Tuesday, January 31, 2023 by Bonnie Synhorst | Technology

From circa 2017 until January 31, 2022 my life was ‘enriched’ by a silly game I had on my iPhone called Wizards Unite.  I thought it was a wonderful excuse to get out and walk as it gave me rewards for my distance walked and encouraged me to walk further, visit certain neighborhood landmarks, and catch virtual adversaries and foundables.  

This is great, you may be thinking, as it encouraged me to get outside and meet fellow Wizards Unite players.  But in retrospect, it dictated my comings and goings.  If I had a chance to be staring at my screen in hopes of catching a rare dragon or adversary, I would certainly do that rather than do something productive that I should be doing.  

Here is a good point in my writing to remind any reader as well as myself that I’m an adult.  I know better.  I had work to do and life to live and yet I spent countless unproductive hours on this silly game.  To go a step further, I played this game with my family and my neighbor who went on nightly wizarding walks with me.  (One good thing to come from it is we still go on almost nightly walks sans silly game). 

Parents, please be mindful of your children’s device habits.  The addiction is real and troubling.  YOU are the adult.  These children are our future and giving in to their immediate wants of the games and trends are corroding and corrupting their minds.  

As a private music instructor, I witness the unfortunate side effects of device usage daily.  Children who should have ample amounts of time to practice, are instead frittering their time away on these devices and then stating that they had NO time.  

I could say more, but I’m going to leave it at this for today: If I, as an adult role model who works very hard and is reasonably intelligent (at least I think enough so that I can discern what activities are good for me and which ones should be skipped), was able to fall prey to the thrill of leveling up and collecting all of the items and rewards, how is a child who is still learning how to make the best decisions for themselves able to resist such things on their own?  Simple answer:  they aren’t.   

Friday, November 11, 2022 by Bonnie Synhorst | Practice Tips & Tricks

Casually chatting with a teen violinist about a month back, the comment was made that “I’ve plateaued on violin and want to branch out to other instruments”.  I understand the excitement of learning new instruments and the wonderful rush of success when things are easy, but I’ve been pondering this statement for roughly the month since it was made and soul searching whether I also use empty excuses to justify my lack of progress or inability to move forward and achieve higher levels of playing. During my thought process, I came down to the bare bones of the problem:  Excuses.

How do we use excuses to justify not doing what we know we should and how does it limit us?  This morning, a student told me “it’s hard”.  Yes, playing an instrument is extremely hard!  But when we use it as an excuse, we give ourselves a pass to quit working when we fail.  Taking this attitude, allows us to only get so far and not discover our true potential.  Which makes me wonder about elite athletes as well as professional musicians, or even top professionals in any field:  science, law, technology, etc. One thing I observe with all these amazing people is that they don’t give up when they run into hurdles.  For every amazing success, there are hundreds and thousands of failures.  The proof that it CAN be done is their success.  And it should be a testament to all of us that we also can achieve anything given that we put in the effort and the work.  We only fail when we stop trying.

Through the course of the pandemic, I was just so happy that students showed up for lessons and it seemed that they often didn’t have the motivation and pure will (in some cases) to push themselves to work and push themselves when things were hard, because life itself was hard.  So in turn, we accepted mediocrity and subpar work.  Now we need to reverse the trend or our future, which is in the hands of our upcoming generations, does not look promising. 

In the studio, I ask and encourage students to do more than they think they are able.  Failing happens often on the road to success so we MUST fail in order to improve.  If we are NOT failing, we are not trying to do hard enough things.  

Oftentimes, I question how this appears in my studio to the outside world when they hear less than polished pieces and/or wrong notes.  Then I realize that those instances may very well be representative of my own struggles with failure and need to continue to work harder to help these students to succeed and not give up as they have these experiences (that I myself had as a student).  

A few days ago, I heard the statement, “the master fails more than the student ever tries.” This brings me to conclude and sum up my thoughts in the following key points:

• Try hard things

• Don’t give up

• There are no valid excuses; merely rationalizations for why we did not do.

• Fail, reflect, learn, and fail again!

Monday, May 16, 2022 by Bonnie Synhorst | Uncategorized

One of the things that I really love to do as a musician is make music with others.  Not only is it fun and rewarding, it provides many opportunities to learn and grow as a musician.  

Music is a TEAM sport—don’t believe it?  When was the last time you went to a band or choir concert or played or sang in one?  With the exception of when individuals had solos, were you focused on one individual performer or the group as a whole?  

You may not have given a lot of thought to the subject, but in a group the parts are designed to fit together like pieces of a puzzle.  Every piece is important and they all come together as one to make a wonderful picture or performance!  But of course it’s a bit more complicated than that as, sometimes individuals must learn to step back and support the other players as the other parts take the lead as well as learn how to still blend with the other parts when their part does take the lead.

When working together, rhythms and notes must be in sync so students learn to look and think ahead to what is coming next.  After all, they wouldn’t want to not be playing the supporting part and let their partners down.  Therefore, students usually work harder to complete their pieces and play them more fluently.

Students learn valuable skills in listening as well as detailed counting. Students that are more accustomed to using their eyes to determine where they are in the music must engage their ears more to hear how the other parts fit with their part.  Students that are more accustomed to listening only have to engage their eyes more to see where their part does or doesn’t match the other person’s part.  They also have to problem solve when the brain doesn’t remember quick enough and look and listen to determine how to get back on track while the train is still moving.

Preparing for an ensemble recital is both invigorating and stressful, but the benefits gained outweigh all the challenges.

I’m both excited and nervous about our upcoming ensemble recital!  But I always tell the students that when we are doing things that are hard and a bit uncomfortable, we are learning and growing.  So let’s embrace it and keep pushing forward!