The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 127 Jennet Ingle: The Happiest Musician

Starting point is 00:00:00 You're listening to the Mind Over Finger podcast, episode number 127. Welcome to the Mind Over Finger podcast, discussions on mindful music making, efficient practice, and building a purposeful career. And now, your host, violinist, teacher, and high performance coach for musicians, Dr. Renée Paul Gaultier. Hi there. I hope you're doing wonderfully well as you tune into this episode. If you're hearing this in April or May, it means that enrollment for the Music Mastery Experience is officially open. If you find yourself in a transition time with big dreams, with some

Starting point is 00:00:51 uncertainty as to how to move forward, you want to start performing at your best consistently. maybe you want to win your dream job grow your career and grow your confidence well check out the music mastery experience the music mastery experience is a highly personalized group coaching program that has all the answers for you so if you're wanting to feel confident to win that job to rock the stage, to grow your career, to make more money. It's 100% possible and the music mastery experience will get you there. Go to mindoverfinger.com right now to book your free conversation with me and get your transformation started today. And stay tuned for more details after the interview. Today, I'm so happy to bring you someone absolutely phenomenal and highly

Starting point is 00:01:48 inspiring. I'm speaking with oboe player, teacher, entrepreneur, coach, and author Janet Engel. Janet is principal oboist of the South Bend Symphony Orchestra and as a soloist at heart, joyfully takes over any stage that will have her. As the owner and operator of Janet Engel Reads, she makes and sells over 200 handmade reeds every month and helps people with their own readmaking through her YouTube series, The 5-Minute Readmaker, her weekly online read club, and her beginner course, Zero to Readmaker. Janet has recently focused on building community for adult oboists. Her signature group program, The Invincible Oboist, demystifies instrumental skills and helps oboists to get past the struggle to find ease in their playing. Her new book, The Happiest

Starting point is 00:02:45 musician encourages creatives to take agency in their careers and not wait to be chosen. Jenna graduated from the Eastman School of Music where she studied with Richard Kilmer. We had a great time covering a variety of topics in our conversation, including what shaped her career and got her where she is today, what it looks like to be a multi-passionate a former entrepreneur, how to start taking agency in your career, and so much more. I know you're going to walk away with so many ideas and find yourself really inspired by Janet's wisdom. Let's go to the show.

Starting point is 00:03:35 Janet Ingle, so fun to have you on the show today. Renee, thank you so much for having me. I love talking with you. Janet, you are such a creative force and you wear so many hats and you wear them all really well, I might add. And I think your story and what you're going to share with us today is going to be extremely inspiring to so many. I can't wait to dive in.

Starting point is 00:03:58 But first, I want the listeners to hear your story in your own words. So please tell us about you and how your artistic path has unfolded. thank you so much Renee so I'm an oboist and I've always been an oboist ever since I picked up the instrument I was like this is what I have to do this is the thing that I want to do and like so many musicians I assumed that after you know shortly after getting out of conservatory I would land a large and important job in a large and important orchestra and that that would be my life, my single paycheck, my plan. And I took auditions for years and years and years. And over and over and over again, I was so close to winning a big job and then didn't quite.

Starting point is 00:04:49 But meanwhile, as I was doing that, as I was first working day job, survival job type jobs, And then as I was leaving those jobs in favor of teaching, you know, private students and then better and better private students, and I was starting a read business just for some like side money, some walking around money, and then got gradually more and more intentional about that and developed it into a six-figure read business. Um, as I was coming along and, you know, practicing for these auditions and for this level of specificity that winning an orchestral audition really requires, I was also finding my voice as an artist and increasingly resisting, um, trying to seek the perfection that orchestral excerpts required of me. And so I was giving recitals and I was, you know, giving concerto performances and I was winning, you know, small jobs and then slightly larger jobs and working increasingly much and with increasing confidence and with increasing joy and soloistic-ness. And at a certain point, I realized that even though I did not have that one big, credible, important job that I thought I needed to have to have credibility, to have importance, to be a success, what I had was a really beautiful career that was made up of all of the things I liked best to do, that was creatively fulfilling, artistically fulfilling, and financially rewarding enough. enough. The magic of having a portfolio career like I have now is that the money always comes from somewhere. And when I have something in mind that I want to do or perform or say or be, I can do it. I can create that for myself. And so that's the very, very short version of a quite

