July 30th, 2010 — General info
With “Performing in The Zone” growing in popularity as a book to help overcome stage fright, I’ve been receiving private performance coaching requests from performers in many parts of the world.
Thanks to skype video chat, I’m now able to give 1-on-1 performance coaching to anyone, anywhere in the world! 
Here is the information from the Private Coaching page of thezonebook.com
What you get:
1-on-1 Personal Performance Coaching online via Skype, or in person where available.
What is the aim of Personal Performance Coaching?
Personal Performance Coaching is different for everyone. However as a general goal, Personal Performance Coaching aims to help you to feel more calm, confident, and in control in your performing situations.
Your individual aim for Personal Performance Coaching is discussed early in the first session, so that a clear path of achievement can be mapped out for you.
How many Personal Performance Coaching sessions do you need?
This varies greatly from person to person, and performing situation to performing situation. Two or three sessions may be enough for one person in one particular performance arena, whereas another person may require five or more. This is very individual.
It’s more than just another chat session!
Personal Performance Coaching is not about you going on skype for an hour and then suddenly you are a master performer. Personal Performance Coaching is about having your current situation assessed, goals defined, a path made to help you achieve those goals, tools to help you get there, and support to lead you through the process.
A very important point to note here: You will get given the tools, but it’s up to you to use them.
Depending upon your requirements, you will be given mini assignments to carry out between consultations. These may be short and simple, or more involved, depending upon who you are, and what your current situation is.
Is it confidential?
Yes. Your Personal Performance Coaching sessions will be treated with the strictest confidence. If you decide to give a review of your Personal Performance Coaching, you can choose to use an alias, or your real name – this is completely up to you.
And finally…
The more you advance, the more you’ll discover that Personal Performance Coaching is not only about getting better results in performing situations – it’s all about you – it’s about learning how to develop yourself into a natural and confident performer in all areas of your life.
Rates:
1st session: US$90 (usually lasts between 1 – 2 hours)
Subsequent sessions: US$75/hour
Payment must be made via PayPal prior to each live personal coaching session.
What now?
Here are the simple steps to follow to receive Personal Performance Coaching.
1) Fill out the Private Coaching form by clicking here. The purpose of this form is to provide me with some background information about you.
2) After you have sumbitted your form, I will contact you via email and suggest possible times for your first coaching session.
3) Once we have booked in a time, you will be sent a PayPal invoice for your upcoming coaching session. Please note that payment must be received before your Personal Performance Coaching session begins.
4) We find each other on Skype (my alias is thezonebook), and then we begin your first session.
Have a question?
Feel free to send an email to
Alternatively, you can ask your question directly through the chat feature above, in the column on the right.
April 7th, 2010 — Inspiration, Interesting sites
March 31st, 2010 — REVIEW
http://jimfordmusic.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/book-performing-in-the-zone-by-jon-gorrie/
Performing in The Zone
This is an awesome book that really helps with performance anxiety and a host of other issues that hold me back from performing at my full potential. I wish I had this book, when I had my “big” audition for bass player in the National Symphony in Washington, DC back in the late 70s. At that time I was studying (post-college) with Steve Brewster the Principal Bassist at that time. By the way Steve was an incredible human being and musician and will be the subject of a future article. I had prepared well for this audition and had mastered the list of orchestra bass parts indicated. I also had prepared a solo piece that I could play beautifully at my lessons. Steve proclaimed that I was well prepared for the audition and wished me well at my lesson prior to the audition.
I got to the audition with my bass and music. I was escorted to the waiting rooms below the stage. I encountered a large number of bassists all working away and practicing their parts and sounding very proficient and capable of passing the audition. Some had the parts all memorized and could wiz through them at fast tempos. I was completely blown away by this and started feeling woefully inadequate. I got quite nervous and began feeling high anxiety about my own audition when the time was to come. I was completely intimidated at this point.
Finally, I was called to go up on stage. I took my bass up a set or two of stairs fairly petrified. When I got on the stage, as expected, there was a screen between myself and the audience where I knew that members of the bass section and other symphony people, including possibly Rostropovich himself. Although later I found out that he only comes to the finals.
On stage with me was a member of the orchestra, who directed me to play each of several orchestra parts including Mozart 40th, Beethoven’s 5th, Prokofiev 9th. I was able to play and get