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James Walley

I see a number of people here talking about how the forced self-distancing is giving them time to focus on playing.  I have to ask the counter-question: is there anyone else here who is finding the current crisis making it very difficult to get up the motivation to play?

Maybe it's just that, living up here near Seattle, which was the first epicenter of the outbreak, we've been getting inundated with news of the pandemic, and the resulting stress, for well over a month now, long before most regions of the country started looking at it as anything other than "just another flu."  Maybe it's that, given my age and my wife's medical conditions, there's a considerable chance that, should we both get it, one of the other of us would likely not survive.  But I find it a real chore to sit down and actually practice - my overwhelming emotion is "What's the use?" - and, when I do, I find myself in a rut, repeating the same errors over and over again no matter how hard I try to correct them.  I am going to try to get out a progress video for this month but, based on the footage I have so far, I can safely say it will feature the worst playing I've recorded since my earliest days.

Has anyone else experienced the same "block?"  And, if so, have you found a way around it?  Sorry for the sob-story, but I can't believe I'm the only one reacting to the current situation this way.
James Walley
13 Responses
Posted: March 31, 2020
Last Comment: April 2, 2020
Replies


Posted: April 2, 2020
Oops!, I meant to say James and everyone. Apologies for the typo!

Blessings,
Mandy


Posted: April 2, 2020
Hi Jaime and everyone,

Thank you all for your words of encouragement in this challenging time we are living in. Jaime, my heart goes out to you and I believe we have heard some very sound words of wisdom and advise from our fellow violinlabbers. I am praying for God's peace to be poured into your heart and that when you pick up your violin it will be a source of joy to you.

Blessings,
Mandy


Posted: April 2, 2020
I like Barb's way of dealing with it. I guess I shared more problems than solutions. Even without the virus I think every player has ups and downs.
 
If I had lived in the early 1800's, lived  far out on the frontier somewhere what I didn't know wouldn't hurt me. Sometimes I think people probably worried less and lived happier lives.
A couple of things that are helping me are the realization that this will eventually pass. Focusing on only the things I can change, praying about the rest. Putting things into a proper context. What looks large is not insurmountable. Realizing that the press is really focusing on this right now which undoubtedly is missing a lot of really good things going on in the world, so when you tune into the news you are hearing a pinpoint version of the total reality. No one has to be doing anything alone. There is always help available.

I have been going for walks. Yesterday I walked probably two miles. Exercise seems to help. I know this is easier said than done sometimes.  I try to mentally detach from anything that drags me down. This isn't to say I'm uncaring. I simply "compartmentalize" and defer some things until later. There's a time for fun and relaxation, for positive reflection, a time to forget all of the other stuff. Soldiers can't fight 24/7. Nurses aren't unlimited sources of energy. Even Jesus had to go away for awhile to rest and the creator rested on the 7th day.
If people won't give that to you, then take it if you have to because it is beneficial to your mental well being. It isn't a sin to pamper yourself when you need it.

For me the violin is all about willpower. To learn it you need to "push through" those disappointing times. Habits can become ingrained. If practice is a regular thing you do, it is done on both good days and bad days. If a person really hates the instrument every time they pick it up, if you can't play the most basic things, I don't think it's a terrible thing to re evaluate it to see if maybe there is another instrument you could play better. The violin is one of the more challenging instruments, especially for older people, so maybe a cello? Who knows? Violinists aren't a special elite group and there are hundreds of other instruments out there. I would have probably done better with cello lol....too late now. I'm sticking with this :)

Barb Wimmer
Posted: April 1, 2020
When I play with the attitude to take a break and either learn something or just have fun - the latter usually, I usually enjoy. When I have high expectations and lots on my mind I try to go back to the simple and try again. I try to focus on everything and it doesn't work and when I just play and focus on one thing improving sometimes it works well. Corona virus is scary. I am healthy and so is family. Praying we can be done with this corona virus and come up with a vaccine soon. But meanwhile just praying everyone is doing well, is healthy. I try to live by the moment, a challenge.


Posted: April 1, 2020
You are not alone, James, especially for the first week of self quarantine.  By day 10 I finally got back my motivation.  I still practiced everyday just missing the motivation part.  I will be back to work this Friday.  Essential service.  Stay safe everyone.

jz
Posted: April 1, 2020
Hi James, I am so sorry to hear of your concerns. These are such stressful times. I live in Italy and I find myself weeping when I hear the sound of ambulances breaking the silence of our locked down city. People here have been creating music at their windows each evening at 6 PM to offer solace, comfort, and connection to each other.
As for the debilitating worry, I always think back to my dear friends who had a child with cystic fibrosis. Unfortunately, their child passed away at a young age, but not due to CF. His dad told me, in words of wisdom that I could not comprehend at the time, that the CF had actually been their friend, in the end. That ever present worry reminded them that each moment of a shared life is precious. They lived joy in each moment, knowing that each moment shared in love is all, and yet everything, that we can hope for.  I feel your fears and I wish you hope. And joy!


