The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 001 James Ehnes: The Essence of Mindful Practice

Episode Date: September 7, 2018

In this episode, international violin soloist James Ehnes talks about what the essence of mindful instrumental practice is: having a clear goal, work efficiently, listen intently, and connect with others. He elaborates on:​ His artistic journey – growing up in Brandon Manitoba, the practicing habits he developed as a child that helped him succeed, and the mentors that helped shape his career Practicing efficiently – how practicing should be goal oriented, how we should practice practicing, the importance of identifying and analyzing problems Competitions – how they can be beneficial for one's career How we should have a performance mindset while practicing Figuring out how to find balance in our life and career His process to learn a work and to prepare for a performance The importance of developing the skill to truly listen to ourselves objectively while we play How music really addresses our humanity and brings us together Website: http://www.jamesehnes.com/james/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jamesehnes/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jamesehnes/ James' discography: http://www.jamesehnes.com/james/index.php?id=62 His recording of the Aaron Jay Kernis Concerto Beethoven Celebrations – Recital with Andrew Armstrong at Northwestern University on January 13, 2019 David Copperfield by Charles Dickens   Biography James Ehnes has established himself as one of the foremost violinists of his generation. Gifted with a rare combination of stunning virtuosity, serene lyricism and an unfaltering musicality, Ehnes is a favourite guest of many of the world's most respected conductors including Ashkenazy, Alsop, Sir Andrew Davis, Denève, Dutoit, Elder, Ivan Fischer, Gardner, Paavo Järvi, Noseda, Robertson and Runnicles. Ehnes's long list of orchestras includes, amongst others, the Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, New York, London Symphony, Philharmonia, BBC Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, DSO Berlin and the NHK Symphony orchestras. Ehnes has an extensive discography and has won many awards for his recordings including a Gramophone Award for his live recording of the Elgar Concerto with Sir Andrew Davis and the Philharmonia Orchestra. His recording of the Korngold, Barber and Walton violin concertos won a Grammy Award for 'Best Instrumental Soloist Performance' and a JUNO award for 'Best Classical Album of the Year'. His recording of the Paganini Caprices earned him universal praise, with Diapason writing of the disc, "Ehnes confirms the predictions of Erick Friedman, eminent student of Heifetz: 'there is only one like him born every hundred years'." Ehnes's recent recording of the Bartók Concerti was nominated for a Gramophone Award in the Concerto category. Recent releases include concertos by Britten, Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Khachaturian and sonatas by Debussy, Elgar and Respighi, and his recording of the Beethoven Violin Concerto with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Andrew Manze will be released in October 2017 (Onyx Classics). Ehnes began violin studies at the age of four, became a protégé of the noted Canadian violinist Francis Chaplin aged nine, made his orchestral debut with Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal aged 13 and graduated from The Juilliard School in 1997, winning the Peter Mennin Prize for Outstanding Achievement and Leadership in Music. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and in 2010 was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada and the Artistic Director of the Seattle Chamber Music Society. James Ehnes plays the "Marsick" Stradivarius of 1715. He currently lives in Bradenton, Florida with his family.   ​ THANK YOU: Most sincere thank you to composer Jim Stephenson who graciously provided the show's musical theme!  Concerto #1 for Trumpet and Chamber Orchestra – Movement 2: Allegro con Brio, performed by Jeffrey Work, trumpet, and the Lake Forest Symphony, conducted by Jim Stephenson. Also a huge thank you to producer, Bella Kelly! ​ If you enjoyed the show, please leave a review on iTunes!  I truly appreciate your support! Visit the website and the facebook page for information about past and future podcasts, and for more resources on mindful practice. MIND OVER FINGER: www.mindoverfinger.com https://www.facebook.com/mindoverfinger/

You're listening to the Mind Over Finger Podcast, episode number one. Welcome to the Mind Over Finger Podcast, discussions on mindful music making, efficient practice, and building a purposeful career. And now, your host, Dr. Renée Paul Gaultier. Welcome to the Mind Over Finger podcast. Today, I have the chance to chat with international violin soloist James Ennis. In this episode, he talks about the essence of what mindful instrumental practice is, having a clear goal, work efficiently, listen intently, and connect with others. You will also hear about his experience with building an international

career and finding balance in his life. James is one of the most prominent violinists in the field, and he is a favorite guest of renowned conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazi, Marin Alsop, and Sir Andrew Davis. You can hear him regularly on the best stages across the world, including Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall, Chicago Symphony Center, and Amsterdam's Concertgebouw. His discography is incredibly impressive and has collected countless honors, including a Grammy and Juno Awards for his recording of the Karngold Barber and Walton Violin Concerti and the nomination for a Gramophone Award for his rendition of the Bartók's Violin and Viola Concerti.

I am so very happy and honored to begin this adventure of the Mind Over Finger podcast with someone that I see as both an incredible artist and human being. I know that you will be inspired by James' insight and wisdom. Let's go to the show. James Ennis, it's such a treat to have you on the podcast. Well, it's great to talk with you. You're definitely, I would say, one of my favorite artists on both violin and viola, actually. Although I hear you're also very quite proficient on the piano.

