MENTAL EXERCISE

FOR MUSICIANS

Pedro Gonzalez Alvarez

TAC
Group A
 Index

- Context. P.4

- Development. P.5
Introduction P. 5
Concept P. 5
Learn to make music with mental relaxation. P. 6
MENTAL TRAINING FOR THE FEAR OF PLAYING IN PUBLIC. P. 9

MENTAL EXERCISE FOR MUSICIANS 1

Index 3
1. Context. 4
2. Development 5
3. Analysis and reflection. 12
4. Practical conclusion. 14
5. Literature. 15
6. Webgraphy. 15
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 1. Context.

Renate Klöppel (born December 3, 1948 in Hanover) is a German author of crime

fiction and music pedagogy. After graduation, Renate Klöppel studied medicine and
worked from 1982 in Villingen-Schwenningen as a pediatrician.

Renate Klöppel completed her studies in 1986 at the University of Music in

Trossingen. After completing his musical studies, he worked as a lecturer at this
university and discussed the intersection of music and medicine in his courses. He has
published several textbooks on the subject, including Helping Through Rhythm (1992)
and The Art of Making Music (1993). The latter is one of the most important works in
the field of current musical education.

Since 1999, she has also been publishing fiction: her first work, Der Mäusemörder
(2001), had a second edition within a very short time. In 2002, he published a second
detective story, Die Tote vom Turm. In 2004, the novel The Dark Side of the Moon, the
story of the life of a schizophrenic painter. Later, in 2005, he published Mental
Exercise for Musicians, which is the book we have been working on.

Regarding her private life, Renate Klöppel lives with her partner in Villingen-
Schwenningen.

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 2. Development

Introduction.

We are presented with the idea of mental practice to improve our daily work as
musicians and complement it with the usual physical mechanisms that every musician
performs when having to learn a score. This practice is widespread in sports but has not
yet taken root as it should in the musical field. It could be a very useful option on trips
where we spend hours doing nothing, to reduce the work it will take to perform a piece
at the highest level and gain extra confidence when playing in public. It is worth noting
that this type of skill is not only relegated to experts, it is within reach of anyone
interested in it, to a greater or lesser extent.

Concept.

Behind an audition, there are a number of hours of study and practice, along with
knowledge that develops our auditory, rhythmic and theoretical capacity. When faced
with a scenario, the tools they give us are completely useless, at least in my case, until
we reach higher education. It is here, where each person implements their own
strategies based on accumulated experiences and depending on the individual, this
ability to manage emotions on stage can be very positive and natural or disastrous. This
idiosyncrasy could also be extrapolated to the way one studies at home; people who
focus on studying as they should and other people who carry out their daily practice
with incessant breaks and distractions.
What mental training offers us is a change in the possibilities of behavior through the
intellectual completion of a task: The objective is to learn a procedure without having
to have practiced it previously. Our instinctive way of acquiring a movement is through
the repetition of a gesture until it is successful, a classic and physical activity that we
people carry out since we are born, but there is also another way to assimilate a habit.
This is what mental training is for.
By observing the gestures our teacher makes when playing the instrument, for example,
we are already activating this mental activity and thus improving our learning.
We must point out that a beginner or someone who is completely unfamiliar with the
instrument, even if he or she were to visualize each of the movements of a highly
complex passage, would not have the technical resources and sufficient knowledge to
carry them out simply because he or she does not know or does not understand what he
or she has to do physically to reproduce that passage in reality. However, someone who
does have this experience could benefit from this exercise, which would lead to savings
in learning time, without risk of injury, practice when the circumstances of the
environment or time are not suitable, to be more thorough in the study and have a more
powerful memory, increase the understanding of the movements, the formal structure of
a work, etc.

It has been shown that when a person imagines playing a piece that they already know,
brain areas responsible for carrying out these movements are activated. Mental practice
is therefore not only a substitute for when active study is not possible but to combine

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both and obtain better results.
A relaxation prior to our practice, both physically and mentally, could be added to our
routine. A state that induces a greater capacity for concentration and, as a direct
consequence, greater learning, a lower risk of injury if we are actively playing and less
tension. While this is true, a distinction must be made between this state of conscious
tranquility and that of drowsiness or laziness. The regular practice of this routine could
bring us great benefits and the time to reach this state could be shorter and shorter. It is
clear that it would also help us in the long term to manage our stage fright.

