The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 057 Robert deMaine: On Practicing

Starting point is 00:00:00 You're listening to the Mind Over Finger podcast, episode number 57. Welcome to the Mind Over Finger podcast, discussions on mindful music making, efficient practice, and building a purposeful career. And now your host, Dr. Rene Paul Gaultier. Hi, everyone. I hope you're doing fantastic. Today, I have a great conversation about practicing for you. And I'm so excited to have none other than Robert Domain, Principal Cellist with the LA Philharmonic on the show. Robert is an incredible musician. He's distinguished himself as one of the finest and most versatile instrumentalists of his generation, performing around the world to critical acclaim as soloist, recitalist, orchestra principal, recording artist, chamber musician, and composer and arranger. A first-prize winner in many national and international competitions, Robert was the first cellist ever to win the grand prize at San Francisco's Irving M. Kline International Competition for Strings. As soloist, he has collaborated with many distinguished conductors, including Nimi Yarvey, Peter Ungin, Joseph Silverstein, and Leonard Slatkin. And he's performed nearly all the major cello concertos with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, where he served as principal cello for over a decade.

Starting point is 00:01:33 His recording of the John Williams Cello Concerto with the Detroit Symphony and Leonard Slatkin is available on Naxos. And his upcoming recordings include the complete works of Beethoven for piano and cello with pianist Peter Takács, the Haydn Cello Concertos with the Moravian Philharmonic of the Czech Republic, and a recital CD of Grieg and Rachmaninoff Sonatas with pianist Andrew M. Strong. In our conversation, Robert talks to us about the different facets of practicing, including the importance of courage, presence, and joy in practice, how to improve your playing at any time, in any circumstances, how to approach practicing for auditions, and his views on mental preparation. Robert has so much great insight and information for you today, and I know you're going to walk away inspired and motivated. Let's go to the show. Robert DeMaine, I'm so excited to have you on the show today.

Starting point is 00:02:40 I'm thrilled to be here. Thank you, Renée-Paul. Robert, before we dive into the music conversation, I'd love for my listeners to get to know you a bit better. So please tell us a little bit about your musical journey and how you got to where you are today. okay um well i come from a really musical family both my parents played instruments my my dad played french horn my mother played the piano and cello and uh all three of my sisters older sisters played instruments as well so i was four years old when i started playing the cello and the piano and my sister was my first inspiration she was my first teacher and uh Then I also studied in the public school system.

Starting point is 00:03:23 They had a string and band program where I also played the trumpet. So I couldn't really decide which instrument I liked best. But I was terrible at the trumpet, so the cello won out. And then I had this wonderful private teacher named Jane Smith who taught me cello and piano and pretty much everything. and uh and i i did uh i did a bunch of competitions and did well and and all the music festivals like meadow mouths and uh like practice camps and stuff like that and i went to aspen and music academy of the west and uh others that i can't remember right now off the top of my head uh but then i ended up going to the eastman school of music and i did my bachelor's and master's there and from there i

Starting point is 00:04:10 went to Yale. And that's when I got my first principal cello job in the Hartford Symphony. And that sort of started me off on a trajectory that I didn't quite expect. But it ended up sort of shaping my life. So in a nutshell, that's that's how it was. I started with my family, and then bled into public school, and then into private teaching, and then to conservatory so i hope that all makes sense sounds like a great journey i wanted to talk to you about auditions today but of course there's so much more about you and your career than orchestra playing

Starting point is 00:04:50 you have a vibrant solo and chamber music career as well but i loved how you have this experience of taking and winning principal chair auditions with orchestras of multiple levels you just talked about the Hartford Symphony, you were in the Detroit Symphony and now LA. And of course, now you get to sit in on a lot of audition panels. So I thought it would be an interesting topic for us to discuss. But first, practicing for an audition starts with also looking at how we practice everything all the time. And I think I'll just pass the mic to you and let you talk to us about it. I'd love to hear about your views on practicing in general. Well, I mean, it's always a good idea to, you know, do sort of nitty gritty work, you know, sort of our technical hygiene. And, you know, of course, scales, arpeggios, shifting exercises, bow exercises, sevchik. I mean, I could name, you know, dozens and dozens of different composers of exercises.