I've sort of, I'm in retirement from playing the piano. It takes too much practice. And you know, I think I don't want to make you blush there, but I think you're probably one of the smartest and also funniest people I know. So you've been a great source of inspiration forever for me. So great to have you. Thank you very much. We've been friends a long time. It's crazy to think of just how long now. I don't know if you know this. The first time I saw you perform live, and this was after hearing your name so many times, I believe I was 14. So you were not much older. And you were on this tour with the Jeunesse Musicale. And you came to my hometown in Chicoutimi. And there was a huge snowstorm. And I think you were crossing the park with Louis-André Barry. and you guys were late for the concert so we just waited patiently in the hall you came in through the hall wearing your you know your normal clothes and you were so gracious and just said just give us a minute to change and we'll be right back and if I remember correctly the first thing on

the program was Sarasate's Carmen Fantasy and you were you just nailed it and I was so impressed And, you know, I think that to this day, that was probably a concert that was so profoundly inspiring for me. I think it was a key moment in maybe my decision making to in becoming a musician myself. Oh, that's that's so nice of you to say. I wish I could say that that was the only concert on that tour that we were late for. But we were we ran into all sorts of weather. And, you know, that's a funny thing about performing, right? You kind of have to roll with it.

And I'm glad that I made the audience feel sort of comfortable. And I think that's a huge part of performing is making people feel like you want to be there and that you're all going to be sharing in something special. Yes, absolutely. I could not agree more. It makes a really big difference in how we listen to the music when the person on stage makes us feel like they are in control and enjoying themselves. yes that's very true so again thank you so much for being here today shall we dive in talk a bit about practicing yeah absolutely james you've had such a remarkable career so far and i think a personal goal of mine is to buy every one of your 50 something records

and um you know you're so young and there's still many many awesome years ahead and awesome things ahead for sure um I would like to hear about your artistic journey in your own words if that's okay with you so if you don't mind would you please talk to us a little bit about your story how you got to where you are and how your musical path has unfolded well um as you know I am Canadian and I was born in a city in western Manitoba called Brandon which is really it's a city by Canadian standards. When I was living there, it was maybe 35, 40,000 people, but it services quite a big geographic area. So there's more in, there's a lot more in Brandon than there might be say in a US city of similar size, including a really wonderful university with a great school of

music. And that was actually what brought my parents to Brandon in the first place as well. my father was the trumpet professor at Brannan University. And one of his very dearest friends was Francis Chaplin, the violin professor there. Due to a large part of Francis Chaplin's influence, but also really, historically, the area has been producing violinists, and it's a strong kind of violin center and has been for generations. So because of those things, there was kind of a robust Suzuki program around and I started playing the violin. It was something I really wanted to do, which is still a little bit of a family mystery why it is that I chose the violin over all other instruments. But I was asking for one for what seemed like ages and I

finally got a violin for Christmas just before my fifth birthday. And my first teacher, actually my first several teachers were students at the university so as they would graduate I would have to find a new teacher and my very first teacher was not a Suzuki style teacher but then my next one was and I ended up going through all 10 books of the Suzuki program and that was kind of my my introduction to playing the violin and I oddly enough this makes me feel really old but I met Dr. Suzuki in Edmonton in 1984 or something like that. There was the Suzuki world conference or some such thing. And my family drove out from Brandon to Edmonton.

And I mean, that was kind of a surreal thing. My, my brother who also played, he and I were for the, maybe the first time just surrounded by so many kids with the same, interests and the same passion. And that was fun. But even in Brandon, there was a really nice group of kids that all studied violin together, some of whom have gone on to really great professional careers as well and have remained close friends. So it was around, I guess I was about eight when And it was not actually through my father that I was first introduced to Francis Chaplin because my father had too much respect for him to dare ask him to listen to his little boy son. But it was a woman named Lise Elson, kind of a prominent Canadian violin teacher that came through Branton and she heard me play and she called up Francis Chaplin and said, you should listen to this boy.

And my dad was quite embarrassed about the whole thing, but thrilled when Francis Chaplin agreed to take me on as a student. And there was another very, very special man in Brandon who was on the faculty of music named Donald Henry, who was a piano teacher and became my piano accompanist and my piano teacher and my general sort of coach. And it was really these three men, Francis Chaplin and Donald Henry and my father, that were, I guess, the main musical influences on me as a boy. And Francis Chaplin had been a student of Galamian at Juilliard back in the late 40s, early 50s. And when he was there, he was friends with a slightly younger classmate named Sally Thomas, who was both of our teachers, Renee. And she taught at and still teaches to this day at the Meadowmount School of Music. And it was, I guess, in spring of 89 that I had just turned 13, and Dr. Chaplin and my father, well, my parents, they thought it might be a nice thing for me to go to one of these intensive summer camps. So on his advice, he sent me off to Meadowmount to study with Sally Thomas, his old classmate.

