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Personal Mastery or The Al Bundy Syndrome: Tips on learning
Over the years and through many conversations, people learn about each other. I have always appreciated the work of the Manchester Community Music School and through the last couple of years I have gotten to know some members of the leadership team. One person in particular, Jeanine Tousignant, Interim CEO of the school, learned that I play flute. Similar to that of Al Bundy who would often recall his touch downs in high school football, I have a recollection of myself being a pretty good flute player; I even auditioned for flute at a college, contemplating music as a career ( a few years ago).
The big day happened, Jeanine emailed me with possible dates to get together for clarinet and flute duets. I selected the furthest date out in the calendar to give myself time to practice some long tones and scales; get some agility back in my digits. With great excitement, I took the flute out of my case, put it together, lifted the mouthpiece to my lips, took a nice clean breath and what a surprise I had! Did my ambrechure fail me? Did I forget how to play? No sound was produced, just a lot of air. I quickly thought of Al Bundy again and wondered if I was going to get caught in the field, not being able to throw a footballseveral years after my hay day. No. That wasn't an option, something must be wrong and it wasn't me.
I realized that the instrument needed a tune up - but to be sure I still had the ability, I took my older flute out and voila, I could generate a sound. Ah, but could I still read music? I could read the notes, but I was more concerned with counting and playing with expression. The day came when I arrived at our practice location, Jeanine and I setup our stands, face to face and began to play. We had such a nice time and we sounded pretty good, I might add. My confidence was so much higher after playing for 20 minutes or so. My father was a professionaI and principal bassoonist. He and I use to play duets as well and while he never gave me formal lessons, I was reminded by a few things I learned from him, my flute teacher and even my own way of practicing that I believe can help us all in achieving and maintaining success in our respective worlds of work.
Play scales every day - this keeps you musically fit. Identify the basic fitness regime that will help you perform and manage challenges . We're talking about fundamentals, the basics.
Play a piece you know very well to help with warmup and confidence- Jump into the day's activity with confidence - spend only a limited amount of time here so not to get into a mode of procrastination and putting off the important tough work waiting for us.
Always learn a stretch piece - to keep yourself challenged. I have to admit, I did disclose to Jeanine that playing Johann Joachim Quantz's work, a German Flutist/composer was not my favorite. I suppose if the motivation were there, I would learn it. I much prefer Mozart. It seems easier to understand for me. Point? Take on stretch assignments that mean something to you - that will propel you toward your vision; always make the learning count.
- Play through and identify the tough spots. Research the situation and prepare strategies for navigating the challenges.. We identified a few tough spots. This also helps with time management. The time to learn the tough measures is not the day before the performance. When you plan for learning, consider the time it will take so you can perform with confidence and excellence. We selected a few pieces that we are to practice before we get back together. (Are you practicing Jeanine?)
- Master the piece measure by measure: Do not move on until you own those measures. Jeanine and I played a few sections repeatedly to be sure we were together and, to be sure it sounded good. Learn the processes of your world of work - one process at a time. Humans don't typically learn by jumping into everything at the same time. Concentration and attention to certain areas can springboard you into higher levels of performance.
- Connect several measures to begin understanding the whole piece. This is where we need to connect with the work before us so we can get a clearer understanding of the impact of the message.
- Commit to being a communicator when playing, say something!- Add expression. Now that I can play the notes, I need to know what the notes are saying and pay attention to how I deliver them. It's one thing to communicate clearly and it is another to communicate with expression and achieve a level of passion behind the message. We need to engage people in our message, being mechanical will not do the trick.
- Play through and listen to the progress you have made. Take stock and convert this into a comfortable piece. We need to hold ourselves accountable to learning systems. No matter how good we get at one process, one task, it will not be complete if we can't integrate that component as a contributing factor for making a whole system work.
- Practice with others and listen to others: Don't operate in a vacuum. Include people in your learning. This raises awareness and accountability to doing great work today and in the future. As Peter Senge wrote in his best selling book The Fifth Discipline, we need to cultivate personal mastery as an attitude and a way of operating to truly learn.
What is your commitment to learning? Your employees, your clients, your family all need you to be your best. By applying the basics, we generate even more and higher potential to realize.
Thank you Jeanine for this great experience. I'm looking forward to hearing our progress. Click here for more information on The Manchester Community Music School
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