31 Days to Better Practicing: Goals Settings

Short Term Goals

One of the best ways to jump start a practice routine is by working toward something, and there is nothing like setting a deadline in order to get work done. Today we will be looking at short-term goals and how they can focus your practice.

Here are some examples of common short-term goals:

• Master the ornaments in a Baroque piece
• Sort out the left hand of a tricky piece
• Play a piece with solid rhythm at a slow tempo
• Increase the tempo of a piece by several metronome markings
• Master a difficult passage once and for all
• Learn that darned F minor formula pattern
• Memorize the first movement of a sonata
• Fit in regular practice times all week
  

Not life-changing goals, but goals nonetheless that move along your playing and take you to the next step. In Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, author David Allen talks about the importance of immediately identifying next actions and completing them as a way to increased productivity. Setting a few short-term goals can very quickly put you on the road to getting out of a rut and improving steadily. Teacher's remarks in lesson notebooks are classic examples of this--students ignore their teacher's concise weekly assignments at their peril...

What are your short-term practice goals?

Next: Medium Term Goals

Yesterday we looked at ways of keeping your eyes on short-term goals in order to have your eyes on the next action on the road to performing excellence. Having your eyes on a prize that requires working over a slightly longer period of time can also can generate the desire to keep on practicing regularly.

What are some goals that you can work towards satisfying along a longer time line, say, three to six months?

• Exams. One of the best ways to measure progress is by taking standardized examinations for an accredited organization such RCM Examinations (known as the National Music Certificate Program in the US). Preparing for these types of examinations requires you to play several pieces from different styles, studies, and technical exercises, as well as take ear training and sight reading tests. The effort required to build the skills to pass each level can provide a very real challenge, and can provide benchmarks for beginning, intermediate, and advanced students.
• Festivals and competitions. Playing in classes specific to age and level at festivals sponsored by MTNA, NATS, Kiwanis, and Rotary clubs, can provide the challenge of competing against other musicians and receiving an adjudication from an authority in the field. This second opinion can often give you the reinforcement (or kick in the rump to keep you) moving along to the next level. And what can compare to the thrill of winning a class against stiff competition? Even if you don't win, the work you did in preparing for competing will have a lasting effect on your quality of playing.
  
• Recitals. If you don't like competitive playing, I highly recommend playing in recitals. These include formal recitals organized by schools, teachers, and organizations, in addition to impromptu occasions for family, friends, etc. If you're learning an instrument, why not share your love of playing with others?
• Auditions. If you're doing well, why not take it up a notch? Opportunities abound for honor bands, orchestras summer festivals, operas, and musicals. Prestigious programs such as the RCM's Young Artists Performance Academy or Juilliard's Pre-College Division are tough to get into, but offer a rewarding education for those able to pass the tough audition.
• Personal milestones. Learning all the Grade 10-level technique, playing your first Beethoven Sonata, getting through your graduate recital from memory a month before the concert, hitting that high C with a solid vibrato, or playing through the concerto in public are all goals that depend not on other's acclamation, but on beating your own personal demons. Claude Debussy once said that "In art, one has more often to fight against oneself, and the victories one wins are perhaps the most beautiful."

Above all, create the challenge and chances are you just might find the way to fulfill it.


Tomorrow I'll be looking at long-term goals.

Next: Long Term Goals

In the last two days we've looked at ways to set viable practice goals for the short and medium term. What are some goals that we can set for the long term, ie. one year or more in the future? This is an important stage of the goal-setting process, but one that is fraught with danger, as one has to walk a fine line between valid outcomes and self-delusion.

Generally, the more ambitious the goal (performing at the Met, Carnegie Hall, signing a DG contract), the more it needs to be broken down into many, many more smaller, digestible goals in order for the final outcome to come to pass.

Let's take an entirely manageable ambition for many students--getting accepted into a university music program. Here are some ways that you could break a big goal into a bunch of smaller ones:

• Research universities on the internet
• Send away for information
• Figure out the application process
• Fill out application forms
• Get letters of reference
• Write cheques for application fees
• Fill out financial aid forms
• Learn correct repertoire for each audition
  
• Make pre-screening audition tape (more and more common these days)
  
• Send out applications well before the deadline process
• Schedule audition once called by university
• Get cheapest flights to college destinations
• Book hotels at college destinations
• Do auditions
• Once accepted, send in acceptance letter with deposit
• Look for more financial aid
• Go to college program

I'm tired already after writing that list and glad that I'm finished with my college education. But looking at that large list, you discover that one big dream can be easily managed if it is broken up into a bunch of smaller, manageable tasks.

I can't emphasize how important it is to be realistic when setting long-term goals. Here are some examples that depend on individual initiative and can be realized with determination and hard work:

• Learn a concerto
• Learn the arias for a role that is a bit too large for one's voice, but which one will grow into in the future
• Learn how to make kick-ass oboe reeds
• Learn the whole Well-Tempered Clavier (Angela Hewitt did it and is in the midst of her Bach World Tour this fall)
• Play the violin with deadly accurate intonation
• Develop into a professional-level singer
• Develop a stylistic breadth of experience in multiple percussion instruments from many cultures

However, when our goals depend on the actions of others, it is much easier to experience serious disappointments. Here are some goals that have the possibility of setting oneself up for disappointment:

• Getting into that world-famous school of music
• Getting that elusive tenure-track college position
• Getting a high-paid position in an orchestra
• Having a concert career
• Getting a top agent

Nevertheless, if we never have goals like these, we will never have the drive to succeed that jump-starts our practice routine in the first place.

I am noticing that this post is quickly turning into an article on life goals in music in general rather than just getting something out of practicing. But I feel that the urge to improve your playing through practicing often parallels the urge to develop oneself, to make a mark, experience satisfaction, and live a fully realized life. Therefore, I'm going to end this post with another long-term goal, one which I feel has no higher calling:

• To be able to play one's instrument at a high level, giving pleasure to oneself and others, and with a healthy technique that will last into old age.

At its core, the art of playing an instrument depends on the level of enjoyment one has in playing both great music and the process of playing the instrument itself. At this level, the degree of professional success one has is immaterial. From Rueckert's "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen":

Ich bin gestorben dem Weltgetümmel,
Und ruh' in einem stillen Gebiet!
Ich leb' allein in meinem Himmel,
In meinem Lieben, in meinem Lied!

I am dead to the world's commotion, And I rest in a quiet place. I live alone in my heaven, In my love, in my song.

Tomorrow I'll be posting some cool practice links from around the internet.