Starting point is 00:05:56 Um, and I, I would say that inventing your own exercises around your perceived weaknesses, and we all know what they are. Uh, we often either avoid them or often we, we sit in the practice room and just practice what we're already good at doing. So I think we need to really focus on, on our sort of perceived weaknesses and have the, uh, have the courage to face ourselves and and really focus in on that so uh in addition to doing you know our regular upkeep and you should always always always realize that whenever your instrument is in your hands it counts so if you're just sort of mindlessly repeating things and perhaps not paying attention to your say hand positions or the way you're sitting or the way you're standing you're you might be practicing

Starting point is 00:06:53 bad habits and reinforcing something that you don't realize you're reinforcing. So you have to be a hundred percent present when you are practicing at all times, because it counts. At the same time, there is a way to make practicing enjoyable or even fun. So that's also important to develop. So it's not drudgery all the time in the practice room. So in a nutshell, that's sort of my outlook on practicing and preparation. I love so many things that you said, and it's so true. The courage to face ourselves in the practice room, that's not always easy, definitely. I know, I put it off myself.

Starting point is 00:07:44 And I love what you said about making it count. Sometimes I talk to students and I tell them that they are anti-practicing. So when they're doing exactly what you described, so you're sitting there and you're mindlessly playing through passages and you're neglecting proper form or beautiful sound, I call that anti-practicing because they're doing exactly what you said, developing bad habits. And I'm also on board with the making it fun part, that's for sure. well may i add one thing to this i know that that many uh many of us do gigs for extra work and especially around the holidays we pick up a lot of things and one of the things that i used to do before you know when i was a student even in high school and in college i would get called to play in the pit for musical theater productions and uh traveling productions that

Starting point is 00:08:34 would come through town and one could easily memorize that book in a couple of performances i mean by by the end of that you were like oh you have to do this again you know two three weeks of the same show every day every night i turned that into an opportunity to improve and i would pay very very close attention to every note every shift every motion i made i turned those into kind of heavy duty practice sessions so you can you can choose to either phone it in and sit there and just sort of zone out and get that what i call highway hypnosis or you can be present 100 of the time while you're doing that sort of thing so you know a wedding gig or a you know a gig playing in the pit uh of a musical theater production or or anything can end up being

Starting point is 00:09:29 a very fruitful practice session as well. I agree so much with you on this. And it's funny you say that because I was a couple months ago talking with the tribe on Facebook and telling them to do just that. And I was trying to come up with a better expression because I was telling them to work hard at the easy stuff to really make it count to use your language. And I was illustrating it with a story from a student of mine who at some point was not able to take lessons for several weeks and she was asking me how she could keep on making progress and I told her to every time she picked up this violin for the orchestra rehearsals I think she was in the summer camp for several weeks without lessons and I was telling her to pick a specific aspect and really

Starting point is 00:10:16 focus on that whether it's round pinky or left hand frame or bow management and to really really make every moment count and use it as a way to improve and when she came back the transformation was really incredible because she had been so present for all of those weeks i love that you brought that up right i mean it's looking at the very fine detail of what we do you know you could make a sports analogy like if a a pitching coach is studying a pitcher and his form and his uh the way he uh he delivers the the pitch uh watching it on camera in slow motion pointing out to to the to the subject the pit the pitcher what what his his fault or what he could do better we can be that coach for ourselves i know that might be an inelegant um sort of metaphor or or comparison but

Starting point is 00:11:10 i i do look at athletes and how how they uh approach what they do in in their practice so yeah that's a great analogy it's very very important now how about preparing for audition there's you know where to begin it's such a broad topic but um what is your take on practicing preparing for an audition i like to try to keep things as simple as possible but in simplicity doesn't mean that it's easy i i i don't try to get inside my head too much when it comes to the actual playing when when the end result is there but in order to get there the preparation sort of physically um is i mean there's there's there's being in shape and then there's being in olympic condition like olympian condition and that takes another special type of uh preparation

