Let’s talk about my musical life before the pandemic.
I knew that I was coasting but I didn’t know how much.
What do I mean by coasting? I had anywhere from 8-10 students, which was really good for me.
I was in 1-2 symphony groups, depending on whether they needed a sub.
I was doing solo recitals, about one a year, which paid in donations.
I was doing something. It was more than just the 40 hour work week at my county job.
I was coasting. Things were easy. Overall I was doing well.
Then the pandemic hit.
Concerts and lessons canceled. Rehearsals postponed. Students stopped scheduling lessons altogether. One day was all it took for things to come crashing down.
And I crashed with it.
It’s been almost 2 years and I’m just now getting the want to get more involved. I’m just now getting up the motivation and want to practice. I have 2 students and I WANT to teach them.
For 2 years I mourned. I mourned the life I had. I grieved for the students I couldn’t teach, not being able to see my music friends, not being able to play with them, and most of all - for not wanting to play. I didn’t want to even look at my instruments, and for a long while I didn’t.
I looked at those cases wanting to want to play. Pleading with myself. “Just pick it up, just play it. You’ll feel better when you do. Just do it.” I couldn’t make myself open that case. For months my clarinets laid in their case. Neglected and lonely.
They wanted someone to play them and I wanted to want to play. I just, couldn’t.
Now if you read that and thought “wow that sounds like depression” you’d be right. Ding ding ding! It was at the beginning of the pandemic that I realized that it was probably some of the lowest I’d ever felt. I’ve been depressed before, but music could soothe my soul and quiet the mind. But now, it was a part of it. Music was a part of the depression that enveloped me. I wanted to play, I knew it would help, but I just couldn’t pick up the horn.
About 6 months after the start of the pandemic the rehearsals slowly started back up again, but only for strings. I felt like a leper. I felt dirty. I felt unwanted. As a wind player you constantly blow your germs around everywhere. I get it, no one wants to risk it. It doesn’t change how it felt though. The one thing that I really needed I couldn’t get. All I wanted to do was play and being told “no winds allowed” just plowed me down further into my hole.
I didn’t spend these last 2 years not playing my instrument at all. I don’t think I was that bad.
Here are the music things I tried to do:
-I tried once to post YouTube videos with lessons for my students in lockdown. I posted 1 video and a string of smaller excerpt videos before I lost motivation and energy.
-I tried to learn a new clarinet solo, but since I wasn’t able to mentally bring myself to practice that didn’t happen either.
-I tried to learn a part of a duet so that one of my friends could put it together and post it. I got about ¾ of the way through learning it before I developed tennis elbow and couldn’t even hold my clarinet steady without pain. Thus losing all motivation and energy.
-I tried teaching through zoom. I really did try. I am bad at it. I am definitely better as an in person teacher. I need to see up close what’s happening. Virtual teaching just doesn’t cut it for me.
Once rehearsals could include winds I jumped at the chance. I got to play Peter and the Wolf with the Salem Philharmonia as my first concert back. It wasn’t too shabby, definitely not perfect. I’d been dormant too long. Those rehearsals were brutal to my self-esteem. I berated myself. every time I missed a note or came in wrong or just in general sounded not perfect I beat myself down for not being up to par. I felt like everyone could see and hear how bad I sounded. I look back on that now and it makes me sad. I couldn’t even fully enjoy myself because I was so stuck in my own head.
The pandemic really messed me up. I lost touch with my music friends. I lost touch with the people I made music with. I lost myself a little. Sometimes I wonder if that part of me will ever come back. The part of me that felt confident in my skills as a teacher and performer. I really don’t know. Maybe it’ll come back but in a different way. As we age we grow, and sometimes in ways we don’t expect. Maybe this is a growing pain to a new part of myself.
Now that I have students, now that I have rehearsals, now that people want to play with me, I feel better. Am I perfect? Heck no. There are days when I don’t want to play, where I can’t pick up my clarinet but those days are getting to be less and less.
I’m ready to put those days behind me for good.
I want to practice again and I’m currently working with a composer friend of mine, Christopher Wicks, to create a recital featuring all of his clarinet and piano sonatas. It’ll be a lot of work but I’m up for the challenge. I love playing new music and especially collaborating with composers. We’re still in a pandemic so it’ll be a little while before the performance can even be scheduled.
So why am I telling you all this?
As musicians we are naturally competitive, and don’t want people to see weakness in us and how we play. Weaknesses can be exploited in competitive spaces. But competitiveness breeds isolation. In order to not show weakness we isolate. Isolation is what makes these thoughts and feelings thrive. It feeds on loneliness and tells us all the ways that we aren’t good enough and how we shouldn’t even try.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. I think if more people opened up about their struggles as a musician, specifically classical musicians, we could create a safe space for each other. I say classical musicians because rock/pop musicians are more likely to be able to channel their feelings into their song lyrics and in general are more open about their struggles with mental health.
If you’ve struggled during this pandemic or in general know that you aren’t alone. There are others out there who feel or have felt the same way. Tell your story and break free of the natural tendency to isolate. There are people who want to hear it. There are people who need to hear it.
Now I shall go practice, because I actually want to. It feels so good to want to practice again.
~Sara
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