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The Confident Musicianing Podcast
How to get more out of your lessons with note-taking
I got so much more value out of my private music lessons with note-taking. Here are some ways to get started with it!
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I brain dump just absolutely everything stream of consciousness, all of my, all of the things into a notebook. Hello and welcome to the Confident Musicianing podcast. My name is Eleanor and I am a British-American oboist studying at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland literally my dream school and it took me a long way to get there. I applied and auditioned for 12 schools in three different countries. It was a lot of hard work but, oh my gosh, so worth it. I want you to have the confidence to work hard in achieving your goals. So come with me as we go on this journey together. So sit down, pull up a chair, take a seat or, if you're on the go, welcome to the Confident Musicianing Podcast. Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Confident Musicianing Podcast. Thank you so much for being here. I am so grateful that you are here and so lucky. I feel so lucky that you are here and that we can have this time to spend together, to chat and hang out and just you know it's good vibes.
Speaker 1:So today we are going to be talking about taking notes after your sessions, or taking notes about your sessions, your practice, well, your lessons. That's it, yeah, so let's get into it. So, basically, when I started working with the Associate Principal Oboist of the Pittsburgh Symphony, I did not take notes after my lesson. And I remember one lesson my teacher said to me. He was like why don't you like? You should like. This is definitely something that you should do. And I can see why. Because when I started taking notes, just the lessons became so much more valuable because I was able to retain more information and just have the lessons be worth more to me. And I have been doing this now for about three and a half years. I still take notes and it's so important to my lessons, it is like a part of them. So today I want to show you how I take notes, because I feel like when we say take notes for a lesson, you might well. I was definitely. I was like how do I do this? And you might be like that as well. So whether you take notes now and you love taking notes, and maybe you just want to see how someone else takes notes, or you're curious about taking notes, or you're like Ele, what are you talking about? Let's all let's you know, let's get into this and see.
Speaker 1:So I have a lot of notebooks. If you're listening to this I am currently holding, I don't know how many one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven notebooks, 11 notebooks all filled with notes. This is not the extent of my notebook Notebooks that I have. This is most of them, but not all of them. These notebooks are all notebooks that I have finished, I have filled, and they are full of notes from my lessons and they're just full of knowledge. And I literally I brought them with me from the States to the UK because I just moved recently to the UK to study at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. So all of these notebooks that I'm holding are notes that I took in the States, but I still brought them over in my suitcase because they are so, so, so valuable to me in my practice and in my learning. So I have them here and we're gonna talk about them and dive into it, and I'm so excited to do this with you, so let's get into it.
Speaker 1:So the first thing that I think is important to talk about is whether we are taking notes in the lesson versus after the lesson. I think this is really important because if we're in, say, a lecture, you would take notes during your lecture. That makes sense, but in a lesson, I feel like it's a wee bit different. I almost always take notes after, almost always, like, in fact, maybe 98% of the time I am taking notes after Well, 100% of the lessons I'm taking notes after, but 98% of the note-taking I do is after the session and the idea of it is when I am in the lesson. I am there, I am focused, I am listening to my teacher, I am doing what my teacher says, I am, you know, I play something my teacher says play it like this. I try it, I get you know, I understand it through there.
Speaker 1:And then when I go home, or maybe on my way home or in the library or whatever, I brain dump just absolutely everything, stream of consciousness, all of my, all of the things, into a notebook. And I think this is so so, so, so, so, so helpful to soak it in during your lesson and then just spew it. Well, that's kind of gross. Just put it out on a page and have that just brain dump into a notebook. And yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 1:And you might be thinking, eleanor, what if I don't remember everything? And I understand that. I understand that nervousness of not necessarily understand or remembering everything that you learned in your lesson. And what I say to that is you'll probably remember more than you realize, at least in my experience I think, oh my gosh, what am I going to remember? And then I get down to writing and it just flows. And the thing that really helps me remember things especially if I'm not, you know, if I struggle with, because sometimes I do struggle to remember the things and I'm like gosh, you know, what did they say, what didn't they say? And of course you don't get everything in the notebook, and that's fine as well.
Speaker 1:But something that I found really really, really helpful is to have the music with you and look at the music as you're writing it down. So not necessarily just have a notebook and like think about it, but actually take out the music that you were working on and look at the music as you're writing it down. So not necessarily just have a notebook and like think about it, but actually take out the music that you were working on and look at the notes and you know everything on the page. And that can sometimes help kind of jog your memory. And also it's helpful if you're talking about a specific phrase, you can say the measure, numbers, et cetera. So I highly recommend having your music out as you are taking notes.