Starting point is 00:06:55 long and complicated path that didn't always feel that never felt linear that is so amazing i feel that as you said we often have this idea and i think things are changing a little bit i think the new generation now sees how many ways we can be artistic outside of just playing the instrument but we have an idea of what the career is going to look like this straight path outside of conservatory, as you mentioned, and we let that define us. And when it doesn't happen, it's easy to kind of get caught up and let that affect our self-perception, self-confidence. And I love that you're talking about just doing these things, moving forward, finding your voice in this increasing joy and confidence that you talk about is so inspiring. It's the epitome of really using

Starting point is 00:07:50 your art history in every way to serve your career. I just love that. What are some of these hats that I mentioned? Well, so I do play as Principal Oboist with the South Bend Symphony. I have one single student at an adjunct position over at St. Mary's College, but the most of the teaching that I do now is through these online group programs that I've created. So I do a lot of work with adult amateur oboists through a program that I've created called The Invincible Oboist. It's a three-month training program to get the struggle out of the way for oboists and bring back the ease and the joy in their playing that they want. I do a lot of readmaking instruction for people, both through an online program called Zero to Readmaker and through my YouTube channel,

Starting point is 00:08:48 which I've been doing for maybe the past five years or so, which is instructional videos for, uh, oboists and reed makers. It's called the five minute reed maker. Um, I also have a program called reed club in which oboists from all over the world actually come together every Monday night and we just have an hour and a half of reed making support. Um, it's a room full of friends chatting as they get their work done and also like crowing their reeds into the microphone and saying, Hey, what would you do with this? What, what does this look like to you? What does this sound like? That might not sound, you know, attractive to people who are not oboists, but like, Oh, the magic of that, like guttural sea crow. What else am I doing? I,

Starting point is 00:09:33 you know, I, I give recitals, um, every year. Sometimes I'll have two different programs that i that i develop and tour around sometimes i can like this year i really can only manage one um but i am proud to put together these fascinating programs of amazing music mostly new mostly living composers because that is what i love to do and uh tour them around the area and share this amazing stuff that is going on in classical music now with people. And I use those recitals as a platform to really talk. I speak as much as I play, and maybe that's not quite true because the playing is extensive and difficult and interesting. But I love presenting myself in that way, not merely my playing, but my own human voice and my own ideas, which has been

Starting point is 00:10:39 something that it's taken me a long time to step into and, and feel like I was entitled to do that. Okay. Sorry. What was I doing? I was talking about my portfolio career. What else is in that? So the online teaching, oh, the read business, right. So I, of course, as an oboist, I make reads and I make reads for myself and reads are individualized and they are, it's a very skilled process to make them. And not everybody has the time, has the training, has the like emotional wherewithal to really put themselves into this task of like working with little pieces of damp wood in order to create artistry. So I, I mean, I can talk at great length about how this business got started, but I will gloss over it for the moment and say that I sell probably 200 or more

Starting point is 00:11:33 reads every month. And I send them out all over the country and internationally as well and have a blast doing it. I have employees in various places across the US or independent contractors, I guess I should clarify in case the IRS is listening. People who do some cane processing, some winding, some work for me. In addition to all of that, I have a blog that I've been maintaining for the last 12 years or so. I also have a podcast, Crushing Classical, where I focus on showcasing and celebrating other musical entrepreneurs, people like yourself and like me and like so many of our friends and colleagues who have taken paths just outside of the traditional performance-only route in classical music so that we make this kind of lifestyle feel possible for

Starting point is 00:12:26 listeners. That's amazing. And you just wrote a book that we're going to talk about as well. Oh, did I not mention that? I just wrote a book. How can you keep track of all of this, right? You know, this is so great. I'm so glad you said all of these things. And what I hope the listeners can see through this is all the words that you're using you're using love a lot you're talking about how excited you are about things earlier you mentioned that you had the one student as a junk faculty but I've I've known you for a while so I know that you used to teach in many places and had quite a large studio and what again tell me if I'm wrong but what I love about what you're talking about is this intentionality that you had