Learn to make music with mental relaxation.

To include the action of playing and its intrinsic movements in the practice, it is
necessary, as I said before, to have a physical knowledge of the instrument beforehand,
otherwise this practice is unfeasible. I'm talking about sensations, arm movements,
mental and muscular scheme of where each note is, etc. To start, the ideal is to have a
score of a basic difficulty on hand and mentally visualize it as it would be played on our
particular instrument, how those notes sound and what gestures we make when playing
the selected passage. It is highly recommended to imagine it first at a very cautious
speed and gradually increase the tempo. If there are difficulties with this visualization,
go little by little, in fragments, until you successfully complete your task: It is important
to make an exact musical representation at the rhythmic, dynamic, pitch and tempo
level. Otherwise we would not be working as we should and the practice would no
longer be so fruitful. To successfully complete the task, we could dissociate all these
musical elements and work on them separately and, once mentally clear, assemble them
all together, as if they were pieces of a puzzle. Even if the musician is very experienced
or expert, it would be advisable that when faced with a passage or work of very high
difficulty, he or she does this mental breakdown so as not to distort each of the
elements that exist in the score and not memorize or visualize a passage that is not
correct. Using this complete, separating elements is possible even if you do not master
the work; it would help with memorization and reaching our goal more quickly. A good
working policy could be to first dissociate the rhythm from the musical piece or
fragment you want to work on; it is feasible and necessary at the beginning to write the
rhythm without notes, in a percussive way on a separate sheet of paper and imagine it.
Once this principle is clear, we could move on to the height of the notes, whether
included in the rhythm or in an abstract way, and then gradually incorporate them into
the metric that the passage evokes. With these two essential elements rooted, we could
move on to new stages if the score presents polyphonic passages, either because we
play the piano or a plucked instrument that allows us to play more than one note at the
same time, or because in a piece for a melodic instrument there is intricate polyphony
in a single melodic line. This requires a prior mental analysis of the work. Another
process of separation of rhythm from melody would begin. When the two or more
rhythms sound correct in our head, we will add the pitch of the notes again.
There are other facets that we could polish and work on with mental training. If we take
the piano as a reference, once we have selected the passage we want to delve into, let us

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mentally sketch out a picture of the entire process that occurs when playing that
passage in question: If there are octave changes or thumb steps, how the body has to
move for that to happen successfully and accurately, having a clear mental outline of
the arrangement of the piano keys. As our fingers move up and down to play the key or
keys that the score indicates, the muscular process is triggered. Being aware of all this
will give us confidence when it comes to giving physical form to the music and
benefiting from this confidence when facing the public; we have to be careful with the
intense intellectual control of the movements because once the piece is mastered and at
the time you have to play it, it could be counterproductive or irritating. It is
recommended to direct attention to broader relationships and musical structuring or
other aspects as soon as the movements have been mastered.
This type of mental practice is unlimited and we could work on sound or pulsation. In
the case of wind instruments, we can visualize the shape of the lips when placing the
embouchure, the sensation you have when emitting a sound, the vibration, etc. Being
aware of all these mechanisms helps us when playing, since we will instinctively play
with less tension.
This method is not only aimed at performers who play an instrument, it can also be
extrapolated to singers in a similar way to how aspects of sound quality in a wind
instrument could be worked on, recreating sensations. For example: Singers have a
certain fear of certain passages with uncomfortable alterations, intervals that are
difficult to tune, or high notes. This simple fear brings us a latent insecurity in the entire
interpretation and that surfaces more energetically when these are going to happen.
Excessive tension is produced in the vocal apparatus and this causes the feared passages
to not come out as one wants, with a poorer sound or a failure to occur altogether.
Working intellectually on these handicaps for singers prepares us and gives us extra
confidence to enter this problem with a sure step.
Of course, one can also successively direct one's attention to the various parameters
described without mental training, but in mental work without deviation due to physical
activity and sensory perception, one can more easily maintain concentration on a
specific detail.
Mental practice is also very suitable for improving old faults. Habits of interpretation
and thinking can be changed more easily in performance because, unlike when playing,
especially when working on pieces that have been worked on for a long time, thoughts
and perceptions function automatically as part of a joint motor and mental program.
List of essential points that should be worked on mentally:
- Musical text.
- Intellectual understanding and musical representation of sound and character.
- Synthesis of reading and thinking.
- Movements of making music.
- Breathing.
- Position and muscle tension.
- Rhythm, intonation, articulation, dynamics, timbre, sound quality and expression.
- Phrasing structuring of a composition in its entirety.

