The Irish Woodshed

Episode 33 – The Irish Woodshed: How trad musicians do (and do not) practice
This Irish Music Stories episode aired September 10, 2019
https://shannonheatonmusic.com/episode-33-the-irish-woodshed/

– Transcript edited by Rosanne Santucci –

Speakers, in order of appearance
>> Shannon Heaton: flute player, singer, composer, teacher, and host of Irish Music Stories 
>> Fergal Scahill: Galway born fiddle/guitar player who performs with We Banjo 3
>> (Andrew) Finn Magill: North Carolina native who focuses on traditional Irish music, Brazilian choro, jazz and American fiddle.
>> Kieran Jordan: Boston-based dancer, teacher, and choreographer, specializing in  sean-nós and old-style Irish step dance
>> Nigel Heaton: young announcer for Irish Music Stories
>> Natalie Haas: California native who performs on cello with fiddler Alasdair Fraser
>> Nicole Rabata: Flute player specializing in classical, Celtic, and Brazilian choro
>> Martin Howley: Galway born mandolin/banjo player who performs with We Banjo 3
>> Rose Flanagan:  Bronx born fiddle player and teacher, and exponent of the New York Sligo style

_____

>> Shannon: I’m Shannon Heaton. And this is Irish Music Stories, the show about traditional music, and the bigger stories behind it…

[ Music: “Tap Room, Mountain Road, Galway Rambler” (reels), from Rehearsal Recording, c. 2009

Artist: Dan Gurney (accordion), Shannon Heaton (flute), Matt Heaton (guitar) ]

…like what the Irish music and dance worlds think about practicing

>> Fergal: I don’t have a regular practice routine, but I suppose I play. I consider it just playing the fiddle at home, where I do pick up the fiddle most days. And I suppose that is my practice.

>> Shannon: That’s Galway-based fiddle player Fergal Scahill. Like many trad musicians, regimented “practice” isn’t part of his life… even though he plays the fiddle on—and off—stage a lot.

Similarly, Andrew Finn Magill didn’t always practice. He just “played” the fiddle. But his habits have evolved since those early days in Asheville, North Carolina. I asked him about that.

>> Shannon: You used a term that I don’t always hear Irish musicians say… and that is “practice routine.”

>> Finn: Yeah.

>> Shannon: Do you have one?

>> Finn: I do, yeah. 

>> Shannon: OK. So Finn has a practice routine! But Fergal doesn’t. And this, of course, gets my Irish Music Stories spider sense tingling.

[ Music: “Sabai Sabai,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

Both Finn and Fergal are highly accomplished fiddle players. But I think Finn’s approach, his practice routine, is more unusual in the trad world, versus, say, the classical tradition. That’s got an entire body of work—the etude—that’s composed entirely for practicing. And classical and jazz players can find MOUNTAINS of books about practicing. In these music worlds, practicing is expected. It’s celebrated. It’s analyzed.

But that’s not really the Irish trad vibe.

So what gives? Are Celtic styles just easier than others? Or… is there a reason to sidestep a regimen with traditional music and dance? 

For this show I’ll talk to fiddle players Fergal Scahill, Finn Magill, and Rose Flanagan; to banjo player Martin Howley, cellist Natalie Hass, flute player Nicole Rabata, and dancer Kieran Jordan, who says this about practice:

[ Dance Steps: isolated foot track from “Mountain Rambler,” from Lovers’ Well

Artist: Matt & Shannon Heaton with Kieran Jordan (feet) ]

>> Kieran: I know I certainly feel good when I do it. And it shows in my work, in my performance. But that’s not to say that a more spontaneous approach doesn’t also benefit.

[ Music: “Pound the Floor,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

Before I peek into a few traditional music woodsheds, my son Nigel and I want to thank this month’s sponsors:

>> Nigel: Thank you to George McAvoy, Michael Craine, David Vaughan, Brian Benscoter, Joe Garrett, Gerry Corr, Daniel, and one anonymous donor.

>> Shannon: Thank you for donating this month, and for helping me build the show. To support future editions, please head to Irishmusicstories.org. And thank you.

———

So here we go. An Irish Music Stories exploration of the practice habits of richly creative and famously generous trad performers.

[ Music: “The Priest And His Boots,” from Cover the Buckle

Artist: Seán Clohessy, Sean Mccomiskey, And Kieran Jordan ]

Go to any decent Irish music session, and you’ll encounter people playing and dancing tunes with a steady group rhythm and flow. There is no sheet music in sight. Tunes are played by heart. 

In order to simply participate in a music session or a social set dance like this, you gotta know tunes and steps and figures. And this takes…  practice… right? 

