For this final exercise, devote yourself to only one of your senses. Turn away from your student and only listen. Don’t watch them – evaluate and discuss their playing based solely on the sounds you see. Refrain from discussing technical issues, focus the dialogue solely on the sounds that are desired.
OR
Don’t listen. Have your student play on a silent keyboard, or if none is available (or if you teach violin or voice), videotape your student’s performance and watch the video with the sound off. I believe that beautiful technique produces beautiful sounds. Rarely have a seen a student who looks awkward but sounds great (or who looks great but sounds awkward.) Focus the discussion solely on the beauty of the motions themselves.
A brief tangent – this is how I learned to hit a golf ball. After a year of hacking away at the ground, I began practicing my golf swing with no other goal than to make it look like a golf swing. Amazingly, I found that once I began swinging the golf club in a way that looked good, the club magically found the ball and propelled it up into the air. As in sports, form is everything, and if you practice with the idea of having good physical form, results have a tendency to follow.
Thanks to all who’ve been reading these – I hope you’ve gotten an idea or two to take to your studio as we move into winter recital season!
Hey, I thought this was a TEN-part series?!
I want to thank you so much for all of these suggestions. Some are things I have done, myself, over the years. Others are things I have thought of but never put into action, or not considered. I will print out the entire list, share it with a few friends, and keep it in my pile of ‘things to sift through now and then and re-read’. Cheers!