Here are my top 5 tips for practicing over the summer! I was a music major for 12 years in college, so I had a lot of summers to encounter barriers and learn to handle them. I’ve also helped countless students have more success practicing over the summer than I did as an undergraduate student.

Check out the tips below!

1. Practice Before Noon

After noon, events and activities are more likely to derail your best practice intentions. With the lighter school workload over the summer, there’s no reason to say no to an impromptu Sonic run or an evening movie, but there’s also no reason to let fun summer events keep you from practicing regularly.

Common roadblocks to practicing before noon

Don’t have much time in the morning? Warm up in the morning and then practice in the afternoon or evening!

You Like to Sleep In – No problem! If you know this about yourself, planning to practice at 8 am is silly and practically guaranteed to fail. Pick a time that you are generally awake, such as practicing right after a late breakfast.

2. Have Music to Play & Personal Goals to Achieve

It’s helpful to have plenty to work on over the summer because “What should I practice?” is the quickest way to kill your practice. You end up spending all of your energy figuring out what to practice and then you don’t have any left to actually practice. Ask me how I know this!

How to find music to play

I like to have 1) my go-to warm-up (plus some options for variety), 2) at least two solos, 3) be working on an etude book, and then 4) also be practicing other core areas like sight-reading, orchestral excerpts, intonation, and technique.

• FluteTunes.com – Lots of free sheet music in the Public Domain (not copyrighted)
• IMSLP.org – check out Reinecke, Telemann, Mozart, Quantz, Stamitz, etc.
• FluteWorld.com – Popular compilation books
• ALRY Publications – Digital downloads
• SheetMusicPlus.com – Digital downloads
• Libraries: National Flute Association Library & InterLibrary Loan (ILL at A-State)
• Piano accompaniment on YouTube: Color is the Piano has some excellent piano recordings of popular pieces!

Common roadblocks to having music to play

You Don’t Know How (or What) to Warm Up – Totally normal. I’ve been there. It’s only an issue if you don’t learn how to resolve it! Check out my complete guide to crafting your perfect flute warm-up at the button below!

You Avoid Sight-Reading Like the Plague – Practicing sight-reading does not have to be tedious or painful. It can be really fun!

Why not practice sight-reading by purchasing the sheet music from your favorite movie? Or read through repertoire that you really enjoy listening to?

You Don’t Know What You Want to Play

1) Consider picking music that will help you grow and improve in some way! Etude books are designed to help musicians address specific performance issues like articulation, intervals, technique, and phrasing. Pick etudes or repertoire that help you reach your performance goals or strengthen a weakness!

2) I like to pick one whole-summer piece and at least one short-term piece that can be learned more quickly. That way, I do not have to wait the entire summer to be able to play all of my repertoire. Mix up the difficulty and the length of your pieces and etudes so you get bursts of satisfaction throughout the summer!

How to set clear & meaningful goals

Speaking of bursts of satisfaction… Goals give you this, too. ESPECIALLY when they are specific enough for you to be able to check them off as “complete.” Daily goals that help you achieve your long-term summer goals will help you “move the needle” closer to the finish line!

SMART goals – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Based

Set your intentions for the summer, write them down, and then consider giving yourself some milestones every 2 weeks to help you stay on track!

Common roadblocks to setting goals

Your Goal Was Too Vague – Once you notice an issue with your goal, don’t throw it out. Fix it!

You Missed a Milestone – Did you get a little behind? It happens! We’re human. Maybe your goal was too ambitious, or maybe there were some summer practice barriers that tripped you up. Identify the issue and come up with solutions to prevent it from happening again. Then, either adjust your milestones so they are achievable or increase your practice time to catch up!

You Can’t Tell What Needs Work – Record yourself and listen back! If you think your rhythm is a little off, count aloud and find where your tempo/rhythm is changing. Listen for where your tone might become a little thin or where your articulation is unclear. You have the ability to be your own teacher by making it easier to hear exactly what you’re doing in a recording!

No One Knows My Goals, So Why Bother? Let’s discuss this in more detail in #3!

3. Create Accountability & Community

Have you ever considered why it’s so much easier to practice during the school year?

Ensembles, lessons, and other scheduled music events motivate us to practice today and not put it off until tomorrow! There’s often the added motivator that we do not want to be unprepared around our peers.

The community and support while in school help, too. We see and hear other musicians practicing and we can feel inspired to work hard, as well. With other musicians around, we’re less likely to feel like a lonely musician trying to do it all by ourselves.

Here are some suggestions:

Join a practice group on Facebook! “Etude of the Week” by Katy Wherry and “Solo of the Month” by Mark Wallace are excellent. These groups are filled with musicians who record and post videos of the featured etudes/solo, and the members are highly supportive. Both are positive and encouraging communities! You can also ask for constructive feedback, but no one will offer it unless you say so. (There’s also Etude of the Week: Amateur Edition with beginner/intermediate-level etudes.)

Etude of the Week

Solo of the Month

Create a practice account on Instagram. There is a huge music practice community on Instagram! When you post practice videos, it’s a fun and low-key way to track your progress over time. You and your friends can also post comments and encouragement! Check out the #100DaysOfPractice challenge on Instagram to see musicians all over the world working towards 100 (non-consecutive) practice days!

#100DaysofPractice on IG

Join the HabitShare app. This is a free and easy-to-use app where you can log your habits and share your progress with friends! For example, set up a flute practice habit, choose how often you want to practice (or which specific days), and then share it with a friend in the app. They’ll be able to see how you’re doing and offer encouragement!

If your friends log that they’ve practiced, you get a notification, too! It’s a nice reminder that others are practicing and you can, too. Bonus: This app also offers some really cool statistics over time!

HabitShare App

Use a proven time-management strategy. Lots of people struggle to manage their time, but you don’t need to figure out how to manage it from scratch! Try one of these methods and discover which works best for you.

• Pomodoro Technique – Uses 20-minute blocks and short breaks to Great for creative thinkers and anyone burnt out from work/school
• Parkinson’s Law – Work will expand to fit the time allowed. This isn’t a time management technique, but understanding it is highly useful for procrastinators and those who work well under pressure.
• Time-Blocking Method – Block out when you will do each task during the day. Great for working musicians and analytical thinkers.
• Getting Things Done Method – Breaks down each task into actionable steps. Useful for those who struggle to focus on one thing at a time and who might feel overwhelmed by daily activities.
• Rapid Planning Method – Trains your brain to focus on a vision of what you want so you can make it real. Great for working musicians and anyone with long-term goals.

Descriptions of these methods and how to use them can be found at the link below!

9 Proven Time Management Techniques

4. Make It Easy to Start Practicing

James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, shares that the best way to make something a habit is to make it as easy as possible at first. Then, when the habit is established, you can build on it. (Atomic Habits is an AMAZING book, by the way! 10/10, would recommend)

If practicing ever feels hard, here’s what you can do to make it easy:

Plan to practice for just 5 minutes. Set your timer, and at the end of the 5 minutes, decide whether or not you will continue practicing. Most of the time, once we start, we will want to keep playing (because we love it!).

Put your phone out of sight. Studies have found that “having a smartphone within sight or within easy reach reduces a person’s ability to focus and perform tasks because part of their brain is actively working to not pick up or use the phone.” Basically, even if you aren’t getting notifications, your phone is still distracting you.

Put your phone under your chair or somewhere you can’t see it unless you’re actively using it as a tuner or a metronome, for example. And while you’re at it, set it to “do not disturb” mode, or create a specific focus mode for your practice so you can practice in peace.

Create Focus Mode on iPhone

Start (and end) with something really appealing! There’s nothing like starting your practice with something truly exciting with zero baggage. Who cares if Lizzo’s About Damn Time had some finger blibs? It’s fun to play! Here are some more suggestions:

• Swap your long tone warm-up for Leia’s Theme from Star Wars or Window to the Past from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban!
• Breathe and stretch while listening to your favorite Laufey song.
• Practice your B minor scale with a YouTube backing track called “Tasty Hard Rock Guitar Backing Track Jam in B Minor.” (Yes, this exists, and it has almost 1 million views!)

Only you can make it fun!

No one else will do that for you, but you know exactly what you enjoy, so get creative!

Try not to let two days in a row go by without practicing. This is a personal rule of mine and it helps me immensely!! After two days pass, practice momentum is low, so it’s much harder to get started again.

5. Don’t Be Afraid to Take a Break

(But do have a plan for when to return)

Once you’ve achieved a certain level of playing, that level is always going to be within your grasp. Taking a break isn’t going to destroy your future or permanently damage the coordination you’ve built up. However, the longer the break, the more your muscles will forget, which means it will take longer to build up this coordination and stamina. Keep this in mind!

Many musicians find 5-7 days without playing is plenty of time to come back feeling refreshed. If you’re burned out, you might need 10-14 days, perhaps more. Listen to your body.

HOWEVER…

Sometimes we don’t need a break from playing the flute, we need a break from what’s fueling us to practice (shame, fear of failure, feeling behind our peers, etc). The summer can be a break from those harmful perspectives without necessarily needing to take a month off of playing.

Most often, we don’t need a break from playing music. We need a break from how expectations during the school year make us feel. For example, we might need a break from the pressure of deadlines, the feeling of “needing to make progress” each day, or the feeling of “never having enough time.” Try to give yourself a break from what you actually need time and space from!

Practice over the summer generally feels 1) much less stressful without pressing deadlines, 2) more free and exploratory, and 3) more luxurious because you have more time to achieve your goals. You also have time to implement all of the suggestions your teacher made throughout the year!