Well, that’s not what Andrew Finn Magill called it, when he was a kid. He’d sidestep Suzuki violin practice for Irish fiddling:

>> Finn: I started with Suzuki, actually, but I never practiced. You couldn’t pay me to practice. I would go home and I would play Irish music for like eight hours. I played all the time, but I never practiced.

>> Shannon: You learned tunes?

>> Finn: I learned tunes… And I was learning like 8-10 tunes a day. And I could play all these tunes. But I still was never practicing violin. When I was in high school I started like to really learn how to read music a little bit. Because I joined chorus, and I had to learn how to read the tenor parts. And then at some point I started an acapella group in high school. And none of the other guys could read music well. So I was like, all right, I’ll arrange the tunes. And I got a good start on how to arrange a cappella.

>> Shannon: Any songs that you recall that were standouts?

>> Finn: Oh yes. We sang a lot of like old classic rock songs by Kansas and Boston…. all the bands that were named after place names in the United States, basically.

>> Shannon: So what was your favorite Boston song to sing?

>> Finn: More than a feeling. Pretty epic.

>> Shannon: (laughs) It’s epic!

[ Music: intro reel groove from Rehearsal Recording

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Shannon: Finn spent hours figuring out classic rock songs, and arranging them for the a cappella group. And he was still learning and “playing” lots of Irish tunes. 

Then he got into jazz. And that’s when he started to practice. At least that’s when he started using the P word. 

>> Finn: It wasn’t until I was like 22 that I really started to take jazz more seriously. I holed up in my room for a few months and practiced hours a day. Like really practiced. And I started to actually enjoy it. I was like, “Wow, this is actually enjoyable.” I’d always associated it with something negative… I kind of rediscovered practice and the value of it. It’s like why wouldn’t you want to get better you know. 

[Music: “G Meditation,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Shannon: Yeah.

>> Finn: And over time my practice routine’s just become more and more regimented, you know?

>> Shannon: It was jazz that helped Finn find practice. Or at least, that’s when he started using the term. 

Because jazz players practice. They work on arpeggios and licks and intervals in all different keys. They work on stuff to do WITH the tunes, more than the tunes themselves. And they TALK about practice. That’s how I know that jazz players spend a lot of time in their little room, working on something good. 

Classical musicians practice, too. There’s all that MUSIC dedicated to practicing—countless etudes and method books. Not TUNE books. Just books about honing general concepts and coordination, and tone and technique.

And there’s all this literature about how to practice, and how to THINK about music performance: The Art of Practicing, the Art of Practice, the Practice of Practice, The Inner Game of Music, A Soprano On Her Head. All these books talk about the routine, the habit, and the psychology of practicing.

But if you search online for “Irish music practice,” you mostly find tools to slow stuff down to learn by ear, like the Amazing Slow Downer, which allows you to slow down recordings without changing the pitch. Or slow CDs for practice. You can find interactive session videos. There are discussion groups like TheSession.org, and platforms like the Online Academy of Irish Music (with video libraries that break down techniques and elements of style). But mostly it’s about the tunes themselves, and the techniques required to play the tunes. It’s not really about the ART of practice, or HOW to practice.

Jeff Kszaiek at the Irish Cultural Association Celtic Milwaukee has good basic ideas about how to build a regular playing habit (like… make a practice area, find your best time to practice, set goals, practice 10 minutes each day instead of 70 minutes once a week). 

And Alan Ng’s site irishtune.info has a primer called “Tips for Learning Irish Traditional Music.” It demystifies HOW people go about learning tunes, because this can look like a closed book from the outside—with people just sitting around a table playing tunes together from memory. How do they do it? How do you get into that? Well, Alan breaks that down.

But when he gets to “how to practice,” he sends folks to a book by Burton Kaplan called “Practicing for Artistic Success”. The book guides players to be in touch with intuitive impulses, and also make conscious managerial decisions. 

OK. Great general stuff — be an artist and be your own best coach. Be in your body, and also use your head (sometimes). 

But this advice isn’t really scaled for traditional musicians. 

So… what about a real Irish player? Like Finn McGill. How does he apply non-Irish practice ideas to Irish music? 

>> Finn: So I do 20 minutes a day of technique in front of the mirror, just working on tone and bow technique, and that kind of thing. And then I do 40 minutes of review… It’s usually choro music, which is a kind of instrumental music from Rio de Janeiro that I started playing. And then and then I might do another 20 minutes of some of the tunes I already play. Just exploring different voicings on the violin or whatnot. And then I do a lot of — a lot of exercises… like my scales as thirds or fourths in different positions on the instrument, or speed practice of playing like 16th notes in like a 4-chord cycle, like maybe a 65 one at 160 bpm and then 180 and then 200. 