The method presented below is the one developed by Tatjana Orloff-Tshcekorsky,

which regularly follows the representation of movement and the interpretation of what
is represented. It is clear that this practice does not have a single path and other artists
can combine mental and physical practice from another approach.
When we play a piece from memory, paradoxically and in most cases we cannot

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remember each and every note, especially if the instrument we play is polyphonic.
However, we play it from “memory”. The common thread here is our muscle memory,
but it could become fragile or play tricks on us at a concert, with the audience's
attention focused on us, external distractions such as noise or some worry and
insecurity that flows from us. These types of conditions are an excellent breeding
ground for the appearance of the dreaded blackouts. By consciously memorizing and
imagining each note that resides on the paper in our head, we ensure that our memory
becomes stronger and more layered, thus avoiding any kind of memory leak.
Visualizing each and every note is an arduous and often tiring task, and these symptoms
are more insistent when practicing this technique for the first few times. Still, it is a
very solid memorization system and through the process of conscious memorization we
will also develop our ability to pay attention and concentrate.
In Tatjana Orloff-Tshcekorsky, the representation of movements is at the forefront of
memory learning and the symbiosis between relaxation-learning. One of the musicians
who should be more than familiar with this type of system is the conductor, since this
type of activity is necessary at home so that the musicians can then materialize the
score in a coherent and previously considered way. For Tatjana Orloff-Tshcekorsky, the
training arises from the problem that students face in playing the pieces without getting
stuck or blocked and without emitting a constant stream of music. Initially, the idea was
to transpose the mental work that an athlete does to that of a musician, but there are
clear differences and an adaptation was needed. In the mental exercise of the musician,
the representation of movement is inseparably linked to the representation of sound.
Therefore, it is necessary to include sound in our mental representation and this is one
of the biggest differences with the psychological expertise that athletes have to devise.
As soon as the method was born, he included it in his students' daily study and
gradually increased their playing fluency, they were able to learn pieces more quickly
and tackle pieces of greater complexity with confidence. Some of the objectives of the
method are:
- Greater technical security.
- A better sound representation, a refined sonority.
- A more accurate realization of the intended interpretation.
- Avoiding injuries due to overwork in the motor system.
- Reducing fear in concerts and exams.
- A fast and intensive learning and memorization.

A kind of guide to start with would be the following:

It is stressed to start with relaxation. It is important to keep in mind daily the mental
and physical state that one experiences when under the influence of relaxation and,
when necessary, to remember those sensations and return to a similar state of relaxation
at a concert or audition. Apart from the fact that it has been proven that learning
capacity increases in a state of lucid tranquility. Once we have achieved our first
objective, we would move on to the representation of the movements necessary to play
the piece to be studied and the sound of the notes to be played. Once this representation
is done, the passage we have worked on should be played two or three times on the
instrument at the imagined speed. It is important to know that to learn a piece,
according to Tatjana Orloff-Tshcekorsky's method, the piece must be divided into small
fragments. It is preferable that in the works we are going to tackle we start with a slow

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tempo, to establish the movements correctly and then speed up the tempo cautiously
until we achieve the tempo that the composer has set for our work; under no
circumstances should we increase the tempo if we get stuck or make mistakes at a
slower tempo. The maximum time to work in this way, according to the author, is 45
minutes for advanced users and 10 to 20 minutes for beginners, with a break of about
15 minutes for both. For greater safety, we recommend not exceeding the expected time
when interpreting the work. When we tackle a contrapuntal piece, we are also
suggested to act differently: We should be clear about the different voices on an
analytical level and analyze them independently and internalize both their rhythm and
their phrasing, and then, yes, that is when we can assemble the pieces progressively.

Mental exercise on the fear of playing in public.