Common roadblocks to taking a break:

You feel guilty for not practicing. If you’re going to take a break, truly take a break! Give yourself permission to not practice or you won’t get the rest you need from the grind. Don’t let this balloon and fill up the entire break. It’s miserable and unnecessary!

Your playing skills are rusty when you return. Be patient with yourself and trust that you will get your abilities back. Start by strengthening your air and core support! These are often the first to become rusty. Then focus on finger technique. Identify which areas need strengthening **without judgment** and work at it bit by bit. It’ll come back!

I’m here to support you over the summer!

If you need ANYTHING over the break, please do not hesitate to email or reach out.

I’m happy to listen to your recordings, help you solve issues, and give you suggestions on what to practice. If you haven’t practiced for a while and you’re getting increasingly panicky, don’t keep that inside. It happens sometimes, and can eat away at you. Let’s schedule a lesson or create a plan to get you back on track!

Flute Lessons

I offer lessons over the summer, and so do many of my students! They can be weekly, every other week, once a month, or whenever you need/want them. Zoom or in-person. (As long as you have a stable internet connection, we can do a whole lot over Zoom!)

You can get started by visiting my Contact Page!

The post 5 Sizzling Summer Practice Strategies for Flutists appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Hey guys! Happy Friday! I’m psyched today because I found the perfect solution for TWO of my current COVID-19 practice problems: 

1) Decision paralysis and 2) Practice monotony

I realized that the freedom and sheer magnitude of things I CAN practice have been preventing me from practicing!

There are so many options for what to practice that I just can’t seem to decide! None of the options are wrong, but it’s still tough to pick something and just START. So here’s a fun solution:

A free app called Spin the Wheel!  

This app is colorful, extremely customizable, and easy-to-use! You can create all kinds of wheels and even share them with friends! (I’m not sponsored by this app or anything, I just think it’s awesome!) You guys know I’ll be taking full advantage of all the colors!

First, I’ll go over how to create and customize your wheel, and then we’ll dive into how to use it to improve your personal music practice AND your private lesson teaching! It only took me about 2 minutes to create my wheel!

Part 1: How to set up your wheel!

Step 1: Download the app and click “Add New” to create your wheel!

App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/spin-the-wheel-random-picker/id1467343690

Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spinthewheeldecider&hl=en_US

The homepage of your app will have some wheels preloaded for you, like a “Yes or No” wheel and a “What to Eat?” wheel. 

Today we’ll be creating a new wheel, so click “Add New” to get started. (I’m using an iPhone, so this might look slightly different on an Android!)

Step 2: Choose your color scheme or click “New Wheel/Empty”

I chose the “Colorful Rainbow Bright” wheel because it is cheerful and made me smile! You can also choose to create a new wheel from scratch, but for now, let’s edit a pre-made template because it will have all of the same options as creating a new wheel.

Step 3: Name your wheel and customize the choice options

I want to create a wheel to help me decide what to practice, so I named my wheel “What to Practice!” 

The “Colorful Rainbow Bright” template I chose came pre-loaded with 8 blank options. To modify your option text, click the little edit pencil in the Options section. 

It’ll bring up a little window where you can change the text color, the wheel slice background color, and even add your own image! My first option is “Long Tones,” so I’ll type that into “Option Text” and add a <3 emoji (because I love long tones!).

Step 4: Finalize wheel options

You’re almost done! On the bottom left, there are few more options you can customize. You can change the text size, decide how many times each option repeats itself on the wheel, and how long the wheel’s spin will be! 

Text Size: Making the text size smaller can help longer options fit better.

Option Repeat: If you have lots of options, set the option repeat to 1 so everything is clearly visible on the wheel. For my 8 practice options, I left the option repeat at the default 2.

Spin Time: If you want to build some suspense in your private lessons, try setting the spin time to “Looooong!” If you want to make a choice quickly in your practice, try the “instant” setting! I’ve left mine at the default “medium,” which still only lasts for a second or two.

Finished customizing your options? Click the preview button to make sure you like it!

Step 5: It’s time to spin!

Here’s my final wheel. It’s time for me to practice some harmonics!

Step 6: Share your wheel (optional)

This app also has some fun social features! You can share your wheel with your students by clicking the share button. If you want to upload your wheel to the Wheel Store, it costs 75 coins (the in-game currency), but you can share for free via text, email, facebook, and any of your favorite social apps! 

It will share a direct link to your wheel where your students can spin it in their browser without needing to download the app! This is perfect for keeping them engaged during online lessons!

Part 2: How to use your wheel in practice and lessons!

Here are 7 nifty ideas about how we can use this app to solve practice problems, lesson monotony, and lack of engagement! (Get it? Lucky Number 7? )

Personal practice:

1. Dump all of your practice ideas into the app and let it decide for you! (the picture in Step 5 shows what I’m deciding between this weekend!)

2. List the different parts of your practice (scales, articulation, harmonics, repertoire, etc) and let the wheel decide the order you’ll practice them!

3. Want to mix up which page of your daily exercise book you’ll start with? Put in some page numbers and spin to decide the page you practice!

4. Do you need to practice your technique? List some of your neglected etude books and let the wheel pick your fate!

Social:

5. Create a practice challenge with your friends or studio! You can have one person spin the app and that’s the number of etudes/scales you’ll practice today.

Private Lessons:

6. Let the wheel decide some numbers! Like how many times your student will practice this week OR how many times they’ll repeat that measure in a row with no mistakes! (Check out Step 6 above for how you can share your wheel with your students so they can do the spinning!)

7. Do you normally include the same order of operations in your lessons? Like warm-up/scales, etude, repertoire, sightreading? Structure is great in lessons because students feel comfortable knowing what to expect. BUT! You can keep that structure and inject some newness and excitement by letting the wheel decide the order of operations! You still cover everything, but the student will be curious to know what comes next!

 

There you have it! What do you guys think about this Spin the Wheel app? I love that you can include all of your favorite colors and emojis on your wheels! Will it help you solve any problems in your practice or lessons, or do you already use something like this? Let me know what you think in the comments below!

The post 7 Ways to Beat Boredom in your Music Practice and Teaching with a Wheel App appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

You’re sure to find something that will make the perfect Christmas gift for flutists everywhere, young and old. These items are all $50 or less, and many are under $20!

(Disclaimer: I am not sponsored by any of these companies or flute accessory websites, I’m just a fan of these products, and they’ve helped me and my students a lot. Enjoy!)

1. ThumbPort

This is an incredible accessory! This rubber and plastic gadget helps hold the right thumb in an ergonomic position, which frees up the muscles in your hands and fingers. I use it to make sure my thumb is in a healthy position, it stabilizes the flute, and it helps avoid hand tension that causes pain and slow finger technique. Nearly all of my students use this tool, too!

2. FluteGels

Another terrific flute accessory for healthy hands. If you ever find the flute slipping or sliding in your left hand, or if you get a shiny, sore spot where your pointer finger stabilizes the flute, this one is for you.

Flute Gels are small adhesives that are both squishy and grippy. Place one where you normally hold the flute and you’ll find it no longer slides, and is a lot more comfortable to hold!

3. ForScore App

This is the *most-used app for reading sheet music on a tablet! It has a bunch of great features. Import PDFs into this app and you can organize everything so easily by title, composer, tag, genre, etc. You can also create set lists to access the pieces you need for a concert quickly! It is great to have everything you need in one place, and you can use an Apple Pencil to

*Available for iOS

4. Manhasset Music Stand

There’s a reason why so many schools have these stands in the band room! They’re both sturdy (will hold your giant music binder or tablet) and nice and wide for large music folders. They’re not the most portable, but nothing beats having a sturdy stand at home where you practice.

This is the one item above $20 in this list. It’s in the $50 range but will last forever.

5. Flute or Piccolo Flag

These are some of the best swabs! Made of absorbant suede and designed to be a shape that is perfect for the tubing of a flute, they can get all of the moisture out of the top of the headjoint. I use my flute flab to swab after each practice session, and I use my piccolo flag to swab moisture in the middle of performances so the water does not stop up one of the keys. They’re awesome!

They come in a couple of variations – I recommend the one in two pieces that allows you to swab the entire instrument quickly without taking it apart. (Great for cold practice rooms where the moisture will condense.)

6. Flute Stand

There’s no doubt about it, it’s hard to put a flute somewhere safe outside of the case. A flute stand is the sturdiest option if you don’t want to put it away! No more helicopter flutes when someone bumps your flute off your chair, or a flute crashing to the ground when it’s been on a music stand.

This portable, fold-up stand is great for gigs when you need to switch back and forth from flute and piccolo!

7. Microfiber Polishing Cloth

These cloths are perfect for polishing your flute! The microfiber material removes dirt and oil without using chemicals or silver polish. It’ll keep your flute clean and shiny, and they come in all kinds of fun patterns!

8. Earplugs for Musicians

If you play piccolo or perform in a large ensemble, it’s important to protect your hearing. These earplugs are designed for musicians and reduce the dB of the sounds around but do it in a way that preserves the clarity. Unlike foam earplugs that muffle the sound, these protect the ears and allow musicians to still hear clearly. A great investment in your hearing health!

9. Spit Sponge

If you ever get water in your keys, this is for you! It will quickly absorb water droplets and dry your pads when you use it. It’s perfect for piccolo players because water tends to build up quicker in the smaller tone holes.

10. Pad Paper

Pad paper is helpful when you have a sticky pad. The sticky sound will drive you bonkers! Pad paper will help clean the pad and stop the sticky sound.

