It is easy to know when we don’t have a piece memorized. It is more difficult to know when a piece is “ready” to be performed from memory.Memorization is a process, and one that requires time and effort. It is not simply practicing a piece until                                     ...

From time to time, we all experience what I call “potentially terminal frustration.” This is the kind of deep frustration that causes us either to give up and walk away or break through and achieve.

The barriers can seem insurmountable. Consider what used to be considered impossible: breaking the sound barrier, running a four-minute mile, a decent frozen...

Sometimes it’s really fun to play the harp.

Practicing is pretty hard work, and while it’s rewarding, I wouldn’t call it fun, particularly technical work like scales and arpeggios.

But the other day, when I sat down to practice, I was regretting the coming end of summer. My train of thought lead me to the famous Gershwin song “Summertime,” and my scales adapted...

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Here we are at the last official week of summer. The schedule is once again the ruler of our lives. with school, work, meetings, and performances.

I have always enjoyed this time of year. The beginning of everything holds such promise. I remember looking forward to the new clothes I would have for school, the new classes, the new...

           One page of my practice log

I want to report back to you on my experience using the 40/40/20 plan as the structure for my emergency practice.

First, the results. I did get enough practice, despite two days of travel time when I could only manage one hour instead of two. Everything that needed to be prepared...

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We all have dreams and goals, but achieving those dreams and goals is not easy. There are endless traps and distractions. Often the hardest part is just getting started.

Maybe you’re the type that can’t sit down to practice until all your other daily chores are...

That hippest harpist Deborah Henson-Conant wrote a great blog post recently about mastery. She pointed out that the heralded “10,000 hours to mastery” isn’t what most adult learners are interested in. (By the way, you can read about the 10,000 hours in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers: The Story of Success .) What they want, DHC writes, is fluency. And I totally agree.

I...

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“Please memorize this for next lesson.” These are words that send chills through many musicians. Do you dread playing from memory? Do you feel ill-equipped for this task?

So many times I hear students of all ages say, “I could never play from memory. I...

Somehow I lost the last month. I had great intentions and a well-crafted practice plan, but it just didn’t work. We had a family reunion, plus I held harp camp and my website has been having issues. I had minor surgery. My son moved out of his apartment into another apartment and then went to on Italy for the summer. It’s been busy here, not really unusual, just busy.   ...

We just finished another fun week here at Harp in the Mountains. Harp camp is always fun, and this year I was privileged to have a great group of students. As always, we rehearsed a lot, but we had fun too. And this year’s heat wave made the swimming pool the best place to take a break from practice.

We like to call ourselves the only harp garage band. The garage is a perfect space for us...