Starting point is 00:12:12 where you leave absolutely no stone unturned in your in your playing every single connection is examined polished and then you move on to the next connection and the next connection and you crawl through your repertoire now there i like to approach things from two two different angles one is is that of which i'm speaking that's sort of uh nitty-gritty very close to the uh, the microscope, um, type of preparation, uh, that we, I think we all sort of dread, uh, at the beginning, but when we're in it, it's kind of fascinating how we just inhabit that world. And, and it's actually kind of fun once you're, once you're in it. Uh, and then the other angle is to almost abandon all of that and play through as much as you can. So I approach the

Starting point is 00:13:10 preparation from both angles. And even if I, if I make mistakes, when I do the big broad sweeping play through, um, I make myself not stop to correct the mistake. So I played directly through as though I were playing in an audition, no matter what my level of preparation is at the moment. Does that make sense? Absolutely. Yes. So eventually the two, the idea is that the two approaches meet in the middle. And that's, for me, that's when Olympic or Olympian condition happens is when I know that I'm ready and I'm bulletproof at that point. And that makes such a big difference to be bulletproof, like you call it, because when you put the nerves into it and that's when the training starts to really shine

Starting point is 00:14:04 and it's uh as as many of us know it's about 99 percent mental and before we get to that aspect how do you get in that olympian shape well by doing all of the right things always paying attention to uh like i said before the uh the very microscopic uh details that that we might gloss over if we were just to say sit down and get the instrument out and just play um i mean there is that aspect to practice that we don't want to forget we don't want to forget about that childlike wonder that we have for our instruments and the whole reason why we're doing this in the first place so we have to remember the overall context that for me that's vital because i if i don't have that as sort of the landscape in which i'm practicing then i won't

Starting point is 00:15:04 get anything done so i think it's it's it's crucial to be doing that fine that very very fine detailed sort of antiseptic work within a broader sort of emotional context does that make sense? Absolutely. What I'm saying? Yes. Yes. Um, I don't know if I'm exactly answering your question in terms of how, how well to prepare, but how, how I do it is uncompromising. I don't gloss over any detail and I'm sure that there are things that I do miss that maybe somebody else, like a colleague might point out, uh, another angle, uh, to, through which to view it. But, But the other direction that I come from playing through it is taking a step back and seeing the forest and not seeing the individual tree or the individual like little leaf or piece of bark or whatever. I'm seeing the entire thing at that point.

Starting point is 00:16:05 So it's crucial to do it from both angles. I can't stress how valuable that has been for me to approach it that way. mm-hmm and how about recording yourself how do you approach that well i i would not recommend just using an iphone because your sound is compressed you're not getting an honest uh assessment of yourself i mean some people think that oh well this is exactly how i sound you know warts and all and nope nope nope you've got to have something that's a little bit more has a little bit more uh ambience to the sound you know what i'm saying uh so i would i would recommend at least having a good microphone in the room and uh yes recording oneself or

Starting point is 00:16:56 videoing oneself is extremely valuable also practicing in front of a mirror is very valuable and uh to make sure everything is is working like you making sure you're drawing a straight bow in general all of that uh recording um i would say it's it's valuable but like with it with any tool uh say a metronome or uh even like a uh what's the device the tuning device all i can think about is a tuner right yeah i guess it's just called the tuner some people clip them on their instruments. I would, I would limit the amount that I use any external tool because we can end up becoming too reliant on them instead of having those actually train ourselves what to listen for and what to watch for when we're on our own. You know, like for instance, the metronome,

Starting point is 00:18:00 we often get so I've listened to so many people, and I can tell they practice all the time with a metronome, and they don't cut the umbilical cord from it. And there's a difference between a beat and a pulse. And sometimes people play with a mechanical beat a little bit too much, as opposed to a pulse, which is constantly sort of renegotiating itself. You know, like our heartbeat, or heart rate isn't constant i mean it is it isn't a constant you know 120 you know it'll it'll vary between you know 116 124 i mean that is that is a natural thing uh some music demands a beat like like say certain pieces by stravinsky or bartok which are very mechanical in nature so but in general i i think in getting back to the point one one shouldn't get too uh addicted to using