It’s a lot cleaner than using a dollar bill, but it’s important to know that you should never hold the key down and then pull out the pad paper. This can tear the pads. Try tapping the key on the paper instead! It’ll do the trick.

11. FIXIT Tool for Screws & Springs

This tiny tool is SO useful! If you have screws that like to wiggle loose or springs that like to pop off of their posts, this tool is for you. One end has a tiny screwdriver and the other has a hook that helps move springs back to their home so the keys function as they should. Great to keep on your keychain or in your bag for emergencies!

12. Pneumo Pro Air Tool

This innovative tool has a number of functions. It’s primary goal is to help show flutists exactly what they are doing with their airspeed and air direction. Pop it into the body of your flute and let it show you exactly what you are doing with your air. It helps immensely with tone and intonation!

Another benefit is that it can function as a way to practice without making an noise! Unlike brass instruments, we can’t mute a flute. This is a great alternative!

We hope you or your favorite flutist enjoys these flute accessories!

Wishing you a joyful holiday season!

P.S. Do you live in the MidSouth or in Arkansas?

Consider joining our next Community Flute Choir in Jonesboro, AR!

The post 12 Useful Gifts That Will Delight Your Favorite Flutist for $20 or Less! appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

But emotionally, they can also be a total snoozefest when they feel redundant and inactive. However, warm-ups don’t have to be either of these things! Warm-ups should be active, flexible, and inspired! Your warm-up needs an overhaul if you’re experiencing any of these scenarios that myself and my students have tackled in our private flute lessons. Can you relate to any of these? (I know I can!)

1. Your warm-up is the same every day and you’re dying to mix it up a little
2. You go on auto-pilot and mentally check out while warming up to get to the fun stuff quicker
3. You skip warming up entirely because you either aren’t sure what to play, how it will help, or you’re simply tired of it

Ouch! These realities don’t paint a very pretty picture, and if you’re experiencing these kinds of situations on a regular basis like so many musicians do, your practice sessions will be more difficult and uninspired from the get go (which makes it hard to even START practicing). But don’t worry, today I have some solutions so you can maximize your warm-up time without it zapping all your willpower before you even get to your repertoire. 

Because like everything in music, the question is not IF you can make practice enjoyable, the question is HOW! Let me show you how to craft a killer warm-up that can adapt to your needs, mood, and energy level!

But before we dive into my favorite flute warm-ups and how you can craft yours on any wind instrument, I want to make sure you understand WHY warm-ups are so crucial! When we understand why and how things work in music, we make educated decisions and feel motivated to unlock the benefits we know are in the near future!

Why You Need to Warm Up

Every professional musician warms up before their practice and performances (when possible). But if you’re like me as a young fluteling, you’re probably wondering why exactly this is! Are warm-ups an ancient music tradition passed down from generation to generation? Does it deserve to have a place in modern music-making?

The answer is yes to both! Musicians have experienced the benefits of warming up for a very long time, but we also know more than ever about exactly why it is important. 

Here are a few benefits of warming-up:

1. It helps your finger, tongue, embouchure, and body muscles prepare for an ultra-precise, specialized workout
2. It helps you settle your mind and focus effectively on your playing
3. It helps prevent repetitive strain injuries

And perhaps my favorite:

4. It takes however you sound today (good or bad) and helps you play at peak performance!

We’re not going to sound our best at the beginning of each practice session. It’s just not a realistic or plausible outcome (even for the pros)! So I want to take a moment to bust two BIG practice myths that I’ve seen countless musicians fall for (especially high school students and adults):

Practice Myth #1: If you don’t sound your best when you start practicing, you’re doing something wrong OR your focus/mindset/mood isn’t right.

Practice Myth #2: If you don’t sound good at the beginning of your practice, you won’t have a good practice session.

Both are FALSE.

We tend to think that we play our instruments with our mind, so if we don’t sound “right,” we think our mind or thoughts are the problem. 100% untrue. The reality is, our bodies play the flute, and our bodies are a little different every single day. If we sound different than we expect, we need to warm up and remind our muscles how they need to work to play our best.

There are all kinds of reasons why we sound different every day. Maybe we slept a bit funny last night and we’re feeling stiff, maybe we ate a lot of salt yesterday and our muscles are retaining more water today, and maybe we’re feeling anxious and we’re holding our muscles a little tighter than normal. There are lots of reasons, but as long as we have a complete warm-up that meets specific requirements, the outcome of our warmup will always be the same: We’ll play our best!

How to Know if Your Warm-Up is Actually Working

Useful warm-up routines need to check certain boxes. Once you know what these boxes are, there are all kinds of exercises you can use to create a comprehensive warm-up! 

For wind musicians, there are 4 areas we want to warm up before we practice:

1. Air, breathing, and tone (these are all linked!)
2. Fingers and technique
3. Articulation and tonguing
4. Intervals

This is also a highly effective order to structure your warm up! Think about it, our air is the core of everything we do on our instruments. If we don’t warm up our breathing or our air usage, it will disrupt the evenness of our fingers, the clarity and speed of articulation, and the smoothness of our intervals. Without warming up your air, none of these things will work right, so start from the ground up! Your air is the base of the pyramid, and each category higher on the pyramid relies on a strong foundation of air.

Air, Breathing, and Tone Warm-Ups

Begin by warming up your air with breathing exercises; long tones; or simple, slurred passages to give your playing a strong foundation of air (flow, quantity, and speed), quality breathing, and a beautiful tone. This part of your warm-up should also include vibrato if your instrument uses vibrato! However, I recommend starting with a straight tone first so you can hear if your airstream is steady. (Vibrato can mask things like inconsistent airspeed, tone quality, intonation, and poor air control.)

Pro tip: Make sure you play EVERY note in your range, from your lowest note to your highest note. If you don’t, the notes you skip in the low and high registers will be the ones that get neglected and rusty over time.

Depending on how easily your air is flowing, warming up your air may take more or less time than you expect. When I haven’t slept well or I’m playing early in the morning, it takes me extra time to get my air to where it needs to be. Physically, my muscles are still a bit sleepy! But any less-than-ideal starting point doesn’t worry me anymore because I trust my warmup will get me across the finish line. You can, too!

How do you know when to move on from air to fingers and technique?

I use my ear and body awareness as diagnostic tools. I ask myself, “Is my air FEELING free and easy yet?” and I answer myself honestly. If I feel like I’m working too hard to move my air, I’m relying too much on my embouchure, or I’m tensing up my throat or body, I’m not quite done yet. 

Once your air is flowing, your body is feeling comfortable with the notes in your range, and your ear is telling you your sound is rich and focused, it’s time to move on to your fingers!

Finger and Technique Warm-Ups

Remember how I said warming up is like a pyramid? Here’s where this analogy really helps. When you’re warming up your fingers, your fingers aren’t working in a vacuum. You aren’t really only warming up your fingers in this section. You’re warming up your fingers while continuing with your best sound and proper air usage.

Make sure that any quick or tricky technique exercises aren’t sacrificing your tone quality or air usage or you’re not going to be able to play these technical exercises in your repertoire with a lovely sound. In other words, don’t let your air know what your fingers are doing!

What can you use to warm up your fingers? Slur anything that appears frequently in your etudes, ensemble music, or solos! Music is made up of scales, arpeggios, triads and seventh chords, and intervals, so infuse your fingers with practical theory knowledge with common musical elements like chromatic scales, major/minor scales, scale patterns, thirds, and triads (major/minor/diminished/augmented). You can also go further and dive into seventh chords, more intervals (minor thirds, fourths, fifths, etc.), whole tone scales, octatonic scales, and broken arpeggios (when the chords are not in root position [inversions]).

There are a lot of options for technique practice, so be strategic about what you tackle by asking yourself two questions: 

1) Which exercises will be useful today? 

And also think ahead: 

2) Which exercises will help me improve my weak areas? 

Choose exercises that answer both of these questions.

The benefits of #1 are pretty obvious! You warm up what you have to do today in your etudes, solos, ensemble music, etc. But let’s expand a bit on #2. If we only ever practice and warm-up with question #1, the music we are currently playing determines the areas of our playing that are strong and frequently covered. This can mean that certain areas get perpetually neglected. It might be a note or two, or it could be a HUGE area like not playing the sharp scales. This may or may not be a problem today, but it WILL affect our flexibility in the short-term and our abilities and skill in the long-run. 

For example, if we encounter different kinds of technical passages in sightreading, receive new ensemble music, or are suddenly offered a substitute position in an orchestra or chamber ensemble, we want our fingers to be prepared! 

We can’t limit our technique warm-up to only what we plan to practice today, so make sure you address any weak areas and regularly rotate through different techniques so your fingers are fresh and always have the latest software update!

Just like when you’re warming up your air and sound, you know you’re done when you’ve 1) covered all your bases and 2) your fingers are moving quickly, evenly, and easily! Use your ear and check in with your body to know when you’re ready to move on.

Articulation and Tonguing Warm-Ups

Once your air and fingers are warmed up, it’s time to warm up the strongest muscle on your body for its size: the tongue! Articulation can be sluggish before we warm up, and articulation may not line up with the fingers.

My favorite way to warm up articulation is by alternating slow and fast articulated notes. For example, I like taking my favorite scale passage and playing it with the rhythm: 8th – 16th – 16th so my tongue is moving quickly for the 16ths but rests a bit on the 8th-notes. Another example is a quarter note and then 4 16th-notes. Giving my tongue time to rest in-between faster articulations feels like a gentle way to wake up my articulation. It also helps me avoid tensing up my tongue by throwing it into the deep end of the pool with straight 16th notes!