>> Shannon: Wow!

Totes wow. Makes me want to get out my flute and metronome and just dig in…

But also, Finn’s talking about practicing the instrument, not Irish music per se. All that jazz and choro music built Finn’s practice ethos. So how does it affect his Irish music practice:

>> Finn: I’ve been playing Irish music for so long, my instincts have been around longer than my Brazilian musical instincts. 

[Music: “Dark Low Jig,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Finn: And from learning Brazilian music, it’s improved my chord theory and my chops so much that I try to play Irish music just better. Like more in tune, and with better tone. And I try to think about Irish music with the same detail as I did when I was learning Brazilian music. 

[ Music: “Horizons,” from Branches

Artist/Composer: Andrew Finn Magill]

>> Finn: I’m kind of a perfectionist. 

>> Shannon: Yeah. Those of us I think who try to channel that perfectionist tendency into something that is constructive and not harmful, we redefine that pursuit as the pursuit of excellence, within any given situation.

>> Finn: I’m gonna start using that instead. Thanks, Shannon. That’s more appropriate.

* * * *

[ Music: “Megan & Jarrod,” from Ports of Call

Artist/Composer: Alasdair Fraser & Natalie Haas ]

Like Finn, cello player Natalie Haas also started with the Suzuki method: 

> Natalie: I started with classical music. I did Suzuki for many years …got through all the Suzuki books, all 10 of them, did classical lessons every week. And then in the summer I’d do fiddle camp. So they were kind of very separate worlds in my mind. My sister, luckily, shared that with me. So we had that common bond. We could sit at home playing fiddle tunes together if we getting bored during the school year, just to keep ourselves motivated until the next fiddle camp came around.

>> Shannon: Nice.

OK, two separate worlds. That was Natalie’s view. There were the weekly Suzuki lessons, with the expectation that practicing would happen between lessons. And then there were fiddle tunes that Natalie and her sister Brittney just “played.”

But the classical Suzuki method and Celtic styles —well, they both involve learning by ear.

>> Natalie: Actually, that had a really big impact on my learning trad music after that, because it meant I had a well-developed ear, which was very useful. Once I started going to fiddle camps I had a little bit of a head start in terms of not being totally freaked out when there was no written music given to me.

[ Music: “Chimes,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Natalie: I had a very intense teacher while I was in high school, once I finished the Suzuki books. It was actually difficult, because she knew I was doing trad music and she didn’t approve. She was worried about what it was going to do to my technique. She probably could see how much I enjoyed it and I don’t know, was worried about losing me or something. So anyway, that didn’t end well.

>> Shannon: Hahaha

>> Natalie: But I ended up going to Juilliard anyway, because I felt like I wasn’t done yet. There were still a lot of the mainstays of the cello repertoire that I hadn’t covered yet, major concertos and the rest of the Bach suites, which are a really big part of the cello player’s canon. So I went to conservatory knowing I didn’t want to become an orchestral musician or follow that soloist path or any of that stuff. I was there to expand my knowledge of the cello repertoire and of the technique on the instrument. And just keep going with my musical training as far as possible.

>> Shannon: So… do you use that stuff in your trad playing?

[ Music: “Megan & Jarrod,” — second tune in the set, from Ports of Call

Artist/Composer: Alasdair Fraser & Natalie Haas ]

>> Natalie: (Laughs) Yeah, I hope so. Yeah, tone production, different speeds of vibrato, use of dynamics. Certainly, having the technical vocabulary of being able to produce different tone colors… and especially with Alasdair and I, with the duo, because it’s just the two of us, we’re really trying to produce a tone palette that’s as rich as possible with only two instruments. So using all of those extended techniques, to vary your sound as much as possible.

>> Shannon: Stuff that Natalie learned from the Suzuki method… stuff that she worked on with her non-trad-loving high school teacher, and at Juilliard. She uses all that when she performs with fiddle player Alasdair Fraser. But certainly there are trad moves Juilliard couldn’t give her?

>> Natalie: Well certainly the rhythmic aspect, that rhythmic drive, I got THAT at fiddle camp, not at Juilliard. Learning by the act of doing, and playing in sessions. I think a lot of it is just really sitting next to people that you want to copy. Or listening and trying to recreate that later on your own. 

>> Shannon: So you mentioned that word “listening.” Does that have a little bit of a different application in trad music than it does with classical music?