Speaker 1:Another thing that's helpful is to take notes in the order that it was in the lesson. So let's say I work on I don't know an etude first and then I don't know, I've been working on the Schumann romances recently. So etude, maybe Ferling, etude, schumann romance, and I don't know something else, reed making my notes then in my notebook would have that as well Fairling, schumann readmaking, and that would be like that. And it helps me kind of remember everything if it's in the same order and that's just a me thing. If it's different for you, then that's fine too.
Speaker 1:The only time I did say 98% of the time, the only time that I take notes in class or not in class in the lesson is when we're talking about reed making and there are like numbers, numbers that I know I won't remember. So, for instance, you know if you're tying and this is very specific to oboes, but I'm sure that there's you know some equivalent for other instruments as well. But if you're say tying the, you know the thread of the reed at a specific, the read at a specific number. Or maybe you know something has to be this specific. You know thick on the micrometer or just basically numbers that I know that I might not remember. I wrote those down or diagrams. If I have to like draw a read and then, you know, write things on it, sometimes I'll do that in the lesson, but that isn't to disturb or disrupt the lesson. I'm not like making the teacher wait while I write right. I'm just kind of jotting things down as they're showing me so that I will remember those, because I know that numbers I don't always remember. If it's like tied to I don't know 47 millimeters or whatever, that I might not remember the first time I hear it. So that's important to remember as well.
Speaker 1:The second thing you might think, um, the second question you might have, and I had when I started doing this, is what do I write? My answer to that is everything, absolutely everything that you can remember. Just go for it. Now there's a lot of I mean, if you like listening to this, my what was it? 11 notebooks. There is a lot to write and there you know when you start writing it. Just it does go. But I think it's interesting because I feel like there are two different types of notes that I take. I take detailed notes and then I take broad notes and I'm going to pick a notebook out from the stack here this one is. I love these notebooks, so this one has writing on the outside of it because I ran out of paper in the notebook. So on the cover, if you know, there's, there's writing which is which is so like aesthetic of of taking notes. But if I go into this I feel like this notebook I used, maybe this time last year, I'm not sure but if I go into it I just pick a random page.
Speaker 1:It's so, so specific. So, for instance, we have measure three the grace notes are on the beat make the C louder than the E flat and the E flat softer than the C. Very specific Line two, measure two make this line focused. Don't accent the downbeats, the fast notes, move it. That's very, very detailed. Then you have other notes where you could say pay attention to the dynamics, don't change it unless it has to be changed. Or I recently had a lesson where we talked about different methods of practicing depending on how much time you have. That's not very detailed, but it is kind of a broader idea.
Speaker 1:So there's two different ways to take notes and I think it's important to do both. You'll have some times I do this, especially with Mozart where I take notes and it's like line you know, it's like measure one, measure two, measure three, and literally every measure has a thought. And then I'll have times where I do broad things where it's like, you know, line one create a stronger crescendo or something that is more broad than you know, this note has to be like this and this note has to be like this. So I think it's important to just jot down everything, right, absolutely everything that you can remember, and just do a lot of stuff. One thing that helps me as well is I put a simile which is Italian and if you might have seen it on music, it's a, and simile is like and similar.
Speaker 1:So if I have, say, a phrase or something that shows up a lot, I don't have to like write it over and over and over again. If I have, say, a phrase or something that shows up a lot, I don't have to like write it over and over and over again. So I'll say, you know, for instance, measures 50 to 51, a simile, it has to be like this, and that means measures 15 51 have to be like this, but so do other measures that have the same theme. Yeah, so that is that what to write everything. And you might be thinking well, eleanor, how long does this take if I am writing everything from, say, an hour lesson, or maybe longer or shorter, I don't know. And my answer to that is it just takes as long as it needs to take, and sometimes I am quite surprised by how long or how short it takes. Sometimes I finish a lesson I'm like I don't have that much to write and then it just flows and I'm like you know, before I know it, I've filled like two pages. Or sometimes I'm like, oh my gosh, there was so much goodness that happened in this lesson, but it was all broad things, so on a page it's not actually that many words. So it's very, it's very different and you kind of just find what works for you.