Pro tip: When warming up articulation, start with a long note and then short notes. It’ll help you move your air for the long note, which will continue through your shorter articulated notes. The air needs to move, always!

What can you use to warm-up your articulation? You can ask yourself, “What didn’t I cover in my technique warm-up?” Because we’re building on top of air and technique, you can get more bang for your buck if you combine articulation with technique practice like scale passages! As your articulation becomes quicker and cleaner through your warm-up, you can increase your tempo and eventually tongue faster rhythms like straight 16th notes.

Don’t forget about the pyramid, though: Make sure you use plenty of air and clean technique while warming up your articulation! Even the cleanest articulation with an undesirable sound will be unpleasant to listen to in our repertoire, so we don’t want to reinforce this in our warm-ups.

Interval Warm-Ups

The last area you want to warm up is intervals, which involves slurring notes to control your embouchure and air speed. Depending on your instrument, you may warm up your embouchure more or less than other instruments. For example, intervals are crucial for brass player’s embouchures. On flute, they’re more important for not overusing our embouchure and creating a flexible air speed instead.

Which intervals are helpful? Octaves are invaluable because they are sprinkled all over our music! But in truth, anything wider than a third or a fourth can help you warm up your embouchure muscles and your air speed. Even full-range arpeggios up and down will fit the bill! (Just like in the technique section, broken arpeggios can be helpful here, too.) Exercise your full range with wide intervals until 1) Each note speaks cleanly right away (smooth connections between the notes), and 2) Your tone quality and intonation are spot-on.

And that’s it! Once you’ve hit these 4 areas and built your pyramid, you can trust that you’ve set yourself up to play your music your very best!

Help! My Warm-Up Routine is Too Repetitive and I’m Uninspired…

The beauty and inspiration of warming up comes from having different exercises on hand or in a rotation so everything feels fresh. Knowing the boxes to check and having a few exercises meet the requirements means your warm-up can vary slightly every day (hello variety)! They can also be tailored to be longer or shorter depending on the time you have available (for flexibility in your schedule). And most of all, they can ensure you’re sounding fabulous by the end!

We’re aiming for the perfect balance of routine and novelty! Here’s why this combo works. If you don’t have a set routine or core exercises you can rely on, you’re going to be making a lot of decisions at the beginning of your practice. Each decision takes time and energy, and can also lead to decision fatigue! 

It doesn’t make sense to spend all your decision energy before you get to the meat of your practice (just like in sports, it doesn’t make sense to tire yourself out with your warm-up before you start the match)!

On the flip side, having one set routine that you use every day can get dull quicker than Emmanual Pahud plays Voliere from Carnival of the Animals! Although a set daily routine may work for some, many of us need some variety to stay inspired and present in the moment. All you have to do is pick exercises that check the boxes, and they can vary depending on what you need and what you feel like playing!

Practice Energy Hack!

Before we get into the specific exercises I use on the flute, here’s one last tip that has helped me START practicing when I don’t feel like it more times than I can count. It’s simple and one of my favorite energy hacks!

If you have a lot of energy and don’t feel like you can focus: Warm up while walking around! 

When I have a lot of energy or I’m feeling a bit anxious, the idea of sitting down for a detailed and diligent practice session can feel impossible! Walking around as you play will help you gently harness your focus, get out of your head and into your body, and you won’t feel trapped to one spot or tied to a chair.

If you are wiped out and are low on energy: Start warming up while sitting down. 

Generally we’ll discover more energy as we play, so you can stand up when you’re ready! A cold glass of water and a good stretch goes a long way, too.

My Flute Warm-Up Routine

Here are my favorite exercises for warming up these 4 areas on the flute! I have a variety of exercises for each category so I can pick and choose what speaks to me today, feels most useful, or will help me address my weaknesses. I generally pick a few in each category if I have the time. Here are the core exercises I use the most frequently! Enjoy!

Tone:

Technique:

Articulation:

Intervals:

• Harmonics (First 4 notes in the overtone series, especially)

• 7 Daily Exercises – Reichert
  • 3 and 5

• 17 Daily Exercises – Taffanel and Gaubert
  • 10 is invaluable! As are the broken arpeggio versions afterward.

• 28-Day Warm-Up Book – Paul Edmund Davies (advanced)

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About the Author | Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, Flutist, Educator, & Gamification Guru

Hi! It’s so nice to meet you! Thanks for stopping by my blog! My name is Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, and I’m a professional flutist and music educator in Phoenix, AZ. I use gamification to help musicians and educators like you hack your motivation, organize your time, and level up your performance skills so you can create the musical reality of your dreams! And I help music educators activate this same superpower for their students, too. 

If you enjoyed this post, be sure to check out the digital resources I’ve created for musicians like you or sign up for private flute lessons!

Have fun and game on,

The post How to Craft the Perfect Warm-Up Routine appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Feeling a bit crafty this holiday season while we’re all stuck at home? Do you have unused sheet music laying around? Instead of sending it to the recycling bin, repurpose your sheet music and create some fun holiday decorations instead!

I’ve rounded up 5 of my favorite festive decoration tutorials for you to DIY this year! Enjoy!

1. 3-D Vintage Sheet Music Ornaments

I love these 3-D ornaments! They’re elegant and perfect for your practice space or music studio!

2. Sheet Music Baubles

I highly recommend you print an extra copy of your favorite piece of music and give it new life with this ornament! Bonus tip: Use a metallic paint pen to write the year(s) that you performed this piece for a trip down memory lane each year.

3. Vintage Sheet Music Ornaments

How cute are these ornaments? What would you put in the center: Vintage Santa’s, your family’s faces, or pictures of your pets? I think I’ll put pictures of my dogs in the center of these. What?? They’re the ones helping me get through this pandemic with some sanity left.

4. Snowy Winter Sheet Music Trees

These sheet music trees are simply gorgeous! Anyone who is a fan of white holiday decor should definitely add these to their to-do list.

5. Sheet Music Star of David

If you’re skilled at origami, try your hand at making a Star of David! If you’re like me and are origami-challenged, here are a couple simpler fold-and-cut options.

Easy Fold-and-Cut and Intermediate Fold-and-Cut

I hope you enjoyed these holiday craft ideas and tutorials! Which ones will you be making this year? Let me know which idea was your favorite AND which piece of music you’ll be using in the comments below! Happy Holidays!

About the Author | Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, Flutist, Educator, & Gamification Guru

Hi! It’s so nice to meet you! Thanks for stopping by my blog! My name is Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, and I’m a professional flutist and music educator in Jonesboro, AR. I use gamification to help musicians and educators like you hack your motivation, organize your time, and level up your performance skills so you can create the musical reality of your dreams! And I help music educators activate this same superpower for their students, too. 

The post 5 Festive Holiday Sheet Music Decorations to DIY at Home appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Should Musicians Avoid Mistakes?

I’ll admit, I’m a bit fired up about the topic of mistakes lately, so I hope you’ll read to the end because it’s an incredibly important topic!

I see so many musicians weighed down by each mistake they make, apologizing for not being “better” instead of appreciating what they CAN do and how far they’ve come! Musicians, this is holding us back when we’re trying to move forwards. It’s making us miserable when we could be joyful and inspired. When we’re thankful for where we are and what we can do, we’re also excited about where we can go next! (It’s the opposite of guilt-tripping ourselves for not already being there. )

You see, musicians don’t become professionals because they never make mistakes. I don’t teach flute at a college because I play everything perfectly and know everything. I didn’t make it through 12 years of music school by avoiding mistakes in the practice room and lessons. (It’s simply not possible!)

As musicians of any age and skill level, it’s time to flip our mindset here collectively. I know without a doubt that I’m more successful as a musician and a teacher BECAUSE I’ve made what feels like nearly every mistake possible. Those mistakes helped me learn how to manage issues, and more importantly, how to prevent them in the future! (For example, now I’m an expert in mistake recovery during performances, a skill I couldn’t be more thankful for!) Each mistake is a page in a book, and I’ve got a library full of books that have helped me become a stronger, more capable player.

Friends, mistakes are not a judges gavel condemning our playing as forever “not good enough.” Mistakes are a door to walk through, a road map telling us where to go next. We need to listen to what those mistakes are telling us instead of rejecting their friendly (but offputting) help. My mistakes often tell me what I should practice more, what I need more guidance on, and what’s possible if I keep trying. Yes, they can be unpleasant and uncomfortable! But I’m also thankful for those friendly neon signs that tell me where to go next. Without them, I’d be lost.

If musical skill is a linear path, you are where you are. From there, you have two choices: 1) Wish you were farther on the path and feel bad for where you aren’t yet (which is highly unpleasant and focuses your attention and appreciation on the future where you have no control). Or 2) Appreciate where you are by recognizing how far you’ve come (which is so much more enjoyable and gives you control over the time you have RIGHT NOW).

Today, I’d like you to trust and take comfort from two facts:

You are exactly where you need to be.

You WILL get to where you want to be. It’s only a matter of figuring out HOW, not if.

(If you’ve tried everything and still can’t get there, others can help make it easier to figure out the “how!” Teachers, friends, family, outside experiences, aka things that can’t be found in a practice room…)

So if you’re a musician feeling burdened by your mistakes or struggles today, let’s all take a moment to recognize and remember all of the incredible progress we’ve made!!

How have your mistakes helped you grow as a musician? What kinds of things are you more skilled at than a year ago? Let me know in the comments so I can celebrate with you!