>> Natalie: Well, yeah. Certainly because the learning is done by ear. So, ALL MUSIC is about listening, right? But we lose sight of that with classical music often because you have that barrier of the written page in front of you. And if you’re trained as a classical musician that is like the Gospel—what’s written in front of you. So it’s really hard to get over that hump of just seeing this as a guide to what you’re trying to express. It still happens to me today if I’m playing for a dance or something, and I don’t know the tunes, I’ll get a book of tunes put in front of me. And my eyes just go directly to that page and zoom in on what’s written there, and it’s really hard to stop reading when it’s in front of you. So, the listening thing is… I think you have to listen in different ways for trad music learning the tune. And learning it by ear. It’s great because it goes into a different part of your brain so you can remember it and pull it out much later. It’ll be there somewhere, in the back of your mind. Whereas a piece I memorized for college 10 years ago, that’s completely gone. I’m lost without the written page there. 

[ Music:

“Rockabye by Firelight,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Shannon: Do you have any kind of practice routine?

>> Natalie: Yeah, it depends what the goal for that particular practice session is. It might just be maintenance, keeping up my nimbleness of my fingers. I might go back and play some etudes and some Bach, maybe learn a tune, maybe try to write a tune. And since I’ve taken on this teaching gig at Berklee, I’m also trying to keep up with my students, because a lot of them are interested in things which are not my specialty. So I feel like I need to get fluent in a little bit more of the jazz improvisational vocabulary. I took a few lessons recently—it’s really nice to go back and take lessons again as an adult—with this guy in Western Mass who invented a technique for the cello called flying pizz. So I will occasionally practice that.

[Music: 

“Mini Thanks,” from Flying Pizzicato

Artist/Composer: Stephen Katz ]

>> Natalie: And then there’s often times where I’ll be learning repertoire for a project and I’m just, again, working by ear, listening. A lot of it is listening, actually. I do a lot of listening before I even start to try and play anything on the instrument.

>> Shannon: Hmmm.

>> Natalie: So, listening. Maybe making some notes for myself. And then figuring out how I’m gonna fit into that. So I might start by singing a part and then figuring out how to make it work on the instrument after that… And I wouldn’t say I did that in classical music so much. 

>> Shannon: Listening, and having easy ways to listen and record music, and having access to so many resources online, and exploring new moves for traditional music with non-Celtic players like Stephen Katz here with his flying pizzicato, the opportunities for learning and applying that learning to traditional music today—they’re endless. Infinite. Overwhelming?

>> Natalie: Yeah. Lots of stuff to work on. It’s an unending journey.

>> Shannon: Nice.

* * * *

Next up, fiddle player Fergall Scahill and Martin Howley talk about how the modern approach to traditional music—and to practicing—is different from when they were kids. But first, a quick announcement from the Irish Music Stories production team. 

>> Nigel: It takes a lot of time and a lot of travelling to create this show. If you can chip in, just go to Irishmusicstories.org. Any amount helps. Thank you.

>> Shannon: OK, so I asked fiddle player Fergal Scahill what he thinks is up with Irish practicing today.

>> Fergal: A lot of generations before this, there weren’t lessons where you were brought every week and you were given your tune and you had to practice. If you were just picking it up from your uncle down the road or the next door neighbor, then there wasn’t that structure. You only had your practice time when you were in that other person’s presence. So maybe that’s why it’s changing. Cause I do see a lot of—a lot of the young kids that are coming up are absolutely astonishing, as you know. Astonishing players. And they have a real practice ethos. And I suppose it’s just the way it’s structured now, in comparison to the way it was when maybe when we were learning.

>> Shannon: Fergal and I spoke about practicing before giving a well-practiced show with his band We Banjo 3. I also spoke with Fergal’s bandmate Martin Howley, who plays mandolin, banjo, and guitar. 

>> Martin: When I was in my teens, when I’d hear something that I couldn’t do or couldn’t replicate, I would sit down for a long time and mechanically figure it out.

>> Fergal: There’s the idea that practice is repeating the same tiny phrase over and over until—it’s not until you get it right. It’s until you absolutely cannot get it wrong.

>> Shannon: Right. It’s really hardwired in there. 

>> Fergal: Yeah. 

>> Shannon: Hardwiring habits and skills. That’s practice, right? Martin thinks that these days, it’s going way beyond repetition and hardwiring:

>> Martin: I think there’s an awful lot more kids learning multiple disciplines of music at the same time, certainly in Ireland. Like when I was growing up, I never learned classical music, because it wasn’t really an open for me to learn classical music in our rural area of Ireland. But like all the kids that are, you know, a generation below Fergal and I, they’re all learning classical music alongside their Irish music. And some of that, like, practicing rudiments, and practicing scales, and practicing etudes, has definitely slipped into their Irish playing. So I would say that’s probably part of it, is the influence of other genres’ practice regimens. And as Irish musicians have got more technically advanced in the last two or three decades, you would see like a general standard of Irish musicianship has increased, in terms of its technicality—and its influence from outside stuff. I don’t know, I’d say there’s more people practicing dedicated technical aspects. 

