Small Steps To BIG Performances (Coaches Corner, Episode 8)

Christopher: Have you ever felt intimidated or overwhelmed by a big performance that you knew deep down you really wanted to do, but it just felt way out of reach?

In today’s episode of Coaches Corner, Andy shares a really inspiring story of one of his clients and how together they figured out a way to get around that.

So we have a great episode of Coaches Corner for you today. It’s actually one where Andrew is hosting, I was absent that week, I think I was traveling. And so Andrew thankfully stepped in to host the episode.

And in this one, like I said, you’re going to be hearing from Andy about one of his clients. Together, they found this really clever way to kind of lower the bar and stair-step towards the big performance so that it wasn’t this big, intimidating, overwhelming thing off in the distance. It became a very natural progression for them to work towards.

Camilo explains how one of his clients needed to work up a new song in just a couple of days, and instead of doing it painstakingly, note-by-note from notation the way they normally would, they actually took a more ear-based approach. And this ties in really nicely with what we talked about in a recent episode on “Becoming a Rock Solid Performer”, how you don’t just want to get your ability up to scratch, you also want to think about being resilient and being robust so that if anything doesn’t go quite as expected, you’re able to handle that. And Camilo’s approach here was a perfect example.

And Andrew shares how he took ideas from one of our recent guest experts, Jeremy Mossman, who specializes in Body-Based Voice. And he used that to help one of his clients tap into their body’s innate wisdom about music.

And last but not least, Zac unpacks all of these surprising benefits of focusing on rhythm, from musical memory to singing, to confidence, and even to physical health.

All that and more in today’s episode of Coaches Corner. Here we go!

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Andrew: Hello and welcome back to another episode of Coaches Corner! I’m Andrew Bishko, Head Educator at Musical U, and I’m sitting in for our founder, Christopher Sutton. I’m also the Head Coach at the Next Level program, so I get to do a dual role today.

But anyway, this is the time where we get to hang out with our Next Level coaches and ask them to share some valuable nuggets from the recent coaching, things that can help you in your musical life.

I’m joined today by Andy Portas and Camilo Suárez, welcome.

Andy, do you have a nugget to share for us today?

Andy: I have indeed got a nugget. And I would like also to say what great fun it is to be working with our clients and a great honour in kind of helping them reach their goals.

And that’s what I wanted to talk about, one of my clients, today, who had the goal, a six months goal of playing at an open mic. Now, bearing in mind she’s never really played in public before, only in the Next Level open mic, the fear of the thoughts of doing this was really quite overwhelming for her.

So what we did was we kind of talked about how she could lower the bar and we brainstormed some ideas and she came up with, like, well, kind of videoing herself, making audio recordings, playing for a partner, close family and things like that.

So that being done, we kind of put that in the order of what’s going to be the easiest to do first, what’s going to be the most comfortable and kind of build up to this open mic she wanted to do, which is actually in her nearest city. So that was kind of upping the fear stakes a little bit for her as well.

So once we got that all in order, she decided to kind of put dates on the, on the various stages and got that planned up and ready. She then decided on three or four songs she was going to do for this.

And once we kind of got all this in place, it started feeling rather exciting for her, rather than something to be kind of feared, which was wonderful, to see that happening.

And now she’s started working through the plan and she’s done the first few stages and things are going wonderfully well. She’s using her practice space to kind of describe how the performance went, and she’s able to kind of self criticise the bits that needed kind of looking at and work on those bits and improve them.

So it’s been wonderful to kind of see that in action. She’s doing really well.

Andrew: That’s beautiful, Andy. I’m so happy you were there to guide her through that, and it’s wonderful that you, as an experienced performer and having been through so much of this yourself, could be there for her.

And it’s also awesome that she’s chosen this. A lot of our clients who come in, they have no idea that they even want to perform, but it’s amazing how many of them wind up being performers, because it’s really part of what it means to be a musician.

Andy: Indeed. Yeah. Yeah. With those that aren’t so keen on that, I tend to try and edge them towards something like that, because without the performance, you know…

Andrew: Absolutely, excellent. Beautiful. Alright, Camilo, what do you have to share with us today?

Camilo: I had a client this week who had this challenge that was learning a song on the fly, playing a performance in two or three days time.

So he said that in the past, when he learned a song, he felt very comfortable and secure if he learned the song note by note as it appears on the recording. Since we have only a couple of days, we discuss, how convenient would that be? Because many things can change.

If you learn a song that way, you might feel secure, but you also need other players in the group to play exactly the same as in the recording. Now, what happens if someone goes off and plays in a different key or decides to play different types of accompaniment? So sitting down and learning the bassline by singing or by simplifying first and then by singing long held notes would give you a strong framework.

So you will be that anchor in the band that would allow others to play with more freedom. So we worked on that, and the client is trying to experience both ways, learning note by note, that doesn’t really lead to a full comprehension and learning. And just the framework, the structure, in a more simplified way that leads to playing with more confidence and comprehension.

Andrew: That’s wonderful. You know, those basslines, they seem to open everything up, don’t they? And when you focus on the bassline, it’s like everything in between the bassline and the melody, suddenly comes into relief. I’ve seen that happen with our clients, too.