Starting point is 00:18:55 external devices recording is immensely valuable if you use it the right way absolutely you were talking about umbilical cords so one could say that you want to wean yourself of those devices they can become like a like a security blanket in some ways like uh only looking at yourself through one angle if that makes uh any sense to anybody um out there uh so and also playing for others is is important but again to it to a certain extent because you know there's a phrase you know i it's i probably can't say it on the podcast but basically the uh the essence of it is everybody's got an opinion absolutely okay so even even among trusted colleagues you might get wildly different opinions so you have to develop your own strong

Starting point is 00:19:53 uh convictions yourself yes so also relying on youtube or relying on recordings things uh that's very very slippery slope it's very dangerous you know so uh to an extent you can use these things as pedagogical uh devices but you have to be yourself i agree completely and it's true with playing for other people where i think that whoever is preparing needs to put some thought as to when to stop playing for others i would say definitely limit that in the days prior it can completely affect our confidence a passing comment can just you know shatter our confidence and our abilities and i think that it's exactly what you said there comes a point where we just need to go back inward and trust the process that we've put ourselves through

Starting point is 00:20:54 trust our own skills our own abilities and our own thoughts about our playing right well exactly but another thought occurred to me is that you know taking auditions is a a little bit like uh for a lot of people a little bit like say quitting smoking um they get married you know what happened i didn't pass the first round in this audition but yet i made the semis in this audition well i made the finals in the next but i was the bridesmaid never the bride you know it's So like each successive audition you take, you're working out a certain type of mental muscle that you didn't realize you had. So I'm going to use my wife as an example. She took, she's a horn player, very fine horn player who took roughly 35 auditions before she actually

Starting point is 00:21:51 landed a really good job and each successive audition she got stronger and stronger and stronger and uh it may not take 35 auditions for somebody to get a job may not take three auditions but if you treat an audition at like it's a type of practice um i'll jump over to the quitting smoking thing it took me at least 20 attempts to quit smoking before finally i realized hey I'm not a smoker anymore. This is easy now. So I think the cumulative, um, effect of preparing for auditions, no matter how many you take, whether it's two or 10, um, you strengthen your resolved. And it just becomes a lot easier over time, in my opinion. And having seen people go through that, I think that that's very valuable as well. It's so true. I agree with you. And

Starting point is 00:22:59 there's so many things that we can read in books or hear from colleagues that sometimes they don't clicking until we experience it for ourselves exactly like what you just said and how about the mental preparation aspect of things yeah that's a big one i mean that's the biggest one of all i mean many of us don't don't grasp that when we're in the thick of trying to trying to nail a shift it's like oh how am i going to do this on stage in front of you know you know a committee of 10 12 people plus whoever else is there and the music director you know i think and i referred to this before as as an emotional landscape one has to enter that zone or that room in in one's mind uh in order to get the best uh out of what you do and i i do think that

Starting point is 00:23:54 um remembering and embracing embracing tightly the idea that we had this childlike wonder for our instruments and for music when we were younger and we were hooked i mean there is that has not left us clearly but often it gets forgotten about and it's in the background instead of the forefront of our minds and i think that should be dwelt is that the right word upon when we are or dwelled upon when we are are gearing up to prepare for something and for me anyway i mean of course i'm projecting everything through the the prism of my my own life, I, uh, have always gotten my best work done when I have enjoyed the process through that lens. Yeah. And for me laying the groundwork, the mental groundwork is, is extremely crucial.