Posted: March 31, 2020
Virtual hugs! 

I found myself having less enthusiasm when practicing... And therefore, less. 

I used to get very excited going home from work to get to practice. The violin takes me out of the humdrum fo daily life. Now, I have a feeling of despair. 

My partner is high risk due to his hypertension. I'm worried that if during my weekly grocery shopping, I might get it and pass it on to him. 

I've made a detailed practice plan and it has helped to keep me on track of my violin playing. 

I hope we get back into the daily humdrum of routine soon and hopefully, my fellow violinlabbers will be safe during this war. 

Virtual hugs and kisses, 

Leslie

Dianne
Posted: March 31, 2020
Is there one technique that you would most like to improve? Or a phrase in a piece that needs more attention? You could work on those. If you were to play just one phrase from one piece, it might condense down the specific technique. And if you had 2 or 3 techniques in one session like that, it would bring a lot of nice results that you could see. Good luck and know that you are not alone in your practicing!


Posted: March 31, 2020
Hi James,

I guess we all experience these things just a little bit differently. I can certainly see why you would feel the way you do. Like Elke I rely on my faith. I have never been the type to advertise my faith but hope that something I do might show it. I am not always a good example of it admittedly.
I had some events coming into this pandemic that were downers. My dad recently passed away. In looking back at it I think he might have had the virus. He had all of the symptoms.Since he had at one time been a smoker I attributed it to this. In any case he is no longer here and given his situation, that of being placed on a breathing tube for life and being sedated so he wouldn't pull out the tubes...that wasn't living.They couldn't keep him on 100% oxygen all the time.It was just a matter of time.
Then we come home and my wife's best friend and a friend of mine died suddenly in her 50's in her sleep of an enlarged heart. This really threw my wife for an emotional spin. A few weeks later another friend died. I played piano and sang for all three funerals. When I play I try to convey the sense of future hope we can potentially have. This was all still a drain on me personally. I'm ready to play a party next time lol. 
So now enter this pandemic. I had wished for more time in the studio before this happened. I also had a room addition project going. I  have a lot here to keep me busy between music and work on the house.I either have or can obtain the materials to do the work. I am also working from home from the computer, so I'm busy. It's just a different routine.
When it comes to the violin, I often feel that same way, that I continue to repeat many of the same mistakes, though I am seeing some gradual improvement. Some of the material I play for practice I must have gone over hundreds of times. Every time I play it I find something else that needs work. It can be VERY frustrating. On the plus side of it, my fingers on my left hand were once very high. Because of my training they are now playing lower to the finger board. This seems to be a very gradual thing to get those fingers trained to stay close to the fingerboard. If I were being graded I would probably get a C- or a D+ for hand placement. The thumb still wants to venture around the neck sometimes. Sometimes I feel the way an alcoholic must feel. They are only one drink from falling off the wagon. I am only one mistake from playing bad again and it's so EASY to play bad.
For me , playing the violin is like a relationship you have with someone that had some rocky places in it. If I can forgive and get past those rocks in the past we can have fun together. The violin has a lot of "rocks" to get over to enjoy the company lol.

Jaime - Orlando , Fl
Posted: March 31, 2020
James, hope indeed you and yours do well during these difficult times.
I have found among this tragedy that is Corona virus, an opportunity to share more with family and even across the miles, with friends. Violin have certainly been a venue to relax and escape reality some... that being said, it hasn't been easy. Heard already of family and some friends affected. Fortunately, those known and affected fairing well, but truly discouraging and difficult to even envision the magnitude of this pandemic. Just taking it day by day.... hoping this too, shall pass...

Karen Egee
Posted: March 31, 2020
Yes yes James here too. We are all of course at such risk but its much scarier for people in high risk groups. I feel for you and your wife. I am lucky enough to be in a bubble with my husband and father, and my father and i play duets as much as time allows. Just the playing of music, the focus needed, the pleasure in hearing the sounds, i find helpfully distracting. We each get distracted and the music stops, way more often than before. I would love to have the attention and wherewithall to practice and improve but i just don't. 

This reminds me of a greif time, like after my first husband died. Our hearts and brains are very jangled and everything is differently experienced. Different people respond differently but I can totally relate to what oyu are saying. When Im not panicking about my father (85) getting sick or the world falling apart or our funds evaporating I can, for an hour here and there, totally enjoy playing. But it is with a different purpose and feel than before. Wishing you and  your wife the very best.