Starting point is 00:13:15 to make space in your life for the things that you loved. And not that you didn't love your students, but you know, you, you have a family and as a traveling adjunct, that takes a lot of time and you made conscious decisions to really create the type of teaching environment you wanted in a way that fit your lifestyle and created these teaching programs at home, which I think is so amazing. Yes, thank you. That's exactly correct. I think at my peak, I had 18 or 20 students, which I know I hear people talk about their 40, their 60 private students, and I can't even imagine because 18 to 20 burned me out so badly. You know, as a teacher, when you're working with a student one-on-one, you're fully focused for that half hour, 45 minutes, 60 minutes on exactly

Starting point is 00:14:11 what they need, how to get them from point A to point B, how to change the words that you use so that the words that you use work for this person that is in your room. And it's a very creative act and it's a very generous act and it's very energy intensive, right? You're one-to-one in a room and every teacher listening knows all about this. And your mind is working a million miles an hour to pivot, to play, to find the creative approach, to really break this person through to their next level. And the model of private teaching that I grew up with and that I was doing for years and years and years is that model in which, you know, every Tuesday at 4.15, you come over to my physical space and we work together for 45 minutes and you pay me money and

Starting point is 00:15:04 you leave with your solo five percent improved from last time and then next week you come back and we do it again and we just keep doing it until infinity and that stopped working for me the time that it took the energy that it took to just keep saying the same things over and over again to the same people to like bring their Saint-Saëns Sonata from 70% awesome to 72% awesome. And then next week from 71 to 73% awesome. It was grueling to me. And while it did train a lot of skills for me, it trained those skills of being able

Starting point is 00:15:46 to find different words and find creative approaches and talk about oboe embouchure, about reads, about fingering tricks, about how to practice for effortlessness, how to think about your practicing. You know, it trained all of those skills. Those were things that I did on the oboe fairly intuitively, but the creativity of having to put words on the things that I knew how to do in my body has always been fascinating to me. What's my point here? I'm working on the pivot from one-to-one weekly teaching to what I'm doing now. There was a certain point where I remember it vividly, actually, and I talk about it in the book.

Starting point is 00:16:31 I was sitting in the middle of the orchestra and we're playing Brahms I, which is like my favorite of the War Horse symphonies. And I'm playing a lot, playing Principal Oboe, and it's in my orchestra. And I love all my colleagues and I was really enjoying the conductor and everything was great. And suddenly a clear, clear voice in my head said in words, what is even the point? of all this. And, and that felt like an enormous wake-up call. And when I zoomed out and I got

Starting point is 00:16:59 curious and I tried to figure out what it was that was going wrong, it was the time. It was the time and the energy that I was giving to all of these students. And I've had wonderful students. It's not like none of these kids were themselves the problem. It was just too much. So I fired everybody. Basically, I limped through to the end of the season. I graduated a bunch of students and quit a bunch of adjunct jobs and fired all my private studio and went down to this skeleton group of three or four students that were ambitious seniors that I felt like I needed to carry through for one more year. And then I got rid of them too. And what's my point? after a few months away from that, my brain started to reset a little bit. And I came to

Starting point is 00:17:49 realize that the right amount of teaching for me is definitely not zero students a week, but it definitely was not 18 students a week. And I was frustrated with the very model of what I had been doing. So that is when I began to create group programs and the magic there. And I know that you work with groups as well. The magic there is that first of all, I can say the thing once instead of saying it four times on Tuesday and seven times on Monday to individual students. I can say it once and then we can talk about it as a group and other people can bring in their responses to it and they can ask questions. And the question that gets asked causes a conversation to happen. And over the course of time, everybody benefits. And another

