My Email Account Exploded into Itty Bitty Pieces...

January 24, 2008 at 2:24 AM

Blogging is a therapeutic way for
us violinists to release our
violinistical frustrations and happinesses
and to analyze and process our concerns within our musical journey, which is why I silently thank Mrs. Niles everyday for the v.com blogging system.
Whenever I write a blog, more recently, more frequently, it is okay to say, "Oh, oh. Jazzy's gettin' all emotional again," because that is exactly what I am doing.

Which leads me to a rather interesting evening of flurrying emotions and spontaneous oppotunity seeking moments.

Today was the official day that I began my position as concertmaster, with my eye glasses and all. The night did not go well, in my opinion. Everyone said, "Oh, Jazz. You did fine," but I, however, knew what I sounded like in my new bedroom when I was practicing over winter break. I improved, but tonight I lost all signs of any improvement.

Why? Well, thanks to the blogging process in which I try to think before I write/type, I pre-analyzed the possible causes of my lapsed abilities. I will share them with you tonight.

Our brain is like an email account. Our brain sends, receives, processes, and files information. When I practiced everso happily within the confines of my wonderful bedroom, my brain was receiving, processing, and filing everything I learned and improved upon. But what I failed to realize is my brain separated this new information into a totally separate file. My brain not only recorded the new things I learned, but also the environment, mood, and physical positions I was in at those times. So, with what result? When I went back to school, to the old practice room and the old orchestra, my brain opened up the old file which was recorded before I went on break. Therefore, I played with the old violin technical file in my mind, instead of the new file. So, how do we, as musicians, delete old files and read only the new without a loss to certain skills? I decided to keep a journal. Oh wait, blogging is like a journal. Well, I mean an actual hand notebook. During each practice session, I need to automatically record any improvements, and then imput my notes in my memory bank. That way, my brain will never close an important file. Well, you might ask, what about the old file? Can you still open it? Well, not at the risk of opening it and closing the newer file. In order to get to the inbox, you have to close the "sent items," right? So, I need to record items from my old file that I like particularly about my playing and continue to improve upon them within the newer and future files.

I will probably start to hear and see the newer file that I created over winter break in a couple of weeks. But it is such as hassle to have to work for all of that again. And it was truly frustrating to discover that all my improvements had suddenly disappeared. So, hopefully, my plan above will prevent such file closing, psychological meltdowns in the future.

Also, tonight was my first rehearsal with the Jazz Ensemble. I am the only violinist. I figured, the school did not specify instruments for the course, so I have the legal right to join. I also want to learn the Jazz genre, so I said "what the hay?" and pushed the register button. We did not play anything tonight but Monday we will. I am so excited to learn Jazz violin. Any suggestions????

From Mendy Smith
Posted on January 24, 2008 at 4:41 AM

OK, I'm a software enginer... this is actually a simple fix. Make your self a "site configuration file" (otherwise known as a site variable). How this works is that you create a file for each "site" so that the software knows where to look for the information you need, which can be kept all in one place. Whenever you are at a different site, go to your "config file" to point you to where you keep all your data.

How to do that in a musical environment when playing in physically different sites, geeze, I don't know :) I've got the same problem, but never thought about the problem in the same way you did. Interesting to think about....

Thanks!!!!!

From Karen Allendoerfer
Posted on January 24, 2008 at 12:17 PM

Try bringing your hand notebook along with you to orchestra rehearsal and reading through it beforehand. Mentally rehearse the new file in the new environment. Maybe then it will stay open?

From Jasmine Reese
Posted on January 24, 2008 at 3:36 PM

Thank you, great advice Mendy and Karen.

I will give an update to how my idea works.

Thanks again.

From Terez Mertes
Posted on January 24, 2008 at 7:13 PM

Those darned brains. I keep looking for version 2.0 for myself...

From Jasmine Reese
Posted on January 24, 2008 at 11:34 PM

The new 8.0 is way better. Comes with playback power. :0)

From Mendy Smith
Posted on January 25, 2008 at 6:49 AM

Geeze, I'm still on "vapor ware" version 0.2c :)

This entry has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.