and Meadowmount became a really special place for me and continues to be a very special place for me I'm actually on the board now which is pretty funny and I saw some saw some great pictures of you there this summer as well yeah I was just there a couple of weeks ago actually and the place looks looks beautiful so I spent four summers there working with Sally Thomas so then when I finished high school it became a very natural thing for me to continue my studies with Sally Thomas. And I went away to New York at the Juilliard School where Francis Chaplin had been years ago. So there was a certain obvious lineage, I guess, to my private instruction. And in those sort of teenage years, that was, I guess, you'd say when my career sort of got

started. You know, when I was 11 or something, I think I did my first national competition. I won the CMC competition, got to play with an orchestra. And I did these kinds of competitions like in Quebec City and Montreal and Minnesota and the old CBC competition that was in Ottawa that I was attracted to, or I should say I was guided to by these people that kind of gave me such great guidance, like my teacher and my father, to pursue competitions that would give me performing opportunities. opportunities and performing experience, um, both for the, for the value of, of those experiences, but also as a way to get a little bit of exposure. I think that being from Western Manitoba, um, it's, it's a little bit harder to kind of get, get out there and have people hear you than if you're from Montreal or Toronto or something like that. So, um, I, I did a few of these kind of national competitions and I had success in those and got some great opportunities to

to start playing in different places and and working my way through the the repertoire and it was a competition in Toronto when I was I think grade 11 or something that I won this competition in Toronto and at the winner's dinner I got sat next to this man Walter Homburger, who was one of the legendary empresarios. He ran the recital series in Toronto, the big series, for years and years and years, and he managed the Toronto Symphony. And perhaps most notably, he was the only concert manager of Glenn Gould during Glenn Gould's performing career. Oh, wow. Anyway, Walter took an interest in me. He had recently retired, and I think maybe he was getting a little bored. And he offered to help me out to, you know, to manage me and

look after me and sort of guide me through the, the complicated process of establishing a career. And Walter was an amazingly important person in my life, who established my career in a very methodical kind of way, which I think was very valuable. You know, I never had one of those kind of moments where all of a sudden I had you know quote a career you know lots of concerts to play or things like that it was it was quite gradual and I think because of that it's laid a very nice foundation there's a lot of places now that you know now I'm in my early 40s that I've been playing for a long long time and I feel this sort of broad base for my career which is very, very valuable. I think that sometimes, you know, you'll hear stories about someone who

wins some big competition and they have one or two seasons where they've got lots and lots of concerts, but then there's no, there's no real base. So once they're not sort of the novelty of the day, it becomes a lot more difficult. So I feel very fortunate the way my, my career developed. And looking back on it, I wouldn't change a thing. That's really wonderful. I love how you talk about the presence of these five people in your life, you know, from your father to Mr. Chaplin and Henry and Humberger and Miss Thomas. And, you know, one thing you said too is how being methodical, but also go slowly, you know, gradually and establishing a strong foundation is so, so important. I should also mention, you know, that my mother was not a

musician, but she was a ballet dancer. And I learned so much from her as well about, you know, commitment to an art form and perseverance and dedication and all that. So even though there was not that direct musical connection, she was also, of course, a huge part of my success in the arts world oh that's yeah this connection between the different artistic disciplines is so is so strong and i'm guessing it must have had some sort of influence on you on how you developed as an artist as well i think so yeah i i think that that the devotion to um to an art form it's it's a specific kind of of devotion and work ethic and seeing that in both of one's parents is yeah very a very valuable thing and of course we're going to be talking about how to

practice and I think that that was that was a huge part of my parents lives is how to how to practice their art forms and how to improve and and yeah being around that maybe made made learning that very valuable skill somewhat easier for me yeah so speaking about practice second great segue how about we jump right into it what do you think sure um i think that you and i would both agree that maybe moving the bow and the strings for hours doesn't mean that you've actually practiced you know um yeah and i always see a very interesting correlation between how um this awareness and how being intellectually involved a musician is in his or her practice and how well or quickly he or she overcomes the challenges of a score technically and musically. I find that the

practicing habits we establish as young children, you know, the foundational habits that you talked about, they can really profoundly shape who we become as musician. And as we were just talking about, yeah, this, I mean, this is probably true for any discipline. What are some of the key elements in regards to practice and work ethic that you find really impacted your development as a young violinist? You know, I think that a quality that I have that I think has been helpful in a funny way is that I don't, I'm not happy just practicing the violin. in. There's too many other things that I want to do with my life and, uh, people I want to be with and experiences I want to have that, um, that efficiency has always been really, really

important to me. Like if I've, I've always, um, I've always felt, and I suppose I was, I was kind of raised this way that, that practicing should be goal oriented. And certainly if you get too caught up in the idea of it being directly related to time, to the time spent at the instrument, that can be, that can be a dangerous way of looking at it. It can, it can almost be counterproductive. I mean, you come across so many, so many kids that it's like they, they are punching in their time clock. Oh my gosh. I want to be good. So I'm going to practice this amount of time, and just the drudgery of that. And they're not really concerned about what they actually accomplish in that amount of time. It's just like, well, I did my two hours,