Starting point is 00:18:35 thing that I love about a group program is that if, you know, Susan says something that sparks an inspiration for Jerry, like that is absolutely a group win for me, even if I wasn't the one who said the magic thing. So moving to this model where I actually feel like the people I'm working with are getting much more value than a one-to-one session with me every single week. And because they're getting more value, I can charge them a little bit more. And because we're working in groups instead of exclusively one-to-one, it saves a ton of time for me. And it makes me so happy because I get to say my smart things to smart people, not just eighth graders. Everything about it is wonderful for me now. And it did take both a burnout cycle and a really conscious re-imagining

Starting point is 00:19:33 of what I needed my teaching studio to be and now that I've made that pivot like I'll keep tweaking it I'm never I'm never quite satisfied but I'm never going back either I love that and as you know I'm also a big fan of group programs exactly for the reasons that you mentioned I walk out of a two-hour session completely energized just in love with all of my clients, full of ideas of what we're going to do next. And it is just such a wonderful atmosphere. And what, I mean, you know, I love you and I love everything you say always. Likewise. I like what you said. You had me as a guest on your podcast. Thanks so much. I hope everyone

Starting point is 00:20:16 checks out this episode. And at some point you said we're like the same brain using different words. I completely agree with that. So one thing you said that I think is very important for the listeners to catch is you said that at some point you heard this voice and then you got curious. And I feel like many times in our lives, we hear voices, we get signals, or we get burned out. But what's important to keep in mind is that what you did is you asked questions to yourself, you listened to the answers, and that can be so scary. And then the next step, which can be even scarier is to implement and make difficult decisions and fire students and change how things are done. As you said, you reimagined how you teach. And I think that could be a really

Starting point is 00:21:09 great transition to maybe go and talk about your book, which is The Happiest Musician. I have it right here. It is so great. How to Thrive in Your Creative Career. And you talk about all of these aspects of creating a career in music, solo career, taking audition, building a business, the freelance solo, all of this teaching. And, but I love it also because you include really tangible information in applicable tips on how we can do these things. There are really great prompts on how to do some reflection and start implementing some things. And also you have just wonderful storytelling and I really like your writing style. So tell us more about this book? Well, during the pandemic, I was running these group programs and I was creating and

Starting point is 00:22:11 launching things a mile a minute. But what I wasn't doing was driving to a million gigs and spending hours and hours in rehearsal to show up for orchestra concerts. That wasn't happening at all. So I had this extra time. And I was feeling so inspired and so excited by the work that I was doing. And I just wished, I wished so much that someone had told me when I was 24 that there was a possibility outside of just seeking that one traditional path, that one traditional pathway to success. Which is not to say that if my 24 year old self had known what I know now, that I wouldn't have continued taking auditions. Auditions are fun. I love them. And who knows, maybe the next one will work, right? But I felt so passionately about the work that I was doing. And I really

Starting point is 00:23:10 wanted to share that because I see so many musicians, colleagues, but also younger people, the next generation coming up, who are tired of the model that we have now, feel cynical, feel scarcity. I hear so many people talking about, oh, why did that person get hired for this gig and i didn't get hired for this gig like that kind of of energy and it makes me really sad because because i don't think it's necessary um i found that when i realized that all of the things that i'm doing outside of orchestral performance or orchestral auditions were creative and were lighting me up and were making me excited and happy the side benefit of that is when i went to the orchestra gigs i wasn't so frustrated i wasn't so scarcity minded like it didn't stress me out

Starting point is 00:24:20 because i knew that i had my own thing that was that i was able to throw all of my creativity into and so the limitations of artistry that come up in the orchestra i'm not saying that you aren't an artist in the orchestra, of course, but when you're sitting in the orchestra, there is a lot that is out of your control. You did not program that concert. Your artistic decisions are not the ones that are primary here. It is up to the conductor. Your colleagues sitting around you are not people that you chose to have around you. You might love them. You might not. You don't have control over that. The role that you have in the orchestra, whether it's the principal oboe role or the English horn role or the section violin role, right?