>> Shannon: OK, so practice-rich other styles of music… and academic programs that now offer degrees in Irish traditional music… maybe these factors are reshaping Irish practice. 

But there can still be this reluctance to embrace formal “practicing” when it comes to jigs and reels:

>> Martin: I don’t know. I feel like in Irish music there’s maybe a little bit of stigma attached to it too. Because it’s an oral tradition. I don’t know why Irish musicians have that around practice. 

>> Fergal: Yeah. I’d say it’s probably because of the session culture. That if you’re lucky enough to be able to go out two or three nights a week and play for two or three hours. That is its own type of practice. 

* * * *

>> Shannon: Flute player Nicole Rabata up in Portland, Maine picked up on that trad worldview of practice when she lived in Cork and Ennis:

 

>> Nicole: It might be just the culture that’s surrounding it. It’s less academic for the most part. And passed down through generations, learned by ear. So much of learning Irish music, in a way, can be just very intuitive. And it sort of soaks into your ear, your soul, your body as you’re learning the music. Just from listening and absorbing.

>> Shannon: And it can be done away from the instrument?

>> Nicole: Yeah. I think just listening is such a huge part. And the idea of really sitting down and working through a practice regimen is not maybe necessarily part of the Irish culture. I mean, I definitely felt that when I lived there. That for the most part, it’s not necessarily something in that genre that people sit down and work through a practice schedule. But it’s more.. it might just be the, the culture of the music and the traditions surrounding it. Of, you know, sitting around with a Guinness around the fire and, you know, sharing tunes with your friends or your family doesn’t necessarily… Which I think right there and then that has just as much importance, and there’s as much to be respected about that approach as there is with the having more of a set out schedule of how to practice, you know?

>> Shannon: Right. Even if at the end of the day, in fact, a lot of work and woodshedding has gone into that sitting around the fireplace. 

Whether it’s tunes and a half set around the fireplace at home, or reels with impromptu old-style sean-nós dancing at the local pub, or practicing with bandmates you first met at sessions, Irish music is a social tradition. And the spontaneity and informality… well, that’s a big part of the PRACTICE of the Irish tradition:

>> Nicole: The definition of the word practice is to perform, to be involved in… to be a practitioner of something.

>> Fergal: Yeah, well you find in sessions—you go to a session in Galway and the same 50 tunes or a hundred tunes are being played week in, day in, day out. And that’s the practice, you know? And it was in that sort of scenario that I heard that saying which was, “learn the tunes that you know first.” So rather than going off and learning, you know, 30 or 50 or I have to learn this amount of tunes, to really dig in and learn the tunes that you know first.

>> Shannon: Learning fewer tunes more deeply—and then practicing at home vs the practice of playing with other people. Well, as a banjo and mandolin player, Martin Howley thinks these experiences can vary depending on the instrument you play:

 

>> Martin: The banjo and mandolin are quite musically inefficient as instruments in comparison to the violin … and playing with them, especially if you’re playing in a session, you’re not hearing an awful lot of what you’re playing yourself, because it’s projecting outwards. And so for me, like practicing in sessions, if the session got too big, if it was 10 people or more, I drew no real practice benefit from the session. Whereas if I played at home, I would like loosen up and be much lighter with my technique … It does vary instrument to instrument. Whereas if you’re like with a fiddle you’re hearing a lot of what you’re playing, no matter what situation you’re in. So I think that it is more efficient to practice in a session as a fiddle player than it is as a banjo player. So mileage may vary maybe, I guess. 

>> Shannon: Working on your fiddle (or banjo) playing can take many forms. Playing alone at home. Tucking into tunes at the corner pub, in between conversation and tasty beverages. Or working out shredding arrangements with your banjo-filled band, like Martin and Fergal do with their group.

>> Fergal: With us within the band when we’re practicing, it’s sort of a let’s play and see what happens. To come out of the head and come into the body—into the music. Rather than… if you’re trying to think about it too much, then you can get caught up in your thoughts. And especially if you try and talk about it too much, you get caught up in the words rather than letting the music do its thing, you know?

>> Shannon: Coming into your body and out of your critical headspace. This feels really important. But some degree of analytical work—of deconstructing your playing and focusing on small technical details, maybe recording yourself and listening back sometimes…not every day. Clearly, Martin and Fergal have both done a lot of this. You can hear it in their playing.