so I'm going to get better. And my father, for sure, like from the early days was always giving me little challenges of, you know, what could I learn? What could I accomplish? and it wasn't within the parameters of of a certain time limit except it might be you know a day or something like i i remember uh one time him going away to to work for for the evening and um just teaching some lessons or conducting the band or something he said well you know i'm going to be away all evening can you learn this piece tonight you know some little suzuki piece and um he sort of laid down that challenge and i remember thinking well a i have to rise to the occasion and uh you know prove to my dad that i can do it but also i thought well

there are other things i want to do tonight um so i want to you know and then maybe watch some baseball yeah right it could be all sorts of things and i remember thinking well maybe if I'm really really efficient and if I practice really carefully and if I'm really focused I can do both and uh and that's really that's I think that maybe there's a part of me that that is always kind of looking for these shortcuts and you know later it would become this sort of thing where it was like hmm I really want to hang out with my friends and go to the park and play tennis or whatever it would be but I really want to learn this piece too you know can, can I do this efficiently and quickly and waste as little time as possible? And Sally Thomas

was really brilliant in my, my teenage years, you know, at Meadowmount when I, you know, I was having so much fun with my friends and wanted to do this and that and the other thing. And, and she would give me these little challenges of, you know, well, I thought that maybe, maybe you could perform this piece next week on the concert but then I thought no you don't have enough time to get it ready and then of course that was the sort of thing exactly what I needed to hear I'm like I can do it I can do it and you know practicing in a focused way if it becomes your habit then you get better at it like I mean you can practice practicing if that makes sense anything that you anything that you practice carefully you will get better at and if one of those things that you're practicing

is how to practice then you'll get better at practicing i i feel like almost saying amen right here what you said is so true being goal oriented and again to quote you so many people do what you said they punch in their time and feel like okay i'll just go in there and move my arms around for little bit and I really I think that's such a gift that your father gave you to really have this focus on efficiency and that question what you what you said what else you know it's a concept I use in my teaching with students is the concept of beginner's mind to always search the way the way an amateur approaches a new hobby what else can I try what else can I find or how better can I get this. I love this. I love this so much. Well, my dad had some very sort of specific things

that he taught me in those early years about how to practice and some really obvious philosophies that I think are neglected too often. I mean, a lot of times students don't really analyze where the problem is. They say, this movement is hard, or then they might get more specific and say, well, these two pages are hard, or they might even be like, this half page is hard, but very rarely do you meet a student who's aware enough to say, this shift, or this string crossing, or whatever it may be that this is the spot and everything hinges on that because really i mean once you get to to a certain level of proficiency i think that more more often than not i mean vastly more often than not a passage that is difficult is difficult because of a couple

of little kind of pivot spots that everything hinges on that like people say well i can't play this run. It's like, well, what, what can't you play? And if you really break it down, there's maybe one shift or one string crossing or one awkward moment that kind of destroys the whole thing. So really knowing where the problem is, isolating the problem, fixing it, or at least figuring out how to fix it. You know, knowing your enemy is a big, is a big thing, you know, analyzing exactly what that problem is and then kind of coming up with a solution instead of you know so often you'll you'll hear people practicing and there will be say a you know a big technical run and they'll play it and it sounds bad and they'll play it again and it still sounds bad

and they'll play it again and you know like with the hope that if they just play it enough times it'll get better. And so they'll play it 20 times in a row. And all that they've done is practiced 20 times playing it wrong. Yes. Like they they're solidifying their bad habits, they're solidifying their mistakes. And that then, you know, for every time you repeat it poorly, it's going to take an extra repetition of doing it correctly to sort of retrain yourself. So I am a big believer in really analyzing where the problem is and then working on that little spot and then kind of working outwards from there. And I remember my father working with me as a boy with things like this. He would have me fix a very, very isolated thing, maybe even two or three notes. And then

we would say start just a few notes earlier and continue a few notes after the problem point and then start a little further back and continue a little further on so you're sort of building out from the uh from the former flaw um until it becomes very natural and then i think also over over time you you begin to realize how many times you might need to repeat it correctly for it to then feel natural because sometimes that can be also very frustrating where you play it and you're like oh it's fixed it's great and then you go on and the next day it's completely not fixed again so you haven't really locked it in place yes your your father was a very wise man or is a very wise man yeah i think so you know going back to something you said earlier actually something

you just said made me think about it because you mentioned competitions and i feel a little bit that for me, they were such a great tool for growth because of precisely this focus that you bring to efficiency, right? You go to school, there's a lot of things to do. You still want to play with your friends, but you prepare for a competition and all of a sudden it brings into light all of these little details that you want to pay attention to. What is your position on competitions as tools for growth? Well, I mean, I've never, I've never enjoyed competitions. I mean, the only enjoyable thing about a competition is, is winning, but I think, um, but I think they are useful in that, as you say, they are a good way to focus your attention, um, to give you a

goal to work towards um to get yeah to have to have your eye on a certain on a certain event that's coming up um i think that that can focus the mind in a in a very necessary way and and also you know from just from a career standpoint um if it is a way to to get exposed to people that you know that's that's important it it's really hard to know as a young person how do you get how do you get noticed how do you get anyone to pay attention to what it is you're doing and uh and also you know these competitions that where performances are a part of the prize uh i'm a big believer in in those sort of philosophically because having the opportunity to perform i mean is is kind of the greatest educational tool one could