Starting point is 00:25:04 It's set for you. You don't have control over that. And it used to feel limiting to me and it used to feel frustrating to me. And now it doesn't have to. I can show up and joyfully do my best and joyfully show up and enjoy playing with other people and accept that, you know, in a regional orchestra,

Starting point is 00:25:30 It's not going to be perfect. It's going to be interesting. It's going to be fun. It's going to be magical in its own way. I feel like I'm off on a big tangent here. Let me pull it back around. I feel so liberated in the career I have now because so many of the things that I'm doing are within my control to start and to stop, to manage myself. And I can lean into the creativity I want. And sometimes I can also just sit back and do the work, work in my business, and then go to bed at night. And it felt really important to me to empower other musicians, other younger musicians, especially, but also the people who are in mid-career and might be feeling frustrated and unsatisfied with what's going on, it felt terribly important to me to empower people

Starting point is 00:26:25 to choose themselves instead of simply to wait and hope and ask to be chosen by the gatekeepers that exist in our industry. Because I feel like the more that creative people can rise in our society and the more that people can see musicians and creatives thriving and happy and, and being, um, being their best selves, like the more all of society benefits. So yes, it's a, it's a small book for musicians. And yet I think there's a much broader application as well. I think it applies to so, so many people I think it might be important I love my book I love your book and you're too modest when you say it's a small book because as I was reading it I was getting that feeling

Starting point is 00:27:17 that what you're just talking about how one can reclaim the control over their lives I think that we often feel like we don't have control and that's kind of now I'm opening a big tangent but it's kind of an illusion. If you're curious about that, let's talk about it. I'll do another episode about it. But this lack of control can be so oppressive. And having this resource that you created so that someone who's 24 years old now can see what's possible. Yes. So that maybe it doesn't have to take them 25 years to get to the point that it took me 25 years to get to. Yes. Yeah. And it's just a great book. So much information. Like I said, I feel also that the storytelling in it is very important for people to be able to see through your story, how that could look like for them as well in their own way. Yes, it was very intentional. I stopped myself midway through the first draft of the book and said, oh my God, it's just so much I, I, I, I, I. And then as I continued to think about it, I realized that that's how I learn. I learn by listening to other people tell their stories. I learn by listening to podcasts where other people are interviewed.

Starting point is 00:28:37 And ideally, I don't listen to podcasts with oboists who are talking about readmaking because that's the stuff I know. I listen to podcasts about entrepreneurs creating things. I listen to podcasts about authors writing books. I listen to podcasts about people in sports and how they develop their skills and the storytelling and the words that they use when they talk about their craft that is different from the words that I use when I talk about my craft. Those are always the ideas that spark me, that make me think, oh, oh, I could, oh, that applies over here. I could think about this that way. And so it was very intentional that I told my story in the first person. I sort of joke that this book is half how-to, half self-help, and half memoir, and half inspiration, maybe. It's approximately 200% of a book. And you know, as I'm listening to you, I realized that one thing we didn't say is that it's not easy to craft your career. It's also not easy to just stick with what we're already doing because that's the easiest path. It's not easier. and creating a course will challenge you in many ways trying to sell the course will challenge you in many ways um having a podcast is challenging i mean so creating a career this way is not

Starting point is 00:30:13 necessarily easy it's a lot of work it's a lot of stepping out of your comfort zone because we we do talk about how inspiring it is and exciting and there's also all of the moments where it's so scary and we fail and we try again and we doubt ourselves but it is so amazing and that's the for me the incredible part of allowing for for me I'll speak for myself allowing myself to go for crazy things that at first I might think wait that'd be crazy if I did that be crazy to start a podcast. Facing all of these fears, going through it, what I find out about myself through this process is so incredible. And you used the word liberated earlier, and I'll use that as well. It does feel liberating, very empowering. So it's not necessarily easy to craft this career. It's a lot

Starting point is 00:31:15 of work, but I do find that staying in the model that we're in and staying unhappy if we are is in many ways, way more difficult. Yes, I agree. And I wonder if there's, if there's this element in there too, that we're, we're not in most cases, I think we are musicians because we kind of get addicted to the the work of getting better to the the creativity of practicing and the way that we dig in to try to like bring ourselves from 98 awesome to 99 awesome right like the the it's not exactly interesting to arrive at the point where we have mastered our instrument and where everything is is easy like no one no one gets to the point i guess i mean where now that you have practiced for, you know, four hours a day for this many years,