Speaker 1:Now the third thing is write things that work for you, which is just what I said in the second thing. So this is important as well. So, for instance, imagery for me is really helpful, making things be more like visual. For instance, if I say something like line three is, I don't know, floaty like a feather or something like that, maybe someone else might not understand what I mean by that. But as long as I understand what I mean by that, it can be fine. I say a lot yum-pum-pum, this is very yumpy, and what I mean by that is the notes are round. I say like molasses, if I want something to be really kind of thick and full of sound, things like that, things like that. That might not necessarily make sense to other people, but just write the things that work for you.
Speaker 1:And if your teacher says one thing, right. If your teacher says, do it like this, like a floating, like a feather and maybe floating like a feather doesn't work for you. Maybe you tried it, thinking about that and it doesn't work. But maybe if you think about it floating like a leaf, for instance, and your teachers like you, you think about floating like a leaf and your teachers like, oh yes, you know that that sounded good, then write in, think about floating like a leaf, and your teacher's like, oh yes, you know that that sounded good. Then write in your thing floating like a leaf, write what works for you, or you can write what your teacher says as well, but prioritize what works for you. It's really, it's really helpful to do that. Um, yeah, so it can it? Can you know, sound quite strange. Sometimes I've posted like, um you know strange. Sometimes I've posted, like um you know, pictures where I've had, like, my notebook in the picture, and sometimes I get responses like what are your notes? They make? They, they're weird, like they. They say random stuff, like floating like a feather, or yum pom pom or things like that. And yeah, it's just stuff that works for me. So do what works for you, because in the end then you know that's the most important thing.
Speaker 1:All right, let's do a recap, shall we? Um, the first thing is in the session, taking notes in the session versus after the session. I recommend 100% take the notes after the session, unless there are things like numbers that you know you won't remember and you can say can I just jot these numbers down? That's more for readmaking for me, but it might translate into other instruments as well. The second thing is what to write? Everything, write everything. This is really important. You have, you know, we talked about details versus bigger stuff. You know more broader stuff. Write both of them. Write everything that comes to your mind.
Speaker 1:I even, for a while, I wrote like motivational stuff as well, because I was going through like a phase where I had a lot of low self-esteem with my oboe playing, so I would write these phrases, like you know, I know it's hard, but you've got this, or you know, I'm proud of you for working through this, etc. And so when I went back to my notes in practicing, I saw them and saw those little little quotes and not quotes, but like motivational sentences that I had written and it just it me. It helped me a bit. So that's something important as well, if you want to do that. And then the last thing is write things that work for you, even if they don't necessarily make sense to other people. These are your notes. Your notes are personal to you. If you want to write yum-pum-pum or yumpy or like molasses or like a feather or whatever it is, write it, as long as it works for you. That is the most important thing. All right, that is about it for this episode.
Speaker 1:I hope that this episode was helpful for you and I hope that it inspires you to get a journal, to get a pen and to write some things or a notebook, you know, whatever it is, you can go as you know, as fancy schmancy or as not fancy schmancy. I remember I'm currently holding two notebooks. These notebooks say things like passionate about culture and history just add German. Because they are notebooks that I got for free in my middle school German class and I didn't write in them for years and then I found them and I just wrote oboe notes in them. Another one says feeling adventurous just add German. It has nothing to do with oboe, but and they're also like, really like they were free.
Speaker 1:I didn't spend much money on them at all, I spent no money on them, but they just, they work really like they were free. I didn't. I didn't spend much money on them at all, I spent no money on them. Um, but they just they work for notes and they were helpful. So you can go, you know, as fancy schmancy or as um chill as you, as you want, it doesn't matter. Whatever works for you, um, yeah, so I hope that this episode was helpful for you. Let me know if it was. I'd be so grateful. You can DM me on Instagram at eleanorobo. You can email me at eleanor, at confidentmusicianingcom. I'd love to hear from you. I hope that this episode was helpful.
Speaker 1:As always, all the things to do with this episode will be in the show notes, including the blog post that goes with this episode. If you want more from me, including the blog post that goes with this episode, if you want more from me, you can sign up for my email list. That is also something you can do. I send fun emails about music, cute, cozy, relaxing, chill emails, stuff about the podcast. I send out freebies, guides, all the things behind the scenes just fun stuff. So if that sounds like you, please do click the things behind the scenes just fun stuff. So if that sounds like you, please do click the link in the show notes to sign up and I will see you in the next episode. Alright, take care. Bye.