Just as a musician studies a repertoire with the aim of mastering it in order to play it at a
future audition or concert, feelings of nervousness, agitation and fear should be worked
on with the same objective. This practice is normalized among athletes, but as far as we
are concerned, it is not yet considered in the way it should be.
Fear is a physiological response to a dangerous situation, it is a method of survival and
it is a big problem if it is unleashed in an excessive manner during an action. Shaking,
sweating, avoidance thoughts or negative self-statements can deteriorate the quality of
our interpretation and prevent the listener from clearly seeing the fruit of our work.
Although fear in a regulated and normal amount is a great ally as it keeps us alert,
focused and aware of everything that happens when we perform. Being afraid when
going on stage is certainly illogical since we are not in any dangerous situation, even if
our brain considers it so. But the fear of not being up to par, negative experiences at
other auditions, our own expectations, those of our parents or teachers, and the fact that
all the attention is focused on us, significantly increases our nervousness. When the
situation overwhelms us and we “fail,” stage fright develops and becomes stronger the
next time we face this type of situation. So what could we do to counteract that fear?
The first thing is to set a realistic goal both in the choice of the work and the result we
could obtain. We could also use various mental exercises:

- Encourage positive thoughts.

- Avoid distressing fantasies.
- Use relaxation techniques.
- Exercise concentration.
- Represent the hearing situation in a concrete way.
- Approaching step by step the distressing exit on stage.

One of these mental exercises, using relaxation techniques, can be the key that frees us
from the prison that stage fright can become. The progressive muscle relaxation
technique is a very beneficial option. Before beginning each practice, we should sit in
our chair, without the instrument, close our eyes and do a mental review from the toes
to the head of our entire body, passing through every inch of it and relaxing it. It should
be accompanied by optimal breathing. At first it may take us quite a while, but if the
student does not give up, we could considerably optimize the time. Once mastered we
could do this same relaxation with our instrument in hand and finally on stage or
minutes before performing. Another relaxation technique that can be beneficial is the

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representation of pleasant images or sensations that encourage tranquility. Whether it is
a beach, a forest, the sound of the sea, a breeze running across our face, a caress or even
a fragrance that creates the effect we are looking for. There are no restrictions
whatsoever as to what is imaginable.
A good way to prepare for a performance is to actually perform it. Because we have
prior knowledge of how they develop, the emotions that flourish in ourselves, the
layout and shape of the stage if it is a place where we usually play when we have
concerts, we could anticipate this fear, imagining with the greatest accuracy a possible
concert situation. Inevitably, and if we do it correctly, we will have sensations similar
to when we are performing in public or in an exam. By getting used to these sensations
and mentally recreating them, we could end up having a good coexistence with the
feeling of anguish that comes to light. If we add to this a relaxation prior to said
visualization and in the hypothetical performance we play the work or the repertoire in
a mentally active way, the benefits should be inevitable.
It is crucial not to think that at a certain point in the interpretation we are going to fail
because it is a risky or difficult passage to manage, since it is evident that the hole of
insecurity would grow and could end up swallowing us, and a realistic recreation
should always be made. Never beyond our possibilities. First of all, one must accept
that one has to let mistakes happen without making any kind of negative assessment. It
is also crucial that if we feel fear, in some way, we do not repress it, but rather live with
it so that it does not appear in a violent and more abrupt way than normal.
We should not only worry about imagining what will happen on stage but also how our
lives will unfold on the day of the concert, from the moment we wake up until we play
the last note. The number of performances we do should be directly proportional to the
stage fright we have.
The minutes before going on stage could be really unpleasant. Our heads are filled with
catastrophic thoughts and negative affirmations overflow disproportionately. All such
behaviors should be avoided immediately without repressing them. For example, one
way to dispel these types of actions could be to imagine a pleasant image accompanied
by slow breathing. Once it is our turn to go on stage, we must come out confidently,
upright and without looking back; all of this should have been worked on beforehand. It
is very common for artists to have a portion of fear made up of a possible fear of
criticism, fear of what our colleagues, teachers, family or the public will say. Failure is
completely normal and if it happens occasionally it does not worsen the quality of the
work. One should think that one plays for oneself to enjoy, so that the public can savour
the work behind the interpretation and nothing more should matter than that, even in
exams. One must be sure of one's work and accept any unforeseen events or surprises
that may appear; these must also be visualized mentally.
Some tips to weaken the fear that accompanies us when playing:

- Play what you are going to play several times in a row without interruption.
- Playing with the idea that someone is listening to us.
- Playing while we record ourselves.
- Playing while recording ourselves and then giving it to someone important to us.
- Playing in front of family members.
- Playing in front of classmates or friends.