Starting point is 00:25:03 Even on a local basis, like say if I have a performance in two days that I'm doing, I practice that sort of meditation getting into that zone and i'm getting better and better and better as time goes by at age 50 i'm finally getting it you know but i've been i've been headed this way my whole life and and i realized that in the high points of of my career i have always been in that mind space that that healthy emotional landscape that is conducive to us getting our best work and our best performing done. And how do you do that? How do you keep joy and fun into this process? Practice, practice, practice. I mean, it's not, it's not getting the, it's not about getting the

Starting point is 00:25:58 instrument out necessarily. It's about the preparation to get your instrument out. It's getting see for so many years I dreaded getting my cello out it was like almost as though I had like the musical equivalent of writer's block and you know I I put so much pressure on myself to do well and I used to joke that and I think I said this to you before that I I wouldn't ever get my cello out unless I had a suit and tie on you know like I I was about to do a performance because i dreaded that entering this sort of unknown space well once i started reflecting on those high points in my life and what did they have in common what was the common denominator that is when i realized oh i think i can do this and the more i would actually think on it and

Starting point is 00:26:56 meditate on it and uh also keep my as part of a a broader uh sense keeping my body in shape you know making sure that i eat well making sure that i i exercise regularly that helped that helped me streamline the process mentally so um you have to practice at that to get good at it I think it's something that ought not be neglected. Yeah, it's a very holistic approach. Definitely, definitely. I used to think it was my own weakness that made me sort of unable to enjoy

Starting point is 00:27:39 the act of playing the cello for a long time. I know I'm going off on a tangent here, but this really solidified and brought me back uh into into focus brought me back where i belonged in a way um in terms of laying the groundwork for for um for the the nitty-gritty microscopic work and for performing as well so and i think it's such an important way to experience practice because when we are enjoying it and we are more in the moment and everything becomes much more productive and i feel like we assimilate the notions assimilate what we're working on at a different level

Starting point is 00:28:23 a hundred percent you know another thing that comes to mind is uh a quote from i think bernstein is the leonard bernstein is credited with saying that many composers uh sit and and wait for their amused to arrive basically it's like they wait for inspiration before before they get to work and if that doesn't arrive then you know they they just give up but you know i think it was either bernstein or tchaikovsky maybe both of them had said this uh you basically what he was saying was that or what they were saying was that you you have to just show up and start working and eventually it'll happen you know sometimes it takes a while for that muse to come and sit on your shoulder you know it's a very romantic notion that that you know that image is there but

Starting point is 00:29:14 you know what i'm saying i think right i uh yeah i might not be expressing it right but you you have to it you you can't always count on being automatically being in that conducive space that really uh wonderful space where we get the best work done and we all remember like when we've done our best work but we can get there bit by bit if we just show up and get the instrument out and and start playing and for me when i when i get the instrument out i often will improvise i'll noodle for a while until i start to feel limber and then i start i start doing doing the work gradually that way i don't just sit down and play a scale absolutely i was talking with ursula oppens and jerome lorenzo a couple months ago and he was one of my chamber music coaches i

Starting point is 00:30:11 loved him yeah oh yeah and i'm not quoting but i am paraphrasing uh they were both kind of talking about the fact that sometimes motivation is not there but if you just sit at the piano and start playing well when inspiration and motivation show up then you they'll find you sitting at the piano you know you just said it far better than i ever could sorry that's exactly what i was trying to say uh but now yeah that's exactly how i feel it's like you have to you kind of suit up and show up and then then it'll happen for you uh you can't give up right away don't give up even if you feel crummy about yourself, crummy about your playing, uh, crummy about life. Often I have, once I've stuck it out, uh, it, it works. And for me also having a distraction in

Starting point is 00:31:09 the room often will speed up the process. Like I've said to you in previous conversations that I would put the, put a season of say breaking bad or Dexter on just in the background to keep me company. And, uh, often it'll happen because I have that sort of hook in, in the practice room. I remember a couple, I mean, this was a few years ago now I wrote a blog entry. I think it was called commit to 10 and it was a cry out to my students to encourage them to just show up in the practice room and commit to practice only 10 minutes, because sometimes we don't want to practice an hour and the thought of practicing an hour is so daunting but if you show up in the practice room and just start improvising exactly what you said you just commit to grabbing your

Starting point is 00:32:00 instrument and do something with it for 10 minutes usually by then you're you're you know in the action and ideas come and it feels great and i think the accompanying picture was a one of my dinosaur in my case, because sometimes, you know, the violence sits dormant in the case and it feels like it's some monster waiting to ruin your day. But if you just take it out and start moving, things happen. So exactly, exactly. Yeah. It's a great way to counter your, your fear. I don't know. I, I, you, you have to, you have to realize that you, you can't climb anybody else's mountain you can't climb somebody else's hill you know if somebody says oh i practice six hours a day no that person practices i should be doing that well you they don't stop to think perhaps