Say hello!

If you’d ever like to talk about how YOU can improve your musical journey with a healthy mindset, creativity, or gamification, I’d love to talk to you! Head on over to the Contact page to say hello, or check out my spiffy Practice Hack Stack Game if you want to level up your practice skills!

Have fun and game on,

About the Author | Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, Flutist, Educator, & Gamification Guru

Hi! It’s nice to meet you! Thanks for stopping by my blog! My name is Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, and I’m a professional flutist and music educator in Phoenix, AZ. I’m a firm believer in making all activities as fun and enjoyable as possible, especially with music games and gamification! I use gamification to help musicians and educators like you hack your motivation, organize your time, and level up your performance skills so you can create the musical reality of your dreams! And I help music educators activate this same superpower for their students, too. 

Join the Sunshine Squad

If you enjoyed this post, you are welcome to join my Facebook group, the Sunshine Squad: A Joyful Community for Classical Musicians! This community is for classical musicians and music educators that want to beam joy into their performing and teaching careers with creativity, games, and a healthy mindset!

www.facebook.com/groups/sunshinesquadmusic

The post Should Musicians Avoid Mistakes? appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Hi there! If you’re new to music gamification, welcome to the high-performance game squad!!

You’re probably here because you want to learn about how to use gamification to level up your music practice or private lesson teaching. (Or maybe you’re totally bewildered by a weird word called “gamification” and you’re curious to learn more.)

Look no further, because you’re exactly where you need to be! If music gamification is new to you, I hope it’s made a grand entrance into your life at the perfect time, just like it did for me!

I’m excited to share with you 3 quick and easy ways you can use gamification to start off the new school year with musical enthusiasm and motivation!

Hang on a sec, what is gamification?

Gamification is when we apply game elements to real-world or productive activities. It’s basically a way to make activities more enjoyable, productive, and, dare I say, even irresistible! There are all kinds of game elements, but a few popular examples are interactivity, levels, points, avatars, and in-game currencies. Other game elements can include the format or type of game, such as card games or board games. Because there are so many different kinds of games, there are also endless possibilities of how we can combine game elements and music with gamification!

One of my favorite examples of music gamification is in my shop: I turned my best practice techniques into a card game called the Practice Hack Stack! Handing a musician a list of practice techniques as a wall of text is intimidating and ineffective, so I put each practice technique on a card and turned it into a game instead. All you have to do is draw a card from the stack to navigate obstacles in your practice! Along the way, you’ll learn which practice hacks are most effective for different kinds of scenarios. Check it out here if you’d like to see gamification in action!

There’s an interactive element to games that helps make music a more fun and positive experience for everyone involved. I try to tap into that whenever I can because it’s a foolproof way to light up musicians of all ages! You can’t beat putting a smile on someone’s face as they’re learning and growing. With gamification, the fun is contagious (even for adults)!

Why should I use gamification in music?

Gamification and music go together like nutella and a spoon. Or like tacos and guacamole. Both are great independently, but when we put them together, they enhance one another! I’ll explain briefly why that is, but I’ll save the intricate game mechanics for a future post! (Sign up here to hear about new blog posts!)

First, I’d like you to think for a moment about a game you’ve enjoyed playing.

Perhaps you were engaged in playing a board game like Pandemic (teehee) or Scrabble, or a card game like Poker or Spades? Maybe you got sucked into phone app games like Candy Crush or Angry Birds? You might have logged on to a computer game like World of Warcraft or The Sims, or maybe you played a video game like Animal Crossing or DOOM.

How did you feel as you played this game? You were probably smiling a lot, were in the zone, and time flew by. Do you remember feeling motivated to succeed in the game by winning, helping your team, gaining experience points, leveling up, or strategizing?

Now think objectively about the kind of actions you took in the game. Were the tasks repetitive? Time-consuming? Did they require a lot of thought, planning, and concentration? 

Now, normally when we’d describe a task as repetitive, time-consuming, and requiring concentration, we’d call it tedious and run the other direction!! We would probably dread starting the task or maybe avoid doing it at all.

Placing card after card on the table one at a time? Sounds boring and pointless. Staring at a computer screen and clicking for 2 hours straight? Nah, I’ll pass. Knowingly taking risks that might lead to mistakes or failure? ABORT!!

When part of a game, though, we actually ENJOY doing these kinds of tasks. And afterward, we feel cheerful and fulfilled instead of depleted and irritated. Wild, right??

What causes this transformation?

1) Our mindset

2) Games activate the core drives that are part of our human nature.

To start playing a game, you have to opt-in and be willing to play. By opting in, you also have ownership over your experience and your decisions. You have the choice and you choose to play!

As you play the game, your core drives are activated and it motivates you to think, take action, and work hard. The games we really enjoy often activate multiple core drives at the same time!

Games also clearly tell you when you’ve won or lost by giving you specific feedback with things like your score, points, a percentage rating, or raking on a scoreboard. This specific feedback tells you your strengths and weaknesses, which creates a feedback loop! Even if you lose, you still feel cheerful because the feedback from the game helps you understand where you went wrong. Most of the time, we’re geared up and ready to try again with a new angle or strategy!

Let’s transition this into a music scenario. 

Thinking a bit pessimistically, music is an inherently repetitive and tiresome activity. We have to practice our instruments frequently and play the same sections of music over and over to be able to perform at a high level. It takes a lot of concentration and brainpower to play well, listen critically, and brainstorm for actionable solutions to our mistakes.

Is this sounding familiar? Just like in games, we complete repetitive tasks to develop musical skills and gain experience. In music, we can also know if we’ve “won or lost” by listening critically for mistakes or areas we can grow in the same kind of feedback loop.

With gamification, the repetitive tasks in musicians’ practice don’t need to be boring or dull. Identifying and addressing mistakes and weaknesses doesn’t have to be debilitating or soul-crushing. When we take the challenging aspects of music and combine them with game elements, everyone wins and we create music in a happier, more joyful way!

As a musician or music educator, you can gamify different elements of your practice and lessons and it will activate the same core drives and feelings of joy that you experience when playing games!

Musicians thrive as confident, capable players when we switch from thinking, “music is hard and I need to avoid mistakes at all costs or else I’ll feel stupid” to “I enjoy practicing because I know mistakes are necessary and they help me learn and grow.” Gamification bridges that chasm because we’re much more willing to try new things.

Let’s dive into these 3 simple ways you can use gamification in your music practice and lessons! I’ve picked 3 gamified music activities that I enjoy using at the beginning of the new school year, but I can guarantee that they’re fun and effective at any time of year!

Music Gamification Ideas

1. Gamify introspection and goal-setting for the new year.

You and your students can create your own musical avatars or bitmojis and add them to your own Musical Hero Profile where you include:

• 3 strengths you have that help you succeed in music (can be music skills or personality traits)
• 3 areas you would like to improve (that you can create steps towards): Bad guys to battle
• 3 long-term goals for the year: Quests!

Here’s are a few of my students’ Hero Profiles! They customized their avatars and I used their interests to pick the backgrounds.

2. Use fun themes to create excitement and variety

I really enjoy monthly themes, and creating them is one of my favorite parts about starting a new school year! As the months go by, themes help me feel like the new month is a fresh and exciting start. My students look forward to upcoming events and themes when I give them teaser descriptions in advance! Despite being fun, they’re also useful and you can use them to your advantage as a musician, educator, or student. I create monthly themes and events in my studio that address relevant topics!

To start, think about the music opportunities you have coming up this year. You can create practice or learning themes to help prepare for performances and auditions! Have a month without a performance? The theme could be FUNdamentals where you go back to the basics and make them as fun, engaging, and refreshing! Do you have your first audition coming up in 2 months? You can read and learn about managing performance anxiety with a James Bond theme because he’s cool under pressure! Pick some of your favorite James Bond quotes to motivate you and maybe wear a fancy outfit as you’re reading. It makes anything nerve-wracking easier to tackle!

You can also use holidays to create events and themes. One of my favorite holidays is Halloween!! I love dressing up and being theatrical, so an event I’ve created in the past is called “Scales Spooktacular” where my students dress up in their costume and record the scale that scares them the most! (Another option is to play your scales “scary fast” for faster technique!)

3. Create a progress map (so you know you’re actually getting somewhere!)

This is REALLY helpful for organizing your time when you have months to prepare for something. There’s nothing worse than working on the same piece for months and having no idea if it’s improving or how much you have left to polish. All of a sudden, the performance date is 3 weeks away and you’re thinking, “Why did I not take this more seriously 3 months ago when I had time??”

This one takes a little bit of planning, but it will pay off in heaps of confidence and performance treasure, matey!!

To start, pick a deadline for a goal you have or an audition/performance date. Work backward and create different performance milestones that help you achieve peak performance well in advance of your deadline! You can keep track of where you are in the thick of it all AND see the end of the tunnel.

You can make a map out of anything.

• A rainbow, where each color is a different performance milestone and you document your progress as you go
• A Candy Land board (it’s perfect, it’s already got different realms for you to conquer!)
• An actual map with pictures of places you’d like to visit someday

Here’s an example so you can see what a progress map is in its most basic form. The sky’s the limit!

Have Fun!

Games are an incredibly positive and motivational way to teach music. With so much time spent addressing weaknesses and mistakes in practice and lessons, musicians can become defensive, hypersensitive, or overcritical. With games, we approach music from a healthier mindset. We’re more willing to try new things! We’re open to making mistakes and failing, because with games, we learn, we fail, we try again, and it’s all literally fun and games. But in reality, games build resilience and help musicians of all ages develop a growth mindset, two incredibly helpful skills to have in music AND in life.