When stage fright takes over, musicians unfortunately resort to using medication to
combat the cause. They usually take some type of tranquilizers that reduce that feeling
of panic. This measure must be radically rejected since stage fright does not decrease,
in many cases it increases frantically, which leads to greater consumption of these

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drugs and absolute dependence when going on stage. Many of these drugs have adverse
effects and considerable long-term consequences, and musicians often attribute their
success to the pills themselves rather than to all the work and study they have put into
their performance after a more or less successful performance.
After all, the true path to success is tenacity and perseverance. Working day by day and
not giving up. Only in this way will we obtain the expected fruits in a healthy and
pleasant way.

3. Analysis and reflection.

The practice of mental training is a highly beneficial method not only for an athlete but
also for a musician. It is common that the desire to take a work to a presentable level or
the simple fact of playing our instrument and producing sound, distances us from the
observation of what we do when playing, from getting intimate with the score,
understanding it and reading it without any type of barrier or means that distances us
from it. Because sometimes our instrument is a point of separation between what the
score wants to tell us and us. Without listening to it first, we try to interpret it through
one more subject in this interaction, often inaccurately, both at the formal level, in
terms of phrasing and precision. It is necessary, healthy and advisable to sit down with
the work we want to play and observe it from beginning to end, contemplating its
nature and idiosyncrasy. Once we are clear about what it wants to tell us, how it is
constructed and what we want to do with it, we must fragment it in such a way that we
can mentally visualize each note, whether it be a melodic line or a voluptuous
polyphony. To do this we must separate all the elements that make up the fragmented
passage and then build it, just as a child builds a sand castle on the beach. The exercise
of imagining each note with the right rhythm and timing, drawing in our heads all the
movements and mechanisms that are activated when playing a specific fragment is truly
interesting. We know that when our brain imagines in such a specific way, the brain
areas responsible for carrying out that physical practice are activated equally, even if it
does not happen. Put another way: In a way, you are practicing and consolidating
knowledge without actually giving a grade. This way of operating, in contrast to the
incessant repetition of passages as if we were automatons, draws my attention a lot. It
could give us greater clarity when carrying out musical activity and be more aware of
everything that happens at all times at all levels that are being worked on. As a direct
consequence, much greater security is acquired and there is an increase in the
assimilation of all concepts. It is a revolutionary way of working that any artist should
acquire. For the musician who feels supported when playing in public, it is a true source
of warmth and confidence. But it should not be relegated to just that, it should be a
daily tool as essential as pressing a note and producing a sound, as is the case with the
guitar.
It is a coherent method and endowed with sufficient veracity so that its results cannot
be questioned. The only possible drawback could arise from the level of consistency
that the student would have to have when beginning the mental exercise. It can be tiring
and the immediacy with which one would like to have results may cause this modus
operandi to be discarded. You must be patient and in the case of people who do not
have the tenacity or perseverance necessary to carry out this method, they should use it
under the supervision of someone with experience in the subject or a teacher who does
not let the student's impetus decline by working only intellectually, without the
instrument.

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This could be the key to solving many of the problems that musicians face in their daily
studies and at auditions or concerts. It could be outlined as a single mechanism that
drives several motors; by working like this, you are working on both the visual memory
of the score and the movements related to muscle memory. Since to do this mental
exercise you have to imagine the sound, we activate the auditory memory, thus
sharpening our hearing, having clear at all times the name and the pitch of the sound.
By dissociating elements, such as the rhythmic aspect, we create a stable engine that we
can embrace in the event of a small memory leak. In short, we ensure that our
interpretation is produced in a manner that is fair in relation to our work.

4. Practical conclusion.

Finally, I can only admit that I am truly surprised by this way of approaching the study
of a work or this kind of preparatory ritual for a concert or an audition. I think it is an
absolutely interesting way of working and that each and every musician should acquire
this habit. It could be a vehicle that will take us further as artists than the traditional
way of working could take us. It would improve our ability to assimilate, our security
and would fight against that voracious anxiety that we face when we play in front of
someone and at the same time it would arm us with a very powerful memory. Although
at first it may seem like a tedious and constantly demanding job, it is a good bet for the
future that every musician should consider and one that I have decided to take a chance
on.

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 5. Literature.

- Exercise for musicians. Renate Klöppel. Ed. Mundimusica.

6. Webgraphy.

- www.wikipedia.de

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