#262: How to Learn a Piece You Can’t Listen To First

When I was a young harpist, there was no internet. I know that would shock a young harpist today who has grown up with the wealth of resources that are available with a single click. I was curious about when exactly the first internet-savvy generation grew up, so with a quick search - everything is clickable - I found the Gen Z’ers are the first internet generation, born between 1995 and 2010. That means those Gen Z adults are now between the ages of 16 and 30 or thereabouts. 

While the internet may feel like a birthright of Gen Z, the rest of us have come to rely on the internet too, and it’s a tremendous resource for us harpists. If my teacher wanted me to learn a new piece, I had to go to the record store (I’m hoping there are some of you who remember those!) to look for a recording. Most often, I was out of luck, but I got into the habit of buying any harp record I found in the store, just in case I might want it someday. 

Today, everything is turned around. There are more harp recordings available to a harpist than anyone could possibly listen to. This makes it simple to hear someone else play the piece you want to learn. You might even be able to hear many players with vastly different interpretations, which is an education in itself. 

But even now, there are those times when there is no recording of the piece you want to learn. When that happens, how do you begin? Where do you start? Are there things you can do before you play the first note to help you learn it more quickly and with more confidence in your approach? 

I want to give you a framework for that today, one that will not only help guide you through approaching a piece when you have no idea how it sounds, but one that will develop a set of skills which will shorten the time it takes you to learn any piece. We’re going to explore what you can know about a piece just by looking at it, and what you can guess. You may be surprised at how much useful information you have been ignoring until now.

Links to things I think you might be interested in that were mentioned in the podcast episode: 

• My Harp Mastery course: Making Music Without Your Harp
• Podcast episode #147: How to Study a Piece: Look, Listen and Apply
• Harpmastery.com

Get involved in the show! Send your questions and suggestions for future podcast episodes to me at [email protected]

Looking for a transcript for this episode? Did you know that if you subscribe to this podcast on Apple Podcasts you will have access to their transcripts of each episode?