Recommended activities

If you’ve been following the news, you know that the music industry is on hold. No concerts. No studio sessions. No albums being produced. No shows on Broadway or anywhere else. And, insofar as we know, the summer has been cancelled. No festivals, no weddings, no form of live entertainment.

I could go into how to help musicians who run into financial troubles, but I already did a couple blogs with the information I gathered precisely on that subject. I invite you to consult them.

For reference, here they are:

Coronavirus help

and:

Coronavirus: Surviving

 

But today I want to talk to all of us who are now trapped at home and wondering what we are going to do for the next few weeks.

I will ask you to forgive my answer for its obvious character, after all, I am a music teacher. So, here it is: practice. Practice, practice, practice.

Each musician should dedicate some time to their instrument. All too often, once we are professional, we are too busy to do our scales or our rudiments. Or we do them, but too often with the sense that we haven’t dug deep enough. We also have some vague projects that’s been delayed forever, a monumental task we thought one day we would be able to tackle. Well, today is the day!

Did you ever dream of putting together a book that would be 100 times better than the Hannon or the Stick Control? Great! Get to it! Did you wish your studio would be organized and cleaned, all material in its place, all the books and methods classified? Awesome! Grab a broom! Did you wish to master all the nocturnes by Chopin? Fantastic! Bite them keys! Do you long to reach light speed with the double bass drum? Kudos for you! Start pedaling!

We do not know how long we will be forced to avoid each other. But as musicians, we should never get bored. You see, those large and delayed projects, that’s the mountain you always wanted to climb, the castle you wanted to buy in Spain. Now is the time to roll up your sleeves because you’re about to catch the greatest chance you will ever get to become truly amazing at your craft.

Besides, I always thought that starting a quest is a very exciting and positive thing to do. And we need as much positive as we can get right now.