(Did I catch your attention?)

The more you know me, the more you know that I actually like to practice. I actually LOVE practicing. So…what gives?

I’ve come to a realization, and it has to do with the fact that the words we use are important. If I tell someone, or myself, that I’m having a “crappy” day…I’ll probably feel worse immediately. If I tell you the sky as “blue”, you’ll probably be less intrigued than if I describe it as “sapphire lit from within”. Words are important.

And this little word, “practice”, gets a whole lotta use in the music world. Most of the time it carries a dreary, heavy, grind-y weight around its neck: “I gotta practice”. “If I don’t practice, my lesson will be crap”. “I’ve practiced N hours today and have X left to do”.

So I propose that we simply DUMP the word “practice”, because when we do it properly, we are actually:

Enjoying making sound
Experimenting
Playing around with different expressions, different solutions
Listening and feeling
Playing “for real”

And all of those things we consider fun!

So please join me in this switcheroo: Cancel the ball-and-chain word “practice”; let’s call it “PLAYING” instead. As in: I’m off to PLAY flute! Sounds a lot more fun (because it is).

I hear you saying: but what about practicing SCALES?? It must be done and surely it’s no fun!

Ha! “Even” with scales, approach them as above: experiment, listen, feel the meaning of notes climbing up or dropping down. See if your scales don’t get cleaner and more expressive faster than when you slog it out “practicing”. Dare ya! (BTW: for scales, you may substitute tone exercises, studies, finger exercises, etc.)

The very word “practice” implies you are “trying to get it right” but are NOT YET doing it right…it implies you are not yet doing THE REAL THING. Kinda negative, no?

If you always play for keeps, there will be much less of a shift to the moment of performance. Either way, you are always PLAYING MUSIC. You might be playing music slowly, you might be playing only two notes of music, you might be repeatedly playing small segments of music. But you are PLAYING MUSIC.

How do we eat an ice-cream cone? Do we practice? No! We experiment (top first, before it falls? Bottom first before it drips?), we play around, improvise, feel our way to satisfaction. Why should music-making be any less delightful?

Yup, I’m QUITTING PRACTICING -and PLAYING up a storm!