One thing I hate: musicians with obnoxiously low self-esteem. Well, actually I don’t mind those with low self-esteem, I mind those people who broadcast their feeling to the entire world. It’s emotionally draining — there have been people who I have to assure, practically on every encounter, that yes, they are a good musician, yes, they sound awesome, yes, they are so not terrible.
And yet I really can’t complain, because there are numerous times when I, too, have struggled with low self-esteem when it comes to playing the bassoon, and when I’ve relied far too heavily on my friends to tell me that, “Yeah, Rachel, you know how you keep saying you suck? Way to be delusional.”
So I think that low self-esteem is a problem everyone struggles with, and especially musicians. After all, we sit alone in practice rooms trying to figure out what’s bad about our playing. We go to rehearsals where conductors — or our peers — tell us that this note is out of tune, this note has too hard an attack, this phrase does not go anywhere. We ask to be chastised. We get better by noticing our flaws.
Before I go further, let me say that one should never become self-congratulatory. I tend to fall into this trap very easily. I want to be happy! So I congratulate on getting my butt to a practice room, congratulate myself on picking up the bassoon, and congratulate myself on making a reed that will play, however dubiously. These practice sessions are always short and always, if not completely ineffective, then certainly much less effective than they could be.
So back to being down on ourselves. This is not a bad thing. In the end, that out-of-tune note in the Shostakovitch 9 solo will probably keep you from winning the job of your dreams, so it is completely in one’s best interest to notice that it’s out of tune, every time.
But one also has to make sure to fix these problems, and this, I think, is where we musicians can escape the path of obnoxiously low self-esteem.
See, it’s one thing to say, “Gee, that sucks!” and then delve into what, exactly, was so sucktastic about the passage. (You can use better English than me, I am sure.) But obviously just acknowledging this gets one nowhere. You’ve got to fix it — and then, I think, you have to enjoy the feeling of fixing the problem. It’s okay to celebrate your awesomeness when you’ve nailed the Ravel Piano Concerto excerpt or when you’ve gotten your double tonguing ten clicks faster. You are fixing problems. You are indeed awesome!
After really productive practice sessions I like to treat myself. Maybe it’s concocting a super amazing dessert in the cafeteria (luckily, they ONLY thing our cafeteria does well are desserts) or taking some time before bed to read some of my favorite book or letting myself have some chill time with friends. This keeps me feeling happy about my progress without getting too cocky. The reward is in the music, and in the fact that the music allows me to create something beautiful. And when I create something beautiful, everything gets more beautiful. So why not celebrate?
Just don’t get too carried away with all the celebration. There’s always something to improve.
At least, there definitely is for me. But I’m going to fix it!
