A Profound Musical Life Lesson
“Ruth, every note counts.”
(Mrs Stock – Piano Teacher)
Every note counts – attention to detail is everything!
You may know that I studied piano from a young age. The story today centres around my second piano teacher, Mrs Stock. (Side note – I must tell you about my first piano teacher one day. Oh, the memories – or nightmares!)
On this particular day, I was 16 and at my piano lesson struggling with some fast arpeggios in a Beethoven sonata. We were working towards my Grade 7 piano exam. I was never great with my left hand and I was sliding over a lot of the notes. They were indistinct and messy. I was thinking the quicker I rushed through it the less she would notice! Not so. She didn’t let me get away with it.
That’s when these immortal words popped out:
That’s when these immortal words popped out:
“Ruth, every note counts.”
These words hit me hard and gave me one of those lightbulb moments people talk about.
As time went on I realised that not just every note counted but every sound, word, expression. Each strum of the guitar. The pitch, pace and colour. Every word chosen in a song. The list went on.
Her words had a long-lasting and profound effect on me. It felt like a musical life lesson.
The importance of detail. That everything matters. Each detail makes up and contributes to the value of the whole. It’s what made me practise a song hundreds of times and pull everything from it – the words chosen to match the music, the expression, tone of voice, no poor sounding notes / chords, etc. Every note and word had to count.
Thinking on it now, though, maybe I took this to heart too much? It’s possible there was a negative to it too. This attention to detail and quest for everything to be right may have contributed to some of my tricky perfectionism.
I like being a perfectionist – it can be a good thing – but it can also be inhibiting. (I’ve actually written about perfectionism here in my career as a counsellor & coach.)
So it seems to me that there’s a balance to be struck. The detail is important and getting things the best they can be makes for a better outcome – be it music, or another career – but not to the point of being disappointed if you don’t hold yourself to a perfect standard. Also, if you criticise yourself or your performance for tiny errors and don’t see all the things you did well this becomes a negative way to live. Yes, I’ve fallen foul of these things!
So I’m wondering, can you relate to this in your life or your career? And have you struggled with the beauty and the beast of perfectionism? I would love to know.