[ Music: “Bill Cheatum / Kitchen Girl / The Donegal Lass,” from Live in Galway

Artist: We Banjo 3 ]

>> Fergal: If there’s something that I hear that is a little bit trickier, then it does take practice. You have to sit down, take it apart. Listen to it. Either slow down the tune if you’re just learning by ear. And take it bar by bar, so that you can slowly, slowly get to where you need to be. Tempo-wise I suppose, because a lot of reels and jigs are about getting it up to tempo.

>> Shannon: So you’re talking about, you might shed on a tune that’s particularly tricky so that you can play it faster?

>> Fergal: It’s not even play it faster, but there are lots of versions of tunes that I have, which I will loosely call pub versions of the tune. So you hear them in the session. You get, you know, 70 to 80 percent of it by ear as it’s played four or five times. And you have the bones of it. And then that becomes your version of the tune. Even though it’s technically not the correct version of the tune. So that’s where if, if you then sit down with some lads and go, oh do you play this tune? And you actually have two completely different versions of it.

>> Shannon: So practicing might mean sorting out how you want to play that tune?

>> Fergal: I suppose there’s so many different places where you can find the notes of the tune. …even when you open TheSession, there are six or eight or 10 or 12 different versions of the tune on there. 

>> Shannon: The Session—i.e. TheSession.org—this is a website where many people might go when they’re trying to find a version of a tune.

And if you’re playing with a band… or especially if you’re participating in the competitive summer Fleadh, which is organized by the Irish teaching group Comhaltas, you really need to have a solid version of the tune. When Martin did this as a young competitor, it was (mostly) a positive process for him:

>> Martin: Yeah, competitions. That’s a double edged sword cause that’s where practice. Like I remember I just did competitions because other people were doing competitions… but it was a very positive thing in that it makes you practice one tune. And increases your technical repertoire for that tune. And it makes you think more deeply about the groove of the tune. And how you’re playing it, and the phrasing. And those things are things you don’t typically do if you’re just learning 30 tunes rapidly. 

>> Shannon: Right.

>> Martin: So it is a benefit in that way. But as you said, if, if a judge has a very particular style type and you’re playing to that style type, then you’re being untrue to your musical expression. Which is kind of going back to what Fergal was saying, you’re playing in your head. Which is probably a very bad thing ultimately.

>> Shannon: Back to the idea of playing in your head… of thinking too much, of being too self-conscious—probably not the best way to develop musical intuition or genuine expression. And then thinking too much about your own playing? Well, that just might be a sin.

>> Nicole: If somebody says to me, how’s your career going? I mean, I’m not going to say, you know what, it’s going great… what I would say is, you know, I keep busy enough.

>> Martin: Yeah. I would say that Irish people in general tend to be quite lacking in hubris. And quite humble as a, as a disposition. Maybe because of fear of retribution, because Irish people will pull each other up on that stuff pretty quickly. 

>> Fergal: And the Catholic Church.

>> Martin: And the Catholic Church. Yeah, shame is a big part, right? Yeah. 

>> Fergal: Pride, pride is a sin. And it’s bad to be proud of what you’re accomplishing. So you kind of hit the nail on the head there that it’s a bad thing to be thinking too much of yourself now. And to be getting to good at anything. “Aren’t you mighty that you were practicing for two hours! Your wan thinks she’s deadly!” Hahahaha

* * * * * * * 

[ Music:

“The Blackbird,” from Cover the Buckle

Artist: Seán Clohessy, Sean Mccomiskey, and Kieran Jordan ]

>> Shannon: It’s all fun and games until someone loses her humility. Pride. Shame. Guilt. This stuff can infect any deep PRACTICE… of any discipline… right? Boston-based dancer and choreographer Kieran Jordan remembers that setting in as a kid. More in the competitive dance world than the old style sean nos style.

>> Kieran: There was that sort of self inflicted guilt—and also parental guilt trip if you hadn’t practiced. And maybe a lot of us who learn music or dance as children, carry that with us, you know, into adulthood. Like that feeling of I should be, I should be practicing. 

>> Shannon: Yeah.

>> Kieran: I think there’s more of an expectation that you’re clocking in your hours with regularity, as a competitive dance student… It’s not quite the same as, you know, if you’re a sean-nós dancer, it is more social. And it’s where the skills develop. I think I’m kind of in the middle of all these things because I did grow up with the competitive expectation, and also the guilt.

>> Shannon: Yeah, that’s fun. (laughs) 

Kieran has been practicing competitive dances and more improvisatory sean-nós old style steps for a long time. And in a lot of rooms… and grocery stores.