Starting point is 00:32:13 your 10,000 hours, now you are awesome and you no longer have to practice and everything is easy because there's always a new level to achieve. And we're always sort of scrambling for that and always working for it. And that's, I would posit that that is the part that's interesting and exciting for the musician mind. And that said, at a certain point, it's not that hard to like go to work and play beethoven five again and even though there are always you can always get better and you can always improve on your performance there's a certain point at which it's easy enough to show up and work and that's when for me my mind gets restless and i'm like well the oboe doesn't feel dangerous anymore where's the danger maybe the danger is like stepping out and launching a

Starting point is 00:33:01 group program in a way that I've never done before. Maybe the danger is in showing up on a Facebook live that I have never done before. Like the actual moment where you click go live and your heart is pounding. Like that reminds me of performances that I gave when I was younger, when it wasn't really clear that I was going to come out on top in the struggle between like woman and oboe. There's something a little addictive about the, about the fear and the moving through the fear. Yes, 100%. Hearing about this too makes me think of something you posted a few days ago and something actually you cover in the book, which is the tall poppy syndrome, that fear of rising above, of showing ourselves, unveiling ourselves to the world. Can you speak

Starting point is 00:33:56 to that a little bit. Yeah, it's terrifying, actually. And the first time I wrote about the tall poppy syndrome was right when I was first launching one of these group programs. And it felt so freaking terrifying to me to show up on social media and to show up to my email list, the one that I had only maintained so that I could let people know when I gave OU recitals, and say that i was in fact ambitiously doing something that i was going to charge fifteen hundred dollars for um it felt so frightening to me in a way that i almost can't put my finger on now like i remember the fear but not exactly the trigger but it felt musicians are so are trained so hard to stay in their lane right if you're playing second flute you should be seen and not heard and if you're

Starting point is 00:34:53 playing section violin like god help you if you get a little extra musical and uh and slide outside of the thing that everybody else around you is doing in that sea of violins and the idea that i was going to stand up and say not only here i am the principal oboe of the south bend symphony which is not you know a high profile gig and say i can help you to get better at your oboe playing that i was going to say that publicly where like other oboists could see me saying it felt terrifying it's it's imposter syndrome right it's the who do i think i am and it and it definitely came um the most strongly when i thought about my colleagues in the orchestras around me um you know if the if the flute player from some random gig that i was on thought that i thought

Starting point is 00:35:53 that i was something like i almost couldn't bear that thought it was so frightening and that felt and when i went right around that time i for the first time heard about tall poppy syndrome which is a thing i think um more in australia new zealand and like asia maybe and i had not heard that term before here in here in in my own culture um but it stood out very clearly to me as yes this is the thing i am feeling yeah we're very scared to step out of our lane we are i wish for it to go away in our culture I think we see it around us all the time all the time and I mean I see it on social media too and I just don't think that is necessary I think that everyone can walk their lane and what kind of community would we create for ourselves if we could just allow everyone to

Starting point is 00:36:53 bloom as high I mean it sounds so tacky as I say it now but you know but yes but I'm picturing like a field of wildflowers yes rather than a like pristine field of poppies that are all exactly the same height um yes yeah there's something so there's there is room for everybody yeah there really is um because in a field of wildflowers every one of them is unique and beautiful in their own way and taken together they make for a gorgeous field and they don't have to be strictly uniform some are tall and some are short and some are purple and some are bumpy yeah and I think it starts with people like you doing it showing others that it's okay I hope so that's definitely definitely what I was trying to do in the book um and you know

Starting point is 00:37:45 of course that in the book I profile a number of other musical entrepreneurs who are who are doing the same and you are one of them and and of course you are um in the same way standing up and saying what's just a violinist i don't think so like i can help you and here is my take yeah and it's beautiful it's beautiful to see yes and those who resonate with it can get so much out of it yes yes janet i could speak with you all day but how about some not so rapid fire questions before i let you go please we talked about how you've created yourself you've created this career that you have this life you've crafted it tell us what's a habit that you have that you think contributed to your success and let's call it a success because i think it's so inspiring to

