pitch can be too approximate – it’s a no holds barred, limbs flailing, whites of the eyes showing slash fest. I’d call it “shock and awe”, but in the end I’m the shocked and awed one, not the piece. I lick my wounds, retire to grab a drink from the fridge, and think about what I going to do next (while watching reruns of America’s Next Top Model on the tube). Good times.

I usually fail to avoid the banzai attack phase, but if I am able, I will allow cooler heads to prevail and instead probe the outer defenses of the piece instead. I might try the opening phrase over and over, trying different colors, shadings of dynamics, phrasings, and the like. Or if it’s really tough, just tune the crap out of the first line until it sounds vaguely like the recording. I don’t often go in to the interior of the piece – I’ve got the recon photos, so I know what’s lurking in there, and I know that I’m not ready for it yet. I usually feel much better about myself after utilizing this approach.

Often, when working on a piece, as in warfare, I find that I don’t have quite the arsenal that I need to breach the defenses. This is when I, if not feeling particularly confident, wonder how I ever got a job in the first place, and how long it will be before everyone discovers what a fraud I am and when I’ll be summarily fired from my cushy orchestra job, my viola stomped to bits, and my wife and cats taken away from me. If I’m feeling a bit more positive and empowered, I’ll take this time to see which etudes or studies might best get my quiver of technical tools sharpened and ready for action. I’ll spend days working on something that I should have practiced for years when I was 6 years old (and tell myself that over and over until I realize that I didn’t start playing until I was 9) until I have regained some semblance of a command of my faculties.

At this point the campaign can go one of two ways: blitzkrieg or siege.

The blitzkrieg approach involves daily hammering of the most difficult passages of the piece. Unceasingly and with increasing fury I will hit these nasty runs, double-stops, artificial harmonics and what have you with everything I have – hoping I don’t break on the rocks like an overextended, bloated wave. Usually I can only sustain this for four or five days of sessions lasting 2 – 3 hours. It’s not a pretty sight, and my mood after such sessions in usually a strange combination of foul and satisfied. After doing a blitzkrieg I usually then rotate the piece out of my practice routine for a week or so to let it fester and rot and think about what a bad piece it’s been to warrant such abuse.

If I go the siege route, I slowly work on each logical section of the piece in turn. Sometimes I can get several sections done in a couple hours, but more often than not my focus is like a laser on the details of one particular section and its trouble spot(s). I see myself as a sort of musical wood chipper in slow motion – slowly but inexorably devouring the piece phrase by phrase into my musical maw. [God, I can’t believe I even just wrote that, but it’s staying in.] I can sustain this sort of work for a longer period of time than the blitzkrieg, but it eventually takes its toll on me, and again the piece goes out of the rotation for a period of time.

I’ve found that, when preparing for auditions especially, a combination of the two approaches often works best. Some passages respond best to the quick, lightning attacks, while others need to be massaged into position with great care. I could be crass and say that learning musical pieces could be compared to the art of seduction, but I’m not French, so that’s not going to fly at all.

But the major thing that I’ve learned about practicing in the 30 years that I’ve been doing it so far is that you must start early, combine multiple approaches, and allow time for what you’ve learned to “marinate” properly. My best performances, either in chamber music, solo recitals, or auditions, have come when I’ve prepared well in advance, hammered the rep hard while also slowly digesting it, and allowing a period of time between the initial ingestion of a piece and the final polishing phase.

When major artists learn a new piece for their repertoire, they often go to a very small town or city to give their first performance, or play it at home for friends and colleagues. The step of performing something for the first time is perhaps the single greatest learning experience we performers have when working up a new piece. You can plan your best for how the battle is going to go, but once you step on to the field, all bets are off. Things can go FUBAR in a big hurry, and often where you’d least expect. I find that my practice sessions after a taped run-through or house demo are often the most productive of all, and that huge gains are made after these sessions.

After the campaign is done, and victory has been declared (a marginal victory, since work is never truly done and perfection never achieved), the clean-up phase comes. Stock is taken: what have I learned about myself, my instrument, and this piece and its composer? What can I do with this added knowledge and skill? And, in the best tradition of imperialist regimes: which piece can I tackle next?

Good hunting!