>> Kieran: I started Irish dancing when I was five years old and there was an expectation that you would learn your steps in class and go home and practice them, and you know, the material builds from week to week. So you kind of had to have it together. And in the Irish dancing school culture, you’re always preparing for something, whether it’s a little performance or a competition (the Feis as we call it.)…Then as time goes on and you get more involved with it, like in my teen years, we were going to a feis every weekend. And competing at a pretty high level. So practicing was essential to get the material, to develop your style, polish your steps, especially work on rhythm and timing. 

I was not very disciplined about practice. But that’s not to say I wasn’t dancing. And I was always dancing. I was dancing in the kitchen, I was dancing in the grocery store with my mom. I do remember feeling like… having an awareness of good floors. You know, so sometimes if you’re in a clothing store and there’s a really good wood floor and your feet start to… Now that is not disciplined practice. But it is kind of constant engaging with the steps and the rhythms that are in your head. So it kind of keeps the material fresh. Do I sound like I’m making excuses?

>> Shannon: Well, this feels like a common refrain—for musicians, too, in Irish music, especially as kids. “Boy, I didn’t practice, but I was playing all the time.” So.. What is practice if it’s not just dancing and learning steps?

>> Kieran: Yeah, I mean, because when you’re just dancing and doing your steps several times throughout the day, that’s joyful. And I think we somehow associate practice with drudgery, discipline, and homework. Maybe as kids that it kind of equates to more homework. But I do think now as an adult and a teacher who encourages my students to practice, I think practice involves a little bit more clarity around the boundaries of what you’re doing. The time. Maybe the number of times per week. And some intentional focus on now I’m going to spend 20 minutes working on my jigs. And now I’m going to spend 20 minutes working on my hornpipes.

>>Shannon: So time management and goal setting?

>> Kieran: Well and sort of a little more organized approach rather than just having fun dancing through your stuff.

>> Shannon: Working on stuff that’s hard?

>> Kieran: Yeah, breaking it apart. Working on tricky sections. Maybe taking things slowly and gradually working your way up to tempo. A more organized approach to it. 

[ Music: “Pound the Floor,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Shannon: So do you have a practice routine?

>> Kieran: I do. A lot of it for me if, if I’m practicing, I always start really slowly. I really need to get into my body. So I lay on the floor and do some breathing. I take a good long time to warm up. So I go through a series of movements that are, you know, really kind of my own comfort zone, drawn from yoga, from different types of somatic movements, modern dance warmups, floor exercises, breathing exercises…

And then I kind of gradually moved from horizontal to vertical. And depending on what I’m practicing, put the shoes on and start to make sound and go through some basic… I mean, I’m still like, it’s like playing scales I guess.

>> Shannon: OK, I think that most Irish players don’t play scales and etudes and exercises. There are little drills in instrument-specific books like Grey Larson’s Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle. But these feel a little unusual. I could be wrong, but I don’t think it’s so common for traditional musicians to do a bunch of extra rhythm studies, outside of the tunes. Maybe this is because the tunes are already so pattern-based? Maybe it’s because social/folk music hasn’t always been approached analytically? I don’t know, I don’t think there’s a lot of warming up that happens before practicing or playing Irish music. Is this because traditional musicians and dancers can be less “touchy-feely”? I mean, Irish culture celebrates hospitality, generosity, humility. But terms like “inner process” and “connectedness” don’t always come up in Irish music sessions and festivals and kitchens. 

>> Kieran: I probably spend more time on the warming up and grounding and centering. I’ve been mocked for this many times among my fellow step dancers. 

>> Shannon: Hmmm

>> Kieran: But that’s important to me. If I don’t do that and I just put the shoes on and go right into steps or practice, it’s not as centered and grounded, and just doesn’t feel as complete an experience. And you know, my background is varied and includes different forms of dance where that type of more classical, gradual warm up is very valued. Also there is a risk of injury. If you are, if you are jumping and dancing hard right away on cold muscles and ligaments, there is a risk of injury. So I’ve learned that also the hard way over the years. So, you know, it’s important to me to be safe with the gradual easing into practice I guess. But it’s mental as well. It’s a way of, you know, calming and focusing the mind. So you’re really present for what you’re doing. That’s not to say that if I have a great step in mind, or I just learned a new step and I’ve got a tune that won’t quit in my head that I don’t, you know, come home and just jump into this nice living room wood floor and try some things like in a spontaneous way, like I would have as a child in the kitchen. I definitely still do that too, but I don’t consider that practicing. 

>> Shannon: Yeah. 

>> Kieran: That’s just kind of like …

>> Shannon: Play?