Starting point is 00:38:41 see what you've built. Thank you. Yeah, I think that here's the habit that I think has been the most helpful. I love systems and I love routines. And when I think about adding something new into my life, I think about how it's going to actually fit and what the system and what the routine is going to be that makes my workflow happen. And I hold lightly those systems and routines once I set them. When they stop working for me, I change them. I have a really strong habit of curiosity, of zooming out to ask myself what I actually need or what is wrong with the situation. Why is this feeling so bad? And I am happy to rework my systems as I go along. this is great so janet i'm holding a copy of your book and i think everyone should get it

Starting point is 00:39:43 especially if you're 24 years old out there definitely um in it you talk about so many of the skills that can be so helpful and as i said many reflections on how to ask yourself these questions how to find answers but in addition to all of this is there any skills that you think young musicians today should develop in addition to the skills they have on their instruments? Yeah, I think it's so important. And I did not, of course, realize this when I was at Eastman as a introverted 19, 20, 21-year-old. But I think the skill of communication is so urgent. It's been instrumental for me, instrumental, in terms of being an excellent teacher, in terms of being able to reach out to people and market the things I'm doing,

Starting point is 00:40:36 in terms of being able to network with people that I meet, in terms of being able to show up on a podcast and promote myself, promote my work in that way. Certainly writing a book itself is communication. My entire oeuvre, my entire portfolio career, or I guess my visibility journey really started when I started writing my blog. And all of these things have been so important to me. And I would never have imagined when I was in school that any communication more concrete, less abstract than just like playing a beautiful phrase on the oboe. I would never have imagined that that was so important. And I think it is crucially important. a great one to keep in mind you're still a performing hobo is that my husband gives me

Starting point is 00:41:32 a hard time about this all the time the h is in english i put i put h's where there's none and then i don't yeah put them when they're there so janet you're still very active as a performer how do you maintain peak form while you're juggling all of these activities well thing one is that i have a a warm-up routine that is simple and moderate but that feels really important to me so that at minimum i spend some time on the instrument getting uh my air flowing getting my articulation functioning and getting my fingers smooth But really, the actual honest truth is that I barely keep everything in balance. We've been, this year has been, my family is hanging on by their fingernails this year

Starting point is 00:42:26 in terms of scheduling and chaos and child at home and everybody working and so forth. And so I have sight read every orchestra gig I've showed up for this year. And I'm not proud. but balance is a thing that is not a noun but a verb and the best i can do sometimes is keep that balance active oh like you know when you're running or walking even and really what you're doing is a controlled version of falling right you shift your center of gravity to where it almost falls and then you catch yourself over and over again. And sometimes that is the best I have. Right. Thanks for sharing this and being so honest with this because I think everybody

Starting point is 00:43:32 feels that way. We just don't always admit it. But also the problem is when we make that mean something worse than it is really. So when we make that mean that we are failing by not maintaining balance, then that turns into a cycle that is so detrimental in how we feel and then take actions and the results that we create. So I'm taking out all of my life coaching jargon out now, but this act of balancing will have its highs and its lows. And I think that the way you presented it is so beautiful thank you and thanks for bringing out the life coach jargon because suddenly i feel a little better about the confessions that i just shared finally how about a quick actionable tip that the listeners could implement today in their

Starting point is 00:44:25 musical lives so this idea comes originally from kenny warner's book effortless mastery but i feel like i've used it and taken it and revised it and taught it and worked it so many times that it feels like that it feels like my voice now and it is to say that when you are practicing when you are working if you make the goal be effortlessness rather than perfection rather than speed rather than any of those other metrics all of the other metrics come along and i can talk for hours about that but instead of doing that i'll just say let effortlessness be your initial practice goal not because um you have to play leaned back sitting in your chair effortlessly all the time but because if you're playing is functionally effortless it gives you

Starting point is 00:45:33 a ton of headroom to add effort when it is artistically necessary and to add energy and to add all of the magic you want to add as you want it i love that beautifully put janet what's coming up for you um a couple of things renee thank you for asking i I am going to be running a live in-person oboe read boot camp in June in South Bend. So if you are an oboist and if you are interested in traveling to a small town to be in a room with a community of oboists and make reads nonstop for an entire weekend and get better and faster and more efficient at that skill, that really might interest you a lot. And the other thing I'm doing is I'm going to start a small workshop series based around the concepts of the book that is meant mainly for people who hear these words about the portfolio career, about starting a business, about separating like the money part from the artistry part, about bringing in financial abundance with the skills they already have and say to themselves, okay, that sounds great.