Elke Meier
Posted: March 31, 2020
James, as for Corona, for me it is my Christian faith that helps me keep my sanity. I find it so helpful that I can just go to God in prayer, bring him my concerns, know that he is near me even when friends cannot be, read Psalms when I get concerned about my parents (they are both in a care home with only phone contact at the moment), etc. That and the hope I have for a future with God for them (and for myself also...) is what helps me not to give in to worry. I am very thankful for that. Worry just sucks the energy out of us. And that energy could be better used in something positive - like making music :)

As for music and motivation to play: I have had very hard months in terms of the violin, very little time for playing, and over the last months, when there would have been more time again during the last weeks, my hands have acted up really badly reducing practice time often to just a few minutes. We used to have a member here on VLab who constantly encouraged me to at least do what he called "maintenance practice". So when I have to stop practicing again after a few minutes I tell myself: I have done the maintenance practice :).

As Kate says, playing what we can do is also a help. When I get frustrated about not making progress, I stop and take out something really simple but where I have nice accompaniment and just play that and let the beauty of the music nourish my soul. Sure, it is not what I would like to play, but again, there is no use wasting energy lamenting what cannot be. Will I ever make progress again? I hope so! But even if it is not possible now, it is much wiser to invest my energy in what can be.

I have had such an intense life lesson on this over the last months. My parents are both in their late eighties and both suffer from rapidly growing dementia. A while ago a friend reminded me of my dad's life motto which he had repeated to this friend many, many times: "I am at peace with my past - it is forgiven -, I don't have the future in my hands. I live NOW." It is true, I remember my dad saying that many times also to us children. Living in the here and now was a life theme for him. Both he and my mom suffer now from rapidly growing dementia. Dementia is emotionally very draining for everyone - the people involved and the family who observes it and has to get to know these changing persons over and over again. But to my big surprise I observe the effect my dad's life motto has on him in his dementia. Whereas my mom is frantic about forgetting people's names or things that they told her, my dad said in a similar situation: "You know, I don't need to remember all this any more. It is okay if I forget it. I am here now in this care home, this is where I live, it is a new phase in my life, I have new people that I relate to, and here I enjoy every day that God gives me." I would have never guessed that this life long learning of neither living in the past nor in the future but contentedly and consciously in the present would have such an immense practical effect on dealing with something as bad as dementia. 

James, I just wish you this look for the gifts that are put into TODAY for you - that you can enjoy them and enjoy them fully while you have them. Be that music, or the fact that we even can play the violin, however imperfect it may be, or the fact that we can enjoy times with friends even over Skype or Zoom or Whatsapp ro telephone or whatever. Sure, it is not the same as personal contact, but what good is it lamenting what we don't have when at the same time we could enjoy what we do have. We do need our energies these days for the extra stresses we are under. Adjusting to this different life style is no small feat. There is just no point wasting energy on what might or might not come. 


Posted: March 31, 2020

Hi James, I'm struggling too. My husband's condition means he is at high risk if he gets it and if he does requires ventilation he will need specialist, specialist care (breathes through his neck). He has to be careful even if he gets a common cold. My response to very high stress levels has been to put us both in complete isolation for the foreseeable future (we're on day 14) and I've spent most of the last 2 weeks sorting strategies for every possible scenario to reduce my anxiety. My normal routing has gone out of the window and I like a routine/ certainty so really, really difficult.

Violin wise I had 2 weeks without my violin and when I got it back it sounded different and felt different (new bridge/ work on nut). Add into that being at a stage where I have a lot of problems with playing at speed (particularly measure 20 of Gossec Gavotte!), intonation getting worse? 4th finger a nightmare etc. etc. and I have been feeling very negative about my progress and overwhelmed by everything I need to tackle. Sooo much stuff at the moment (Intermediate Level 1) that is revealing big areas I need to concentrate on.

I've decided to just try to enjoy it and not get worried about any progress. If I feel I can't be bothered to 'practice' I'm playing earlier stuff that I really enjoy and isn't too challenging to give me a boost, I'm working on some really simple hymns that I can play for my dad over the phone, a couple of Beatle tunes the kids will at least recognise :) and am (very slowly) feeling able to tackle some of the big things I need to work on. I'm also working on Jesu, Joy of Man Desiring because, although I am probably not quite ready for it I really love it and there aren't any fast parts in it to really frustrate me (but really good practice for string changing etc.). In other words I'm not really stressing about focused practice at the moment but I'm playing things that make me feel good. It means I will not progress as quickly in the long term but will keep me sane in the short term.