I hope this post fired up your imagination and these 3 gamification ideas kick off your new year with a smile! If you’d ever like to talk about how YOU can improve your musical journey with gamification, I’d love to talk to you! Head on over to the Contact page to say hello, or check out that spiffy Practice Hack Stack Game if you want to level up your practice skills!

Have fun and game on,

About the Author | Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, Flutist, Educator, & Gamification Guru

Hi! It’s nice to meet you! Thanks for stopping by my blog! My name is Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, and I’m a professional flutist and music educator in Phoenix, AZ. I’m a firm believer in making all activities as fun and enjoyable as possible, especially with music games and gamification! I use gamification to help musicians and educators like you hack your motivation, organize your time, and level up your performance skills so you can create the musical reality of your dreams! And I help music educators activate this same superpower for their students, too. 

Join the Sunshine Squad

If you enjoyed this post, you are welcome to join my Facebook group, the Sunshine Squad: A Joyful Community for Classical Musicians! This community is for classical musicians and music educators that want to beam joy into their performing and teaching careers with creativity, games, and a healthy mindset!

www.facebook.com/groups/sunshinesquadmusic

Digital Downloads

The post 3 Unique Music Gamification Ideas to Kick-Start the New School Year with Style appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Do you feel like you’ve tried EVERYTHING but your motivation sits at zero and it just won’t budge?

Sick and tired of feeling guilty because another day went by and you didn’t practice?

If your daily practice feels like a battle with no survivors…

You probably aren’t using your motivation type to your advantage!

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If you haven’t taken the quiz yet, CLICK HERE!

If you took the quiz and learned which practice motivation type you have, keep reading below for the Motivation Profiles of each type!

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As musicians, our practice can be motivated by two kinds of expectations:

1. Inner expectations: Expectations we have for ourselves. For example:

• You expect yourself to practice [number] of days each week
• You want to practice [number] of minutes or hours each day
• You choose to practice certain kinds of exercises (scales, arpeggios, intervals, etudes, etc.)
• You want to play and master particular music and repertoire

2. Outer expectations: Expectations others have for us. For example:

• Directors expect us to have ensemble music prepared
• Our peers expect us to be prepared and reliable in rehearsals
• Our lesson instructors expect us to practice lesson material or practice in a way they recommend. (i.e. they might recommend practicing 5 days a week or practicing at least 1 hour daily)

Teamwork Tchaikovsky Motivation Profile

As a Teamwork Tchaikovsky, you use outer expectations to achieve your own inner expectations. This means that you are probably successful at meeting the needs of others, but might struggle when you want to meet your own practice goals. Teamwork Tchaikovsky’s often ask, “What must I practice today?”

Even though it can be difficult to meet your personal practice goals, this does NOT mean you are lazy, a people-pleaser, or that you lack willpower. It means that you need accountability to feel motivated to act. You are in good company, because Teamwork Tchaikovsky’s are the most common motivation type! Other Tchaikovsky’s just like you use outer accountability in creative ways to achieve their inner music goals.

Your Strengths

Reliability – As a Teamwork Tchaikovsky, you are the most dependable of the four Motivation Types. Your dedication to helping others means you are probably a highly valued member of your ensembles and community.

Possible Weaknesses

Difficulty Saying “No” and Burnout – Because you are highly motivated by outer expectations, you might have difficulty saying no when you have too much on your plate already. If this continues for too long, you can burn out and rebel against what is expected of you.

Would you like a motivation type name that highlights a minority composer? Check out Shirley J. Thompson‘s music and become a Teamwork Thompson instead!

Are you a Teamwork Tchaikovsky who wants an in-depth guide to practice motivation with 30+ type-specific practice tips?

Get the Teamwork Tchaikovsky’s Guide to Practice Motivation here!

Inquisitive Ibert Motivation Profile

As an Inquisitive Ibert, you are motivated by inner expectations but resist outer expectations. This means that you are probably successful at achieving your personal practice goals! However, you might struggle when others ask you to practice something you feel is unnecessary or pointless. In particular, you probably do not react well when someone tells you “Do this because I said so.” You want to know why you should bother!

Inquisitive Ibert’s often ask, “Why should I spend my time practicing this or practicing this way?” For example, Inquisitive Ibert’s need to know the reason why a teacher is asking them to practice a certain way before they feel motivated to act on their advice.

Your Strengths

Logical and Self-Motivated – You practice with a strong sense of purpose and have solid reasons behind your practice choices. You are willing to research the most useful exercises and strive to understand why they are helpful to you.

Possible Weaknesses

Appearing Disrespectful – Because Inquisitive Ibert’s ask so many questions, teachers and ensemble directors can see them as argumentative or confrontational. In reality, they are just trying to understand why an outer expectation is worth their attention and effort.

Would you like a motivation type name that highlights a minority composer? Check out Adina Izarra’s music and become an Inquisitive Izarra instead!

Are you an Inquisitive Ibert who wants an in-depth guide to practice motivation with 30+ type-specific practice tips?

Get the Inquisitive Ibert’s Guide to Practice Motivation here!

Motivated Mahler Motivation Profile

As a Motivated Mahler, you are motivated by both types of expectations, instead of one (or none) of the expectation types. This means that you are probably successful at achieving your practice goals because you are self-directed and driven. Others know they can rely on you, and you know that you can rely on yourself.

Even though being a Motivated Mahler means you probably have little trouble motivating yourself to practice, you can struggle to feel motivated without clear expectations from yourself and others.

Your Strengths

Habits and Organization – You are likely able to form helpful practice habits more easily than the other Motivation Types. You might also excel at time management and organizing your music goals.

Possible Weaknesses

Inflexibility – You might struggle to quickly adapt your practice routine or material to new repertoire or expectations. Or, your practice routine might be in need of an update because you continue to stick to a practice routine you have outgrown.

Motivated Mahlers and Teamwork Tchaikovskys are both motivated to meet outer expectations, so if you feel this description does not fit you, you might be a Teamwork Tchaikovsky! The key question is: Do you struggle to meet your inner expectations? If yes, then you are probably a Teamwork Tchaikovsky (see the first profile above).

Would you like a motivation type name that highlights a minority composer? Check out Thea Musgrave‘s music and become a Motivated Musgrave instead!

Are you a Motivated Mahler who wants an in-depth guide to practice motivation with 30+ type-specific practice tips?

Get the Motivated Mahler’s Guide to Practice Motivation here!

Rogue Rachmaninoff Motivation Profile

As a Rogue Rachmaninoff, you resist both kinds of expectations (instead of being motivated by one or two types of expectations). Yours is the rarest motivation type and it often means that you value the freedom to make your own decisions. Resisting both inner and outer expectations can make motivation difficult, but it is still very possible to motivate yourself as a Rogue Rachmaninoff. 

Instead of feeling motivated by expectations, Rogue Rachmaninoff’s prefer to defy expectations. You probably respond well to challenges and enjoy proving others wrong. However, when someone gives you directions or instructions, you may feel resistant and resentful even if it was something you wanted before the directions. As a Rogue Rachmaninoff, your lack of motivation can sometimes be mistaken for laziness. This motivation type does not mean you are lazy, though. Rogue Rachmaninoff’s are often expressive, creative, and passionate musicians.

Your Strengths

Individuality – Rogue Rachmaninoff’s march to the beat of their own drum. They do not conform to traditions or conventions, which can lead them to create innovative solutions to practice problems.

Possible Weaknesses

Inconsistency – As a Rogue Rachmaninoff, you feel the most motivated to practice when you are free to practice when and how you choose. This means that it can be more difficult to form practice habits, which you tend to resist.

Want a motivation type name that highlights a BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) composer? Check out Daniel Bernard Roumain and become a Rogue Roumain instead!

Are you a Rogue Rachmaninoff who wants an in-depth guide to practice motivation with 30+ type-specific practice tips?

Get the Rogue Rachmaninoff’s Guide to Practice Motivation here!

Want to unlock the full 17-page guide to motivating yourself to practice?

Hack your motivation and learn how to navigate your type’s weaknesses with 30+ actionable tips you can use TODAY!

Maximize your practice productivity with your type’s Guide to Practice Motivation!

Included in the 17-page Comprehensive Guide to Motivation:

1. The Definition of Motivation

2. The Difference Between Motivation and Willpower

3. What Motivates Musicians

4. What Fires Up Your Practice Motivation Type (Your In-Depth, highly detailed Practice Motivation Profile!)

5. The Inner Workings of Each of the 4 Practice Motivation Types

6. How to Maximize Your Type’s 4 Core Strengths and Use Them to Your Advantage!

7. How to Become Aware of Your Type’s 4 Potential Weaknesses and Manage Them with Ease

8. How Your Secondary Motivation Type Influences Your Practice

9. Your Type’s Core Practice Pillars That Will Be the Foundation of Your Practice

BONUS: 30+ of the Best Simple and Easy-to-Use Practice Tips to Maximize your Type’s Motivation!

(Organized by each of your type’s unique practice pillars!)

The post [Quiz] Learn About the 4 Practice Motivation Types! appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.

Summer is here! You made it through your spring studio recital, you minimized the panic, squeezed in all of the extra lessons, and things couldn’t be better! But you know what is looming ahead of you.

“Summer is coming.”

Students start canceling lessons. They forget to show up for their lesson because they didn’t realize it was Wednesday. Some of your most dedicated students suddenly start practicing less consistently.