Starting point is 00:32:51 that maybe you know they could achieve in less than half the time that they're doing in six hours maybe they're practicing too much uh already that things that they they can already do well um maybe they're they're noodling half the time and not really getting getting anything done Um, not that that's a bad thing necessarily, but, um, I think we have to realize that we, we have each one of us has our own way that we have to find. And, uh, we can't base our own experience on somebody else's, if that makes sense. Absolutely. We need the mic drop moment right there.

Starting point is 00:33:33 Yeah. Robert, do you have any routines or rituals around audition preparation? Well, technically speaking, yeah, I have a 45-minute technique routine, or let's say it's a warm-up routine at first, that is heavily involved with shifting, with double stops, with stretching exercises, and with drone exercises. Now, when I talk about practicing with a drone, I don't use an external drone. I use the open strings of my instrument and practice scales and arpeggios with an open string above and an open string below. so uh that helps me um really pinpoint my intonation and uh play in tune with my instrument you know whether it's with the the drone above or the drone below and that builds in a certain amount of flexibility in the intonation uh it's never uh your your f sharp isn't going to be the same if you're playing it on the d string with the g drone open g drone as it is with the open a drone

Starting point is 00:34:50 so there's a bit of flexibility inherent in that practicing that or that that philosophy of practicing uh so i really i stress drones heavily it also gets the instrument ringing and uh by the end of 45 minutes i'm well oiled i'm ready i'm ready to get some work done and in in practicing the uh the excerpts i what when i was getting going with orchestral auditions uh back in back in my actually late teens even i i started doing a lot of listening in like the sibley music library for example they had you know wonderful they have everything there uh the library at Eastman, which we both know well. And so I listened to a lot of different recordings and acquainted myself with different approaches to the pieces. And over time, the usual suspects for

Starting point is 00:35:53 auditions, like the usual excerpts that we have, I started treating them like they were my favorite little show pieces or uh lyrical pieces and that i think is a key approach when you approach like even that that uh the opening of barter bride overture or the tricky passage in the mendelssohn uh midsummer night's dream scherzo that everybody fears you treat that like it is your favorite little bonbon and that's another another way in as opposed to oh i gotta polish this like you know these eight measures you know that's that's kind of a drag if you approach it that way but once i started treating these like individual show pieces and each one had their own character each composer had his own character uh like the Verdi didn't sound like the Beethoven

Starting point is 00:36:55 it didn't sound like the Mozart it didn't sound like the Copland you know etc so each one has a different and unique style so you have to highlight the differences between all of these things everything has to be thought out and the fine-tooth comb approach is is very very valuable if you don't do that you're going to end up chasing your tail and you'll end up coming back to it eventually so why not start with it yeah i love that approach love it how about any um audition day rituals that you don't feel uncomfortable sharing with us oh well uh nowadays i you know i've gotten well i haven't taken an audition in a while yeah i was gonna say nowadays i don't think you're taking auditions but i would i would say do do what it is that

Starting point is 00:37:54 makes you very very comfortable uh in terms of like like if you have like your chamomile tea or you have to have your indoral at a certain time right before the audition if uh i don't know if that's okay to say on your, on your podcast, but I think you, you, on the day of the audition, it's crucial that you don't think about the outcome. You don't treat it like it's an audition. You're not trying to prove anything to anybody, but yourself. The best playing I have ever done, whether it's a concerto or a recital or an audition, is when I didn't give a, you know what, and I only wanted to show up and play. Play. That's the tip of the iceberg of all the work we do. That is the result we should be thinking about. We shouldn't be thinking about what is