hope for i know that um you know when i was well you mentioned the the first time you heard me play when i did these these recital tours for jeunesse musicale when i was 16 and 17 you're playing recitals in different towns different conditions um different challenges you know night after night I learned so much from those experiences and grew so much through those experiences. And, you know, we can talk about this a little bit as well, but you can't just learn how to play your instrument and expect that things will just happen for you. You know,

you have to find opportunities and you have to make opportunities. And then of course you have to take advantage of whatever opportunities you do have. Um, so I think that, um, for some people, you know, competitions are, uh, they're an entree into, into the world of performing. And if that's, uh, if that's what it takes, then, then I'm, I'm for them. Yes. Oh my gosh. You know, you're, you're dropping these, uh, truth bombs all over the place. Um, everything you're saying is so true and I hope that all of my students get to hear it but it's as you say I think that oftentimes we learn the violin when we really need to spend so much more time thinking about how we're practicing and how we're understanding

and again as you said seeking these performance opportunities is so crucial the performing is something that can be practiced as much as you know learning a specific shift Yeah. And I think that the more comfortable you are, well, the more comfortable you are, but also the better understanding you have of a performance atmosphere that helps you with your practicing away from performing too. um i'm thinking about well there have been actually a number of instances where where kids have come up to me and they've said i you know i i don't know what to do because i practice and i get my repertoire to a point where it just seems bulletproof you know like i i can play it in the practice room over and over i can play it in my sleep i don't even have to think about it and then I get up on stage and I'm second guessing everything and I feel like

I'm not prepared and I know I am prepared but you know how do I get past this and and I think well gosh it's it's so sad because they have practiced getting to a point mentally that they will never be in that place when they're performing like the the whole concept of being like oh I could play this piece in my sleep you know I don't even have to be paying attention and I play through it's like, well, what good does that do you? Because you're never going to be on stage, like asleep or mentally half there. You know, I think that when you're, when you're on stage, you have a heightened sense of focus. And when you're practicing, you have to be in that same frame of mind. I mean, if, if you're not practicing in the same frame of mind as when you're performing,

then you're not really practicing doing the same thing at all um and and i think that um you know the more you perform the more aware you are of that feeling of kind of really being locked in the zone and this kind of heightened consciousness and that helps you recognize that mindset in your practice sessions as well and so hopefully one's practice sessions can at least some of the time be more accurate replicas of an actual concert situation. That's so true. And how does that work for you right now with the productivity and, you know, maximizing time in the practice room when you seem to be juggling, you know, you have a family life, a really busy travel schedule and a very large list of repertoire and you do all sorts of things with concerti and recitals and

chamber music as well? How does that work for you? Well, sometimes the balance feels great. Sometimes it seems very complicated. Life is funny. I think that really part of living one's life is trying to figure out the best balance in your life all the time. And you might make certain self-realizations and say yeah this is this is the way that i want to live my life this is the way i want to pursue my career this is the balance of of work and play and whatever it may be so then you you maybe try to implement that and put that in place and maybe by the time that you have maybe your life has changed and you're looking for something a little different and i think in the music world that um that's sort of a constant challenge because even if

you're lucky enough to have control over the elements of your performing career, um, it takes a while to, to put them into place. And by the time they're in place, you know, maybe things have changed and certainly there's no bigger game changer than, than having a family. And, uh, you know, I, I have two kids and, and I want to spend as much time with them as I can. And I I've been so lucky to get to travel with my family a lot. But I mean, there are a few things quite as crazy as traveling around the world with a couple of kids and then trying to perform at the same time and learn other repertoire. And you talk about trying to be efficient. I mean, now I feel like I have to be more efficient than ever just to juggle all the things that I want to do.

You know, and I'm not, I'm not complaining about it. Like, it's sort of like a sport in the performing musician world to be like, Oh, I'm so busy, you know, and I just, my life is so crazy. You know, I'm never home. I'm always on air. And it's like, Oh, come on, you know, if you don't want to do it, then don't do it. You know, the fact is I love my life and I love being able to do what I do and I feel very lucky. So I'm not complaining, but I will say that it requires a certain amount of juggling of resources, that's for sure. And that can be challenging, but it also can be very rewarding. You know, James, when I think of your playing, you know, what comes to mind is, well, from my perspective, it's always technically flawless, but it goes way beyond that when I hear you play. I find your approach and interpretations, they are always, in my opinion, again, just so elevated. I, well, I'm a big fan, as you can tell. Thank you. can you talk to us a little bit about how the process is for you to take a piece from start to finish you know technically but also maybe i'm sure you spend a lot of time thinking about the intellectual aspect but um can you talk to us a little bit about that well for me um i want to i want to know pieces from if you were to to make a kind of a strange metaphor i would