Wonderful. Really beautiful. Well, I’m going to switch sides here and go from host to coach!

And I had a wonderful experience this week with new information from our guest coach. We had as our guest coach, Jeremy Ryan Mossman, who is a vocal expert and part of, well, the founder of Body-Based Voice.

And he was talking about using the body’s intelligence, and I’ve been thinking about that and how that just opens up a huge amount of neurology for us to make music with when we’re seeing our bodies as not the things that we’re trying to control and direct, but as these complex adaptive systems that have the wisdom and that already know how to do some of the things that we want to do.

And so I tried this with one of my clients. He was talking about what a terrible ear he had. He was working in jazz, and he had to do all these half steps, and he was saying he was trying to sing them, and it was so difficult. He was having such a difficult time singing them, and he thought it was because of his ear, there was something wrong with his ear, and he would have to do all kinds of ear training.

So I said, you know, stop. You know, first of all, he was doing these chromatic exercises called enclosures, where you approach a note from half step above or a half step below, and then you zero in on a note.

And he was trying to assimilate this by singing them, and he’s finding a hard time singing them. So I asked him to sing it, and then I said, wait, now wait a second. Now, instead of just singing it, imagine it, audiate it, listen to it in your mind, okay? Which is something we’ve used a lot in Next Level, right? We talk about audiation.

And he did so, and he did a little better. And then I took a cue from Jeremy. I said, “let’s activate that body-based, self regulating, adaptive system. I don’t know the vocabulary precisely, but let’s activate all of that. And so I said “now imagine yourself singing it with a twang”, alright? So the twang added a bit of humor. He lightened up. And imagine yourself singing it with a twang. And so I said “no, don’t go right ahead and sing it”. And he took some time visualising himself, and by doing so, he was activating his body. His body was responding to his thoughts, saying “hmm, how do I make this sound?” And then we said “okay, now turn on the voice”.

And he did it, and he nailed it.

There’s nothing wrong with this guy’s ears! He’s hearing what he wants to play. It just was a difficulty in accessing his body’s wisdom in order to produce these sounds.

And he was, of course, thrilled about it and was really happy to see that.

So much of coaching, really is helping people access what they already have inside. And here was a really beautiful and direct way of doing that through singing and through the body-based wisdom.

Oh, and welcome to you, Zac! What was your nugget this week?

Zac: So recently in coaching I had a really, like, this was so cool, this breakthrough that happened, but from focusing on rhythm. It really unlocked the power when you just really just focus in on rhythm.

And my client, she’s a singer, and she likes to do sight-reading and read from scores, and she’s trying to memorise pieces. And she was also trying to work on her pitch, too.

But we had her focus on rhythm for, like, it was like three months. She was just doing rhythm syllables. She was doing rhythm walking. She was focused on doing rhythms with different expressions, just really focusing in on rhythm.

And she said that doing that has elevated her in all areas of her musicality.

And one really surprising one was her musical memory. So when she was trying to recall melodies, she found that if she focused on the rhythm and she could get the rhythm, then the pitches would also come.

She also found that her breath support for singing was improved because her brain was no longer worried about where the notes were falling, and she wasn’t rushing or dragging or pulling things around, trying to work her brain to figure out the rhythm. So her breath support was better, and her vocal expression.

Her confidence is better. She said she used to be in the choir, like, looking around at other people, trying to follow them for rhythms and movements. And now she’s really confident. Sometimes she’s the one that people look for.

And she said that rhythm has also helped – which I just love, I love this one, too – it’s improved her mobility.

She had some, some knee troubles, and so she’s been going to a physiotherapist and doing, like, walking. And so during her physiotherapy and her walking, she was also adding on rhythm exercises. And so she said that has helped her improve her walking.

Her actual, like, just normal day-to-day mobility has improved from focusing in on rhythm. I think that’s so cool.

Yeah, she says that she can look at sheet music now, and it “speaks to her”. And she can understand what’s happening in the sheet music, and then she says she can speak back to the sheet music, so cool.

And now she’s, her goals have expanded. When she first started Next Level, her goals were, you know, they kind of sound like some goals she might think someone else might want her to do. But the last time she talked about her goals, she wants to be Ella Fitzgerald and her, all combined into one person.

And she believes that she can work on this vocal improv. She didn’t think she could do vocal improv before, but now that she’s been focusing on rhythm and just doing kind of different expressions and playing around the rhythm, she’s like “oh, I can think I can do this vocal improv thing and maybe even do some of this high-level jazz scat singing vocal improv”.

So goals expanded, musical memory, increased pitching, breath support, confidence. It was crazy. All areas of musicality and even life were improved from her just focusing in on rhythm really deeply for about three months.

So it’s pretty awesome.

Andrew: Great. It’s so awesome to be with you guys for another Coaches Corner. I’m looking forward to the return of Christopher hosting the next episode, and we’ll see you next time!

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Christopher: Wasn’t that cool? As always, such a great grab bag of tips, and thank you to Andrew for hosting that one in my absence.

As always, I just really encourage you to latch onto something there, whatever snagged your brain or whatever connected with what you’re up to in your musical life.

Grab the idea, take it away, run with it and see the results you get.

That’s it for this one. Cheers! And I’ll see you on the next one. Go make some music!

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