Starting point is 00:46:43 But how? Where? Where do I start? What is my first step? What do I even? How can I even? If those are your questions, this might feel really interesting. It's up on my website under the Happiest Musician Workshop series. And I think that will be starting in mid-April. It's a little vague in my mind right now, but I'm pretty sure that by the time this airs, that will be a thing. That sounds amazing. And I'm going to have all of these links in the show notes for the listeners. Thank you so much, Renee. Janet, I think you're just awesome. There's no other word to use.

Starting point is 00:47:19 And I hope that everyone listening walk away with so much. I know I do. I hope everyone gets your book. Check out your content online. I'll have all those links, as I just said. And I just want to thank you for being so open, sharing so many important concepts with us. And, you know, for showing the way to so many people who might feel limited by the preconceptions many of us still have about what a career in music looks like. Thank you so much for everything that you do and for giving me the space to talk about this today.

Starting point is 00:47:58 It's such a pleasure always to speak with you. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed this conversation with oboe player, teacher, entrepreneur, coach, and author, Janet Ingle. I have links for you in the show notes, including where to find everything related to Janet and where you can buy her wonderful book, The Happiest Musician. Also in the show notes, you will find the links to all things music mastery experience, the life-changing program for musicians. The Music Mastery Experience is my highly personalized group coaching program where I take you through a massive transformation. You're going to feel

Starting point is 00:48:50 certainty in the practice room. You're going to experience joy and freedom in performance. Gain the confidence you've always wanted and you will know how to go about creating the career you've been dreaming of. If you're ready to crack the code to start performing at your best and to experience fulfillment in your music career, this program was made for you. We cover everything from practice methods that work to performance preparation strategies that have you perform with confidence consistently and powerful life coaching and mind management techniques that will remove all the obstacles and self-limiting beliefs that hold you back. If you're done with not seeing results for the endless amount of work of time and energy that you put in the practice room,

Starting point is 00:49:44 go to mindoverfinger.com right now to book your free conversation with me and let's change that today. No more indecision, band-aid, and short-term solutions. The Music Mastery Experience is unlike any other program out there because we go beyond their strategies and methods. You're going to get plenty of those, actually an entire foolproof system to peak performance, but we don't stop there. We get to the root cause of issues. We unlock everything that's keeping you stuck and you'll start experiencing amazing results, not only on stage, but at every level of your music making experience and your life. You're going to see results from our very first session and you will not believe what you're capable to accomplish within a short amount of time. Whether you want to

Starting point is 00:50:42 win an audition, perform optimally time after time, grow your career, make more money, or experience confidence like never before. As I said earlier, it's 100% possible, and the Music Mastery experience will get you there. And the Music Mastery experience is radical, because once you're in, you're in for life. You heard that correctly. Once you join, you will have constant support month after month to keep reaching new heights and realizing new, bigger, and bolder dreams. All of this is done in a small, inclusive, and private environment where you will feel supported, inspired, and motivated. And the spots are filling up, so don't hesitate. So are you ready for new thinking, new tools, and a community of peers creating big things?

Starting point is 00:51:42 book your free call right now at mindoverfinger.com and let's make this happen for you don't forget to share today's episode with everyone you think might benefit from Janet's insights share a post on Instagram and Facebook and tag me so I can say hi I'm Mind Over Finger everywhere that's what I have for you today be well my friend once again thank you so much for listening. And à bientôt.

The Mind Over Finger Podcast - 127 Jennet Ingle: The Happiest Musician

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