Starting point is 00:38:53 the committee wanting. You know, I possibly did my best technical playing for a certain audition when i played how i thought the music director and how i thought the committee wanted me to play and i was the runner-up in that audition and i think i would have won it had i gone out there and been just been myself you know you can't do i i can't imagine that one would play his or her best if they went out there treating it like an audition. And I hear people, I can feel that they're not in the right mindset when they're playing their audition. And as good as they might be, they haven't quite figured that out. And sometimes it's accidental. Sometimes we go out and and we feel great and don't know why we feel great sometimes you can't predict it i mean you

Starting point is 00:39:50 can never really truly predict what's going to happen but we can come close i think if you get good at establishing that right mindset of only playing for yourself and saying to yourself they are stupid if they don't they are yeah the interesting dichotomy is that my next question was going to be from your perspective having said on so many committees what the committee's looking for but chances are you're going to give them what they want if you do play without trying to please them and you do exactly what you just said which is to really play the most beautiful music that you can yeah that's that's that's a great a great statement i think that when we when i've sat on i don't know countless committees and the people who have have won the positions

Starting point is 00:40:44 have always played somewhere beyond what we expect to hear it's like oh i i'm forgetting about my expectations i'm forgetting about ticking the right boxes i'm just enjoying listening to this person play and i hear them you know i hear the artist i'm not even thinking about those details when i hear somebody who's playing transcends all of that and i know that people listening out there you've you have had those moments in your life where you have played and you've transcended all of those things when you are at your highest point mentally and physically um so yeah i i hope that makes a little bit of sense you know when i when i say you shouldn't think about what what individual details that the committee is is wanting to hear

Starting point is 00:41:42 as long as you are out there playing and you're loving what you're doing and you are in the moment and uh not carrying one wit about what anybody else thinks that's when you do your best work i've found i absolutely agree yeah that's so true there's a lot of mic dropping going on here today i don't know about that but but i i uh you know humbly i i say these things mainly observations through my own my own experiences you know taking a you know a few auditions myself and and uh seeing so many people and hearing so many people audition for for the positions i was on the committee for so yeah ultimately practicing for audition is just excellent practice taken to a highest level of details well ultimately preparing for audition

Starting point is 00:42:43 is just continuing to practice with excellence you know there's it's a different process than preparing for a recital or a chamber music concert definitely but I think that sometimes people feel like they have to completely transform how they practice for an audition but the fundamentals are the same it just needs to be great awareness to details but also bringing these elements of joy that you're talking about and staying focused on why we play music and why we do what we do? Well, Renee Paul, I mostly agree with what you said. I have to disagree with you in that we have to treat auditions differently in our practice. We really don't. I think basically what I've been saying the whole time is losing the hang up about, oh, how do I prepare for an

Starting point is 00:43:41 audition you just for me i prepare for a concerto the same way a recital the same way um you know playing solos in the orchestra the exact same way that i would prepare for a an audition i make no different no differentiation i think that uh the when i have let go of that audition hang up i do my best and my head is in the right place yeah no i agree with you i think i just meant in the sense that an excerpt might be 45 seconds as opposed to a 20 minute sonata yeah and and often they can drop they can drop the needle in a bigger piece and say oh play from letter r to letter w in helden levin or whatever and you have to be ready to do that but if you have the right mindset that it's just it's one of your favorite little pieces in the world no matter where they

Starting point is 00:44:34 dropped the needle it's as though you're playing a recital it's as though you're playing for you know uh a concerto or or it's as though you're just playing for yourself yeah which is when you do it it's you're your harshest audience audience member right there but uh yeah you know prove it to prove it to yourself that is the number one number one is number one robert how about a round of rapid fire questions sure shoot so you have talked about metronome and tuner already i'd love to know what your favorite tool in the practice room is or are and why my favorite tool is my my open strings nice uh i i rely on them greatly and uh it the the practicing with drones makes uh It makes my intonation much, much sharper, much better, sharper in terms of pinpointing, being pinpointed.

Starting point is 00:45:39 But anyway, rapid fire question. Open strings are my favorite, favorite tool among all the other gadgets. What skills do you think young musicians studying today should acquire in addition to learning to play their instruments? I think it's never too early to play chamber music. And chamber music is a wonderful training ground for every musical skill there is and every interpersonal skill there is. I would say you can't hide who you are in a chamber music group. And you develop skills in diplomatically deciding, phrasing, dynamics, your overall vision of a piece, and also how to play together. and the skills that you need to develop in order to play with a really good ensemble.

