From Zero to Mozart in 12 Months: The 3 Keys to Success
During the last few weeks, I’ve been reflecting on how I learned to play the violin again. After walking away from the instrument 25 years ago, I started with limited skills, but learned rapidly.
I came up with three big factors for success:
- I took a structured approach, full of scales, arpeggios and all those drills that our teachers forced us to play until we dropped.
- For the first time, I felt the excitement of choosing whatever I wanted to play. In formal training, you never get to pick your pieces!
- The third factor? Well, it’s something that might surprise you.
It’s . . . you!
That’s right — without an audience, and without people from all over the world throwing out applause and a thumbs-up every here and there — I would have never stuck with this.
It started out a whole lot rougher than I thought it would be.
But because I was playing to a highly interested audience, I didn’t stop.
Beyond the music, the project has also served as a lab in which I discovered the biggest pitfalls in my approach to work.
In Part 2 of the video, called “the Brindisi Breakdown,” I saw that I’m still willing to run myself into the ground to get things right. That footage shows the night that I locked myself into a room for two hours until I played an aria from Verdi without a glitch.
In the sixth month, when the project started running me down, I tried something new. I took a break.
Interestingly, my playing still improved during that time, even though I wasn’t practicing much — which leads me to believe that I wasn’t learning to play, as much as rehabilitating an old skill. It’s like those neurons kept going, even when I didn’t.
I hope that you’ll continue to join me as I move into more challenging literature in the next year.
I’m planning to make more videos with interpretation of important pieces, like the video on Shostakovich below, as well as videos that demonstrate violin skills.
Thank you for joining me! You’re a critical component for success.
Let’s keep in touch! You can follow my story here: Rebecca Raney (ck.page)