say sort of like from an aerial view, you know, like I want to be able to look down and see the whole thing, kind of how it, how it works. And, you know, music, of course, as you're experiencing it is, is quite linear as a listener. You're hearing moment after moment, but I think as a performer, in order to know how to best guide the audience through this narrative, you have to know very clearly like where you're going and what your destinations are and where you've come from and how it all unfolds so you know a lot of people use the term of architecture

and music and I think that that is something that that is very important to me certainly when I'm first learning a piece like say if it's a new piece that maybe maybe is a piece that's just been written. My process is just to kind of slash through it as best I can, not getting really caught up in the weeds, so to speak, like just slashing through it, getting a sense of how the piece works, you know, what the shapes are, what the proportions are, getting, you know, kind of a vague sense like that. And then maybe my next stage is working through it more methodically bit by bit, finding the parts that from a technical standpoint are going to be most challenging, most intricate, and sort of figuring out how I'm going to negotiate those

spots you know just kind of technically learning learning them to to a reasonable level of proficiency so you know really that's that's the sort of the the grunt work the drudgery of just the nuts and bolts of figuring out how to play uh certain parts and then i guess it gets into learning bigger passages you know whether it's you know a even something now no bigger than a than a phrase but then you know maybe getting into sort of a musical paragraph or maybe an entire exposition or development you know a larger section and then eventually you know getting comfortable with whether it's the entire movement or even the entire piece um and often i find if i can, it's to my advantage to learn a piece kind of to say 90% ish, like not, not really quite

performance ready, but to the point of knowing it pretty well. And then if I have the, the time and the, the ability to do so, I'll put it away for a while and, um, just kind of let it sit because I find that when I come back to a piece uh that last five ten percent whatever it is comes more naturally than um than if I'm trying to really learn it to performance level from the very beginning that those last stages of a piece can sometimes be the hardest for me so I feel a little bit of distance and uh and a little bit of perspective kind of helps out and over the years I mean I think that that every performer gets to know in this weird kind of sixth sense kind of way they you begin to know where you need to be at a particular point in time you know like I know

if I'm learning a piece like where I need to be a couple weeks before that performance or where I need to be say four or five days before that performance I suppose that's probably something that that comes not just by you know the experience of performing a lot but probably you learn things from poorly negotiated decisions along the way but um but i i really think that that that's that's something that i don't even know that it can be taught you know i think that that feeling and you know what i'm talking about right where you know okay it's not it's not perfect today but the performance isn't today the performance is in x days and i am about where i need to be right now and uh i i rely on that mechanism a lot because i think that if you're trying to do something

that you're just kind of not ready to be at that spot um then it becomes very very difficult and just um you know if you don't if you don't have to be pushing yourself beyond your natural mechanisms then obviously that's going to make life a lot oh that's so true and you know you touched on a point that i think is so important um that i you know probably did the same as a student but i see it a lot is how sometimes students wait to get all the answers from us and i think that it's so important this self-knowledge that you have to go to the lesson, but then go home and explore within yourself and find where this guidance that you got in the lesson fits in your own playing and in your own process. I feel like there needs to be

an internalization of the notions that is not always happening. And thank you so much for bringing it up. I think it's such an important aspect. Well, I think that in a way, the most important thing that we really need to to learn um as musicians it sounds so obvious like it it's almost embarrassing and i'm sure that there will probably be listeners that i'm going to say that it's the most moronically obvious thing to say but we really need to learn how to listen to what we actually sound like. We get so caught up as instrumentalists in what we're doing that we very often lose sight of what it actually sounds like. And we have ideas about what we think we sound like, or we have these projections like, I want to sound like this, so therefore I am

sounding like this. And, you know, sadly, you see it in, you see it a lot among students where, you know, there'll be a group of students, they'll say, oh, so and so, well, you know, they're technically, they're not so great, but they're very musical, very musical. And sadly, a lot of times, what that means is, they don't play well, but they really love music, and they make a lot of faces when they play you know it's like well you can love something and really you know like i see this sometime with students where i can see that i can see how much it means to them and i can i can feel how much it means to them in this sort of this kind of physical struggle that they're going through but if you just listen to it it's like i'm sorry it's

just not coming across and it's because they have become confused by i think on the one hand they're they are measuring the output by the intensity of the input and um and uh i think that you know the biggest challenge that that i often give to students is to just really listen to your playing to try to be as objective as possible and say well listen to yourself as if you were listening to someone else is that really what you want it to sound like and it's it's a really difficult thing to ask of someone i mean i think most professionals they don't all we're ever trying to do is get as close as we can we're trying to approximate the ideals that we actually might have in our in our minds um but just wanting to

sound beautiful is not is not the answer you know and and i think that if you know what you actually sound like that's the first step in learning how to sound like what you want to sound so true so So true. So true. You're so good, James. This is great. You know, do you, do you have any other activities outside of music that you find contribute to your growth as an artist? I don't know if you, maybe a sport or a hobby and I mean your family, of course, I'm sure. And, but do you have any other creative outlet?

I don't know. We all have our hobbies. I think that as far as things that maybe have some sort of influence on my music making or my artistic personality, I think it's maybe interactions with people. and um you know if we if we feel like we know our audience then then we know how to reach them you know and i think that sometimes when people are performing or starting to perform part of the discomfort is not feeling like it's somehow appropriate to, to share, uh, something as in a way, something as intimate as, um, as so much of, of musical art can be. Um, so I, I don't know. I think being around, uh, people that are, that are passionate about the arts i think that that that kind of helps me understand how to um how to reach people better

as a as an artist myself and uh like just yesterday for example i've played a very interesting concert last night in this beautiful it's just a private concert this beautiful castle in scotland and uh you know it was really kind of a warm-up in if in a sense for this uh recital but i'm playing at the edinburgh festival in a couple days um but this wonderful pianist friend of mine steven osborne uh he and i thought well it'd be a valuable thing to kind of play the program through for some people and we were just in this beautiful beautiful home um with about 20 or so really interesting and elegant people that that all had you know we all had this shared interest in this beautiful music and it was so clear in that setting that we were sort of

messengers of we were how to say this we were communicators we we were bringing a musical message to these people and it wasn't about you know sometimes you go into a big concert hall And it's like, oh, you know, is the piano perfect? And is the stage placement perfect? And well, how are the acoustics? And am I technically, is everything happening the way I want it to be? And those things can get in the way sometimes of remembering that the message is one of communication. and uh i think that that is such a such an important thing to remember and a huge moment in my more recent life was uh when my my first child my daughter was was born and she was just this little this little bug you know and i would when i would play the violin she she would kind of get this look like she was focusing on these sounds and it was the same look that she had when she would hear me speaking or to hear my wife speaking and it was this realization that

she didn't understand what i was saying when i was talking and she maybe didn't understand what this music was that i was playing either but she recognized that it was a form of communication that they both were forms of communication. And to her, the music and the words, they were in the most sort of basic animalistic way. They were the same thing. They were both methods of communicating a certain message. And I thought, wow, that is something that we should never, never forget, you know, that we, that's what we do here. We're communicating a message that the beauty of that message is that it's one that cannot be expressed in words, but it is something of of importance and of value oh that's so true i mean what you're talking about

really is the essence of of the arts not just music you know it's bringing our humanities together like this and these exchange and you know going back to to your background with suzuki that's one of the thing he talks about a lot too about how he raises human human beings through music and oh what a great answer thank you so much of course you know i could keep you here all day but i know you're you're very busy so um i'll get you on your way but how about a quick round of rapid fire questions would that work for you okay all right so um we've talked a little bit about how uh you know your life looks like as a soloist we can call you an international soloist um but For the people who are dreaming of becoming, you know, let's say a soloist like this, what do you think would be one thing that they would need to really be prepared for?

You have to be prepared to deal with a lot of airports, to deal with a lot of logistical frustrations, and you have to be able to meet a lot of people. if you're not comfortable meeting a lot of different people and being in a lot of different social situations then the life will be very difficult because that is just a big part of what it is right and how about a performance that stayed with you throughout the years is there one you know there's been so many it's it's hard to it's hard to pinpoint them Sometimes they're at the most unexpected times. One that really stayed with me is not even one where there was a solo performance at all, but it was a performance when I was at Juilliard of Mahler's Third Symphony,

where I was the concertmaster and some of my very closest friends were in the orchestra with me. And it was, um, one of the great, um, one of the great experiences of, of sort of a collective feeling of, of beauty and accomplishment. Uh, I know that even all these years later, when I, uh, come across people that I was in school with that were in that same performance, we all remember that so fondly. It was one of those things where I think it meant a very great deal to all of us. And maybe none of us know exactly why, but it was very special. Oh, that's great.

Once again, you know, this communion of humanity. That's awesome. What skills do you think young musicians studying today should acquire in addition to learning to play their instruments? And we've talked about many already. um yeah well I think um I think something that uh that is very important is learning how to create opportunities um because uh things there are an awful lot of people it's a big world and there are an awful lot of people that want to do what you want to do and um and things are changing a lot too you know so many of the institutions that were established orchestras

even schools you know things are changing and we need to adapt so much yeah and I think that you can't expect no matter how well you play you can't expect things to just happen for you if there's a project that you're passionate about you need to find ways to bring that to other people you can't just sit back and expect people to take notice because there are just too many gifted people around that are being proactive. So I think being proactive in one's career is very important. That's great. You mentioned reading earlier. Do you have a favorite book that you would recommend to our listeners? You know, I have a lot of favorite books. My favorite books tend to be whatever I'm reading at the moment. But I would say that the book that

has remained a favorite and that I return to periodically is David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. And I think that just about anyone you will ever meet in your life, you will also meet in that book. And you come across characters that since the first time I read it, I meet people very frequently. And I just kind of laughed to myself and say, yeah, I know you. I've met you before. You know what? I've never read this book, but I'm definitely going to now for sure. It's great. It's absolutely great. And is there an advice that you've received in the past that you would like to transmit now? You know what? I got this, this came up in conversation with a very dear friend of mine, a wonderful cellist named Jan Vogler. We were talking about kind of