For private music lesson teachers, summer can mean a lot of things for students’ practice. For motivated students that don’t have enough free time during the school year, summer can mean inspired practice and progress! Score! For other students that lack time management skills or have a hard time remembering to practice, it can mean weeks without picking up their instrument.

It can be frustrating and heartbreaking to experience the negative effects of summer break, especially when practice and progress is usually at an all-time high for the end-of-year recital! Everyone was working so hard and felt that rush of pride after the recital. What happened?

The reality is, everyone experiences a mindset shift when summer arrives. Rigid schedules and habits quickly change when the structure of the school year is replaced with unlimited free time.

Here are some summer issues you might experience as a private music lesson instructor:

1. Canceled lessons because of family plans or travel – Sometimes our students’ amazing travel plans can mean weeks without practicing! This makes it difficult to maintain lesson momentum and often means treading carefully when students come back feeling upset and vulnerable because of their rusty chops.
2. Low motivation and decreased practice – Many of our hardworking students get burned out from school and want to relax over the summer. They absolutely should take the time to recover! However, if their practice stops completely once summer arrives, there are so many fun things to do that practice can completely fall off their radar!
3. Sometimes even pausing or quitting lessons, never to return – If practice struggles go on long enough, parents and students will recognize that summer lessons aren’t working out. They will eventually pause lessons and might never come back. Or worse, they might text you some version of “Thanks for the lessons! We aren’t going to continue over the summer, but will consider restarting in the fall.” Unfortunately, we teachers know what that can mean…

Can you see why summer lessons can be so challenging? As teachers, parents hold us responsible when students aren’t improving, but in reality, we only see them for one hour each week. The other 6 days are up to the student (and the parents)! With decreased income, less structure, and an upward battle convincing students to practice, we’ve got a large burden of responsibility for the summer.

Make the Most of Summer Music Lessons

However, it is absolutely possible for private lesson teachers to minimize these issues and turn the summer into a wonderful time of year! Here’s what studio teachers can look forward to during the summer, when private lessons and practice remain a focus:

• More free time for students to practice
• Time available to address fundamentals
• More relaxed lessons without looming recitals or performances
• Group classes on supplemental music topics

So, how can we turn summertime blues into summertime joy and productivity? How can we motivate our students to practice without relying on parents to nag or sending constant reminders? How can we make music practice fun and memorable?

A game called Practice Tag!

How to Play Practice Tag

This game is simple and effective! Here’s how it works:

1. Each student is paired up with another student in the studio, who become practice partners. Students help encourage and motivate their partners to practice regularly. (You can pair students based on their age, level, disposition, the frequency of their practice, or a shared goal. If anyone is mismatched, consider pairing up a mentor and a mentee!)
2. Determine how long the game will last and have each student pick a reasonable goal they would like to achieve by the end of the Practice Tag event. This gives their practice a higher purpose and establishes a clear reason to participate in the game! A big struggle students have with music is that they do not set goals, so they can’t gauge if they’re improving. Definitely don’t skip this step!
3. Let each pair decide which student will first be “it.” Once this student practices, they “tag” their practice partner by sending a text message or email! Obviously, this game works best for music students that have easy and consistent access to email or a cell phone. I recommend they cc you or include you in a group text so you can facilitate practice, if needed. You can also bcc parents, too.
4. Tagging their practice partner as “it” can be as simple as sending, “I practiced etude #6 today!” More fun and motivating examples include sending a selfie with their instrument, sharing a practice victory, or even sending a clip of themselves playing (this gets students to become comfortable recording themselves and listening back. Wonderfully sneaky, if you ask me!) If the students have a shared goal, definitely encourage them to share progress updates or tips for success they’ve discovered!
5. When you end the game, enthusiastically celebrate the accomplishments of those that reached their goal! Maybe they earn a prize or a new piece of music. Maybe the game could include a contest to see which pair has the highest number of “tags.” You get to decide based on what you think is best for your studio!

(For those that did not reach their goal, consider extending the game a little longer if they enjoyed it, but needed more time. Or, use it as an opportunity to help them recognize how much they improved during the game and talk about setting achievable goals!)

Sounds easy enough, right?

You can absolutely stop here, and this game is fun and helpful enough on its own.

Students pass-the-practice back and forth and get to know each other along the way! It’s easy-to-play, connects students, builds studio community, and prompts students to practice frequently over the summer.

But as we all know, games without a challenge also lack a level of persuasion to play. This is how we’re going to appeal to older music students like high school students, college students, and adults!

Boost the Fun by Increasing the Challenge

At their core, games consist of unnecessary obstacles. If the game is too easy, there is no challenge and nothing to overcome. We generally don’t bother playing these games, or the excitement fizzles out quickly. With well-designed games, we happily accept the obstacles of the game because we want to opt-in and play!

By adding one or two more rules, we boost the challenge factor of this game to get your students hooked on practicing!

So here’s the fun part, and it’s devious!

Students cannot practice certain material until they are “it!”

I call this Mischief Mode. *cackles*

For example, the student who is NOT “it” can practice scales, technique, and etudes, but they can’t practice their repertoire until their partner tags them back!

(Obviously, a certain amount of trust and honesty needs to be part of the game, but I’ve found that if students want to play and voluntarily opt-in, they’re going to follow the rules! Especially when other students are involved. And if they do practice something they “shouldn’t,” they’re still practicing and engaging with their partner. It’s still a win!)

If a student’s tag partner isn’t practicing, you can ask them to send a friendly reminder. “Hey, friend! Can you practice for 5 minutes so I can practice my solo?” BOOM! Positive practice reminder.

“Hey! Yeah, sorry, I forgot to practice today… I’m having a hard time wanting to practice my B major scale. ”

 “Oh my gosh, me too. It’s so hard! But you can do it! If you practice it for 5 minutes today, it’ll be easier tomorrow! We’re in this together!”

Practice reminders, positive encouragement, and social connectedness are packaged into one delightfully simple game.

Practice Tag is an effective way to motivate students to reach their music practice goals without having “The Talk” about how important practice is. If a student is still having trouble practicing at some point in the game, they’ve got you and their partner to support them in a fun and lighthearted way!

Tailor Practice Tag to Fit Your Studio + Your Students

With a simple game premise like Practice Tag, there are all kinds of quick and easy ways to tailor this to your studio! It works really well as a simple game of tag, but if you’d like to add that extra level of challenge and motivation, try Mischief Mode! Here are a few options that I recommend.

Mischief Mode

Option 1: Consider specifying which kind of message they must send to “tag” their practice partner (or give them a few choices)! This is the best option for younger students (middle school) and students that are shy or less motivated.

For example: If they love taking selfies, adjust the rules so they can only tag their partner with a practice selfie with their instrument or music! If you’d like them to be recording themselves more, ask them to send a short practice video that is 5-10 seconds long. You know your students’ likes and dislikes, so you can tailor the rules to fit each pair.

For students that are shy, don’t know each other, or are hesitant about sharing recordings of themselves playing, start off with something that both are already really comfortable with. Then, as the game continues and they become more comfortable with the game and their partner, consider increasing the difficulty by changing which kind of message they send to “tag” their partner!

Now, Option 2 is a bit more challenging. It’s also my favorite part because it uses a bit of scarcity in a positive way to hack students’ motivation. Option 2 is best for high school students, college students, and adults! Give them the option to opt-in to this extra challenge.

Option 2: Establish which material the students cannot practice until they are “it.” Make it juicy! You can do this in one of two ways:

Option 2a. Restrict something they really want to practice, such as their repertoire! They can only practice scales, exercises, long tones, etudes, etc. until they are “it” again. Again, simple and effective. This method works well for students that are eager to follow the rules.

OR, use a bit of reverse psychology.

Option 2b. Restrict something that they do not want to practice and then require that they practice this same material to “re-tag” their partner. You can say something in a jokingly serious way like, “Under no circumstances are you allowed to practice [insert material here] until you are “it! Even if your lesson is tomorrow, you can only practice [material] when you’re ‘it’!”

This option works particularly well for students with a shared goal or practice task, and students that have a slight rebellious streak. For example, say the goal is to master the B Major scale. All of a sudden, you flip the perspective on them. Instead of saying “You have to practice this scale,” you are effectively telling students, “You are not allowed to practice this scale,” even if it’s just some of the time.

Instead of forcing them to eat their vegetables, you’re saying “You’re not allowed to eat your vegetables sometimes.” Deep down, we’re all going to naturally rebel slightly and want what we can’t have, even if it’s just a little bit.

Using Mischief Mode in this way can be enough to start bridging that chasm between students “avoid practicing ___ at all costs” and mastery.

And hey, even if the reverse psychology fails, you have this safety net to fall back on: Students will be trying to get that practice over with so they “aren’t allowed” to practice it again until they’re tagged again! It’s a nice break from practice guilt!

Either way, win-win!

How to Build Skills with Practice Tag in Mischief Mode

Because we’re teachers, we’re always looking for fun and strategic ways to help our students improve their skills. Here are a few examples of skills you can help students improve with Practice Tag in Mischief Mode:

1. Accountability – Students must send each other pictures of their practice log to “tag” their partner. This is great for those students that forget and try and fill out their practice log the night before their lesson! If their partner doesn’t hear from them, they can send a friendly reminder. It’s way less intimidating coming from a friend or peer.
2. Listening to Recordings – Ask students to send a message with the professional recording they listened to during their practice session. It can be a YouTube link or the name of the performer/piece title on Spotify, for example. This encourages students to listen to high-caliber musicians, and can also open the other student’s eyes to a new piece or performer. (Don’t forget to teach your students how to find quality performers!)
3. Friendship/Camaraderie/Community – A lighthearted and easy way to help students become friends is to send pictures! Selfies, a pictures of their pet, their practice area, their solo, etc.
4. Recording (and Listening Back) – If the rules say they have to record a snippet of their practice session, you can bet that students will listen critically to their recordings and get a few takes before sending it to their practice partner! It’s the practice equivalent of checking our hair before we post a selfie.
5. Increased Practice Time – Another option is to create the rule that students can only “tag” their partner when they reach a certain amount of practice that day!