Starting point is 00:46:36 So I would say chamber music is a must for all young musicians. I hope that answers the question. Absolutely. I love that answer. How about a habit that you have that you think has contributed to your success? Well, I would say in my case, it's diagnosed OCD. uh but uh i mean i would say intense concentration on detail is uh is is crucial is a is a good habit to develop and uh never never trust yourself a hundred percent always have a little bit of doubt it's

Starting point is 00:47:18 always going to make you question what you're doing and and i think that's the essence of of looking at things very very closely is that you know humans are fallible right and we need to do preventive maintenance all the time not just for an hour in the practice room they're always doing damage control as we play that's so true so it's like be confident that you might be wrong drop the mic robert how about a quick actionable tip that listeners can implement today in their musical lives? Okay, I would say find a way to embrace the reason why you do this in the first place. I know it sounds simplistic, but we all tend to forget why we're doing it when it becomes our job, when it becomes our livelihood. Remember that it was also an

Starting point is 00:48:13 avocation hobby a something that we love to do and often we do forget why so enter that mind space every day every time you look at your instrument you know try to conjure up that same wonder that you had when you were five or ten or however old you were when you started playing and fall in love every day with what you do. That's great. I love that. Robert, I want to thank you so much, especially the listeners don't know this, but we've actually had this interview before, and this was my first technical glitch on the Mind Over Finger podcast where the interview got lost in the internet platform. So I'm so grateful that you accepted to come back. and since then there was a wonderful conversation that you had with nathan cole and akiko on the

Starting point is 00:49:16 stand partner for life podcast so i really encourage my listeners to go and check it out to hear more about you and your story and um but yes i will probably need to buy another mic after today after all these mic drops and but i'm so grateful for all of this insight for this gift of your time and your wisdom well i i hope that i can at least you know move one person out there you know i i hope it's of some some value to somebody and uh good luck to all of you and feel free to contact me too and anytime uh you can find me on the web and i'll put all the links in the show notes thanks so much all right thank you renee paul it's been a real pleasure thank you guys so much for listening i hope you enjoy this chat with robert domain there's so

Starting point is 00:50:18 much that i'm taking away from this conversation and for those of you who are starting to know me a little bit more you know how much i love that he talked about courage presence and joy in practice I think that it's so easy for us to get caught in the day-to-day mentality, to get discouraged if we don't see quick progress, and to get in a rut and go on automatic pilot in the practice room. But it's really when we take the time to cultivate those qualities, to build that courage that he's talking about, to really bring mindful presence in our work, to intentionally prioritize joy in the practice room, And understand that what we're on is the path to mastery and that focusing on the quality of the process rather than on how fast we can get to our goals, that true and faster progress really happens. I would love to know what your favorite takeaways from today's conversation was. So please get in touch with me. I am mindoverfinger on both Instagram and Facebook. And of course, you can find me at mindoverfinger.com, where you can read the show notes, find more information about mindful and deliberate practice. and make sure to visit my resource pages at mindoverfinger.com slash resources, where I've put links to all my favorite tools, recordings and websites, as well as the books recommended

Starting point is 00:51:39 by my guests here on the podcast. And if you're looking for a community of mindful practice enthusiasts, join the Mind Over Finger tribe. This is my private Facebook group where I pop in once a week to talk about mindful practice and answer your questions and where you can exchange with fellow musicians about practicing and music making. You can also participate in our book club. These days we're reading The Inner Game of Golf by Tim Galway and we're going to read it and study it and apply it in our practice. So get the book and join the tribe at facebook.com slash groups slash mind over finger tribe and let's get in the flow together. And because I like to make things as easy as possible for you guys, I'll have all those links in the show notes.

Starting point is 00:52:23 So that's it for today. I really hope you enjoyed this conversation. I invite you to visit Robert's website at robertdemain.com, and you can also find more info and links about him in the show notes. Again, thank you, and à bientôt.

The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 057 Robert deMaine: On Practicing

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