>> Kieran: Play. Yeah. Yeah.

[ Music: “G Meditation,” from Production Music Made for Irish Music Stories

Artist/Composer: Matt Heaton ]

>> Shannon: So really in a way, practicing by yourself vs. working on something with a bunch of people—one of them is practice, and one of ‘em is kinda like rehearsal?

>> Kieran: Yeah, that in my mind means like getting ready for a show. Maybe we’re even on the stage and the theater, we’re rehearsing. We have an all day rehearsal that means with all the dancers and the musicians. Yeah. 

>> Shannon: That doesn’t mean practicing your part and practicing your own skills. 

>> Kieran: Yes. 

>> Shannon: You did all that earlier. Ideally. 

>> Kieran: Yeah, I think so. Yeah. 

[ Music: “Galway Rambler, Mountain Road,” from Live in Germany

Artist: Matt & Shannon Heaton with Kieran Jordan ]

>> Shannon: Dancers can’t always dance with live music. I wondered about the process of practicing, when you’re preparing for live music situations:

>> Kieran: It’s almost like another set of skills to put it together with live music. It’s almost another thing you need to practice. Because live music is, is full of, you know, unpredictable variation. And the feel is completely different. It’s just not, it’s not a recording. It’s not the same every time.

>> Shannon: How do you practice for dancing with live musicians?

>> Kieran: I think it just involves listening to a lot of different music. Even listening to a lot of different recordings. Listening to a lot of live music. And understanding that unless you’ve rehearsed tightly with these musicians, this piece of dance and music, then you’re essentially the collaborative part of it, you’re winging it. That involves flexibility—it requires flexibility. And a little bit of lightness to know that it’s not the same every time.

I think that kids aren’t given that opportunity enough, to perform with live music or collaborate that way, and then it becomes a scary thing. The less you do it, the scarier it might become.

>> Shannon: Right. 

The more you practice something, the more you do it. And, probably, the less scary it becomes. The easier it can be. The more fun you can have.

When I was in Pearl River, NY with fiddle player Rose Flanagan and flute player Margie Mulvihill, they reminded me that I need to hound my kid about practicing piano. They said he’s not going to know if he likes it, until he gets good at it.

>> Rose: The more you practice, the better you get. The better you get, the more you practice, It’s true.

>> Margie: And the more you like it.

>> Rose: And the more you like it. When you get to a certain point of playing that you’re good, it becomes so much easier, more pleasant to listen to, and then you desire to go even further, you know?

>> Shannon: Maybe kids learning today approach traditional music and dance differently than people who learned less formally. Maybe more resources are leading to more structure?

Fiddle player and teacher Laurel Martin shared her rule of threes, and Kieran Jordan shared those ideas with HER dance students:

>> Kieran: I really enjoyed having this chat with Laurel Martin about her recommendation to her students, was to divide their practice time into thirds. So if you’re doing 30 minutes, you do 10 minutes, 10 minutes, and 10 minutes. So the first 10 minutes would be your scales and exercises. The next 10 minutes would be the new piece you’ve been taught, or the new tune that you’re working on for next week’s lesson. And the final 10 minutes would just be play time—just playing through tunes you know, or playing tunes you want, or playing happy birthday, or whatever. But it was interesting to think about thirds. Let’s say you’re doing just 30 minutes a week. That’s all you’re doing. You could do 10 minutes on Monday, 10 on Wednesday, and 10 on Friday. But that would have value, too. 

>> Shannon: Yeah.

>> Kieran: Just less time clocked in.

>> Shannon: And if you’re doing 3 minutes, it’s a very small amount of time on each!

Organizational systems aside, this PRACTICE of Irish traditional music and dance involves a lot of work. And any accomplished player has to learn tunes or steps….

… and listen to a LOT of music, to pick up that Irish feel and style

… and hone techniques and sounds 

… and tap into the rhythm of the Irish tradition (the musical groove of things… and the social and cultural flow).

Because without all that, it’s probably not Irish music, no matter how hard you practice it.

******

Irish Music Stories was written and produced by me, Shannon Heaton. Thank you to Matt Heaton for the production music and to Nigel, for acknowledging our sponsors. 

And thanks again to George McAvoy, Michael Craine, David Vaughan, Brian Benscoter, Joe Garrett, Gerry CORE, and Daniel and an anonymous donor for underwriting this month’s show. If you can kick in, there’s a donate button at IrishMusicStories.org. Every little bit helps. Thank you for listening, everybody!

[ Music: Song: “More than a Feeling,” from Boston

Artist/Composer: Boston ]

>> Shannon: Stephen Katz and his flying pizzicato! (laughs}