As you can see, the possibilities are endless! You can customize this game as much or as little as you’d like. It can be adapted for music students of any age and level!

Make Practice Tag a Game Students Can Win

To prevent the game from becoming overly complicated, I recommend keeping the rules simple. If you 1) limit which kind of message they send, 2) require practice material to “tag” their partner, and 3) set different material they cannot practice until they are “it,” that’s probably going to be too much to remember! If it’s overly complicated, the game becomes more of a burden. We want a reasonable challenge, not an impossible one.

Along the same lines, you want to manage the difficulty. If you require something scary or intimidating like recording AND that scale they’ve been avoiding for the last 3 months, students will absolutely avoid both. Balance the difficulty and pair something they enjoy (like taking a selfie) with that more difficult task.

Less is more in this game! We generally don’t like to play games we know we can’t win. Include a challenge, but also make sure your students can win the game!

Benefits of Practice Tag

It’s been a lot of fun playing Practice Tag in my studio! Here’s what I’ve experienced with this game:

• Summer practice increases, because playing the game and being tagged as “it” keeps practice fresh in their mind.
• Working towards a goal can provide structure and motivation in the endless void of summer free time.
• As I mentioned before, a big struggle students have with music is that they do not set goals, so they can’t gauge if they’re improving. With Practice Tag, students learn to set goals and receive feedback on how manageable the goal was, how well they prepared to meet the goal, and if they reached the goal or not.
• Students develop a practice routine that can continue long after the game is over.
• Students get to know each other and become part of a community!
  • Bonus: Studio recitals and chamber ensembles will be much more fun for students when they perform among friends!

How to Maximize the Benefits of Practice Tag

Tap into your students’ core motivational drives by giving them control over the game, the rules, and how they play. This is especially effective for teenagers and adults!

Let Students Develop Their Own Strategy

Part of the fun of games is that we can figure out how we would like to play the game. We develop a strategy and that keeps us interested and engaged. Here are a couple ways to give your students some autonomy when designing the rules:

• Let the pair of students pick the rules from a list of your choices! If they decide what they cannot practice until they’re “it,” they’re much more likely to enjoy the challenge!

• Get two pairs together via video chat and have each pair decide the rules for the other pair. If a pair chooses tough rules, the other pair can “get them back” by also suggesting hard rules for the week! It encourages friendly rivalry and helps improve the community in your studio.

Keep the Rules Fresh and Interesting

Keep in mind that even the best-designed games will not stay interesting forever. It takes a specially-designed game to keep the players’ interest long-term. If you plan to pair up students for the year, for example, consider modifying the game so they must reach out to their practice partner once a week. Constant contact and “not being allowed to practice certain repertoire” will eventually become tedious when the newness wears off, especially with the business of the school year.

The simplest way to keep this game fresh is by switching up the rules. You can also play this game for 2-4 weeks a few times a year. Consider strategically using it as part of the month’s theme when you want to boost student’s practice time (such as before your studio recital)!

Have Fun!

Games are an incredibly positive and motivational way to teach music. With so much time spent addressing weaknesses and mistakes in practice and lessons, musicians can become defensive, hypersensitive, or overcritical. With games, we approach music from a healthier mindset. We’re more willing to try new things! We’re open to making mistakes and failing, because with games, we learn, we fail, we try again, and it’s all literally fun and games. But in reality, games build resilience and help musicians of all ages develop a growth mindset, two incredibly helpful skills to have in music AND in life.

I hope you enjoy Practice Tag, especially in Mischief Mode! Let me know how this worked for you and your students in the comments section or head on over to the contact page!

Have fun and game on,

About the Author | Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, Flutist, Educator, & Gamification Guru

Hi! It’s nice to meet you! Thanks for stopping by my blog! My name is Dr. Stephanie Hoeckley, and I’m a professional flutist and music educator in Phoenix, AZ. I’m a firm believer in making all activities as fun and enjoyable as possible, especially with music games and gamification! I use gamification to help musicians and educators like you hack your motivation, organize your time, and level up your performance skills so you can create the musical reality of your dreams! And I help music educators activate this same superpower for their students, too.

Join the Sunshine Squad

If you enjoyed this post, you are welcome to join my Facebook group, the Sunshine Squad: A Joyful Community for College Music Students and Music Educators! This community is for college music students and music educators that want to beam joy into their performing and teaching careers with creativity, games, and a healthy mindset!

www.facebook.com/groups/sunshinesquadmusic

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Thankfully, burnout has been studied for decades now, so we know a lot more about the causes than we used to! Burnout is even an official medical diagnosis, so doctors are taking it seriously. I used to think that burnout was caused by doing too much and not taking good enough care of myself (which definitely doesn’t help!!), but the “Areas of Worklife” model actually identifies 6 areas of imbalance that can lead to burnout. Do any of these apply to you?

Workload. Arguably the most obvious cause, when your workload outweighs your abilities and capacities, it cuts into your rest and recovery time and can make it difficult to restore balance. Recitals, tests, auditions, ensemble performances, student recitals, personal practice time, the list goes on and on!!

Perceived lack of control. Uh oh, this is a big one. Do you feel like you have autonomy over your work, education, and personal life? I can think of a few ways being a musician can pressure us into giving up control:

1. Needing to take every gig, job, or student in order to pay the bills
2. School determining how you spend your time and wreaking havoc on your priorities
3. Professors telling you what to practice and how to practice it (which is really helpful, but also makes us feel less in control)
4. School administration telling you when you have time to plan, or telling you that band has to be at Zero Hour (AKA the crack of dawn)

We have good reason to feel like things are out of control. But if this feels like you, ask yourself a few questions: “What is causing me to feel this way?” Do people expect you to answer emails instantly at all hours of the day? Do you feel like you’ll get behind if you aren’t practicing, working, or studying? Is your schedule or work so unpredictable that it’s impossible to effectively prepare?

After asking yourself what is making you feel like your life is out of control, ask yourself what you can do to improve this situation. Can you set better boundaries that separate home and work/school life more effectively? Can you practice some music for fun just for yourself that you’ll never need to perform or play in a lesson? Can you say “No” to some students, gigs, or shifts so that you have time to say “YES” to more of what you want or need? With these questions, you can identify what can be improved and what will stay the same no matter what you do.

Rewards. If the benefits and rewards do not match the time and energy you spent, it is not going to feel like the activity is worth it. Did you have to spend hours and hours to perform a piece of music that you didn’t even enjoy? We’ve all been there. Having to spend your valuable resources on something that isn’t worth it is incredibly discouraging. Consider communicating with your lesson instructor or boss that you could use more positive feedback. Maybe you’ve earned some vacation time, or deserve a raise. Maybe you need to take a step back and remember why you are doing this and refresh yourself on the benefits of your long-term activity. Or maybe you just need some CHOCOLATE because you’ve made it through a crazy day. Experiment with rewards that make you feel like your time and energy are well spent!

Community. A lot of the time, we interact with the same people on a daily basis. Burnout is contagious, and it’s easy to be emotionally affected by those around us. Do you feel like the relationships you have in school and work are supportive and trustworthy? We can’t always choose who we interact with, but we can choose to improve the dynamic. In school, you can choose to study or perform with musicians that are positive and hard-working. Consider only accepting music students that fit your studio’s values or communicate with the parents of students that are a drain on your energy and happiness. With music gigs and rehearsals, choose to communicate in a respectful, non-judgmental way and speak positively with those around you.

Fairness. Do you feel that you are treated fairly compared to your peers? If you feel like unfair treatment fuels your burnout, start by speaking up! Sometimes people are unaware of their biases or won’t take action until you ask for what you want. Do other students receive extensions on their assignments? Do other teachers receive more resources or funding than you? Could parents help you stock and set up the reception table at your next recital? Respectfully ask for what you need.

Values mismatch. If you highly value something that others or your organization do not, motivation can plummet. We’ve all probably experienced this in group projects in school where one person does all the work and the others slack off. Does your chamber ensemble or study group value hard work and dedication as much as you do? Do your colleagues value how your humor allows you to connect with others? Consider how important it is to you that you match your values to those of your organization or group.

Burnout might feel inevitable, but it doesn’t have to be a constant presence in your life. It’s a complex problem, but by exploring these 6 causes and attempting to make changes, you can make real progress towards a sustainable lifestyle and career and feeling more joy! If you find that despite your best efforts, little has changed, then see if it makes sense to stay or if it’s time to leave.

Take your time and work through these 6 areas with compassion for yourself, and with the support of someone who cares about you! I’m here cheering you on, and you’re not alone in this struggle. Be brave and reignite that inner flame inside you that shines brightly in every area of your life!

Sources: https://hbr.org/2019/07/6-causes-of-burnout-and-how-to-avoid-them

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/12693291_Six_areas_of_worklife_A_model_of_the_organizational_context_of_burnout

The post 6 Causes of Burnout: Musician Edition appeared first on Stephanie Hoeckley | Flute Lessons + Music Gamification for Dynamic Performance.