the the unpleasant experience of when you have to play sort of an audition type scenario whether it's an actual audition for for a job or for a place in a school or an orchestra or whether you're playing for a conductor whatever kind of situation it is that those kinds of awkward audition type scenarios uh he made the very brilliant point that once you get to a certain level of proficiency, you know, sort of a professional level. Um, the difference between your very best and your very worst is not as big as you think. And it basically, we tend to sound the way we sound. And if somebody likes your playing, they're willing to forgive almost anything. And if someone doesn't like your playing, there's nothing you can do to

change that and you know when you think about that like when you listen to a quality player you know sort of a professional level player you know right away whether you you like it or you don't and and it's not about whether they nailed that shift or whether that harmonic squeaked or you know it's really it's not about that it's about whether you connect to their playing or not and if you can remember that then i think it's so it's so freeing because you just have to to think well this is what i do and if you like it great i hope you do and if you don't well there's not really anything i can do about that yeah that's so true so much of the anxiety related to performance is this perception that we will be judged harshly yes thank you so much this is great advice

so before I let you go how about a quick actionable tip that our listeners can implement today in their musical lives well we talked about this a bit before but I really think what I would encourage students to do is to learn how to truly listen to what you're doing in the most objective way possible and you know nowadays we all have access to such wonderful technology I mean you can take out your phone and record yourself. And it can be something simple, something that you feel you know, really, really well, and play it. And then listen to it and say, did that sound the way I thought it sounded, you know, and it's particularly eye opening, I think, to challenge oneself on things that you think you do well, you know, don't necessarily listen to well, I sound

bad in this part I want to sound figure out why I sound bad but challenge yourself to say oh I sound really good when I do this this is what makes my playing special and then listen to it say is that really how I want to sound does my vibrato really sound like that am I doing am I doing this particular musical gesture because that's how I feel the music needs to be or am I doing this as a crutch to get around some sort of a technical hurdle and I think developing that kind of musical objectivity and objectivity of listening is one of the most valuable things that you can do. This is so great. Thank you so much. How about a project? Do you have an upcoming project? I know you always have many going on, but that you're excited about that you'd like to

tell us a little bit about? Sure. Well, you know, there's a couple of things that I've been very excited about recently. I mean, coming out in, I think within, within the coming month. So in September, um, there's going to be a release of a CD that's very special to me and that it's three pieces that were written for me and that I premiered, uh, two violin concerti, uh, one by Aaron J. Kurnis and, uh, the other by James Newton Howard, and then a violin and piano piece, um, called Stream of Limelight by Bramwell Tovey, and these three composers are also three very dear friends of mine. The pieces are very different, but they're each fantastic in their own way, and the concerti were recorded live, the Kernis in Seattle and the Howard in Detroit,

and the Tovey piece is with one of my most regular and beloved musical colleagues, my friend Andy Armstrong. So that's a project that has meant a lot to me. And I'm excited for that to finally come out. And hopefully people enjoy that. And as far as things kind of coming into the future, there's so many things I'm looking forward to. But one thing I feel very lucky about is that for the upcoming big Beethoven celebrations in 2020, which will be his 250th birthday i'm going to be doing a lot of a lot of beethoven in a lot of my my favorite cities performing you know the concerto and the romances and the triple concerto and in many places uh the complete cycle of the ten sonatas for violin and piano so um that's a very exciting thing to be

involved in such you know an iconic project uh during such an important anniversary oh wow that sounds incredible. You know, I'm going to put links to a lot of the things that we talked about today. And of course, you know, your website, but do you have a favorite place where our listeners could find information about all those things? You know, it's a shame because my website is kind of dead at the moment. And we're in the process of creating a new one that hopefully will be a fun site with access to everything. And hopefully it'll be clear and concise and helpful and all that but uh but yeah jamesennis.com eventually will be back to life and um and that hopefully will be a good resource for people that are looking to see what i'm up to i'll investigate

and see if i can find the links to these recordings and put them in the show notes and i'll put your instagram handle as well if that's if that's okay with you yeah that's great sure yeah well james i cannot thank you enough for accepting my invitation to being here today oh real pleasure I always tell people that in addition to being one of the world's greatest violinists, I think you're a truly wonderful person. And I think that everyone listening today can hear that. So, you know, I think the insight you gave us is so valuable and I think it's going to prove to be an inspiration for everyone listening. I mean, you said so many things that are so important for musicians of all backgrounds and all levels to hear. um you know i cannot thank you enough thank you so much well thank you i think it's a wonderful

thing what you're doing focusing on these these very important topics of how to practice how to prepare um you know it's something that that we don't spend enough time thinking about so i hope that some of what i said today will hopefully register with with a few people out there thank you james thank you guys so much for listening you can find the show notes for this episode with james ennis at mindoverfinger.com i would also love to connect with you so join the conversation on social media i am mind over finger on all platforms next week i'll be talking with the awesome host of Contrabass Conversation, Jason Heath, and we're going to discuss practicing and building a

fulfilling portfolio career. If you have the chance, please take a minute and head over to iTunes to subscribe, rate, and leave a review. It's very much appreciated. Again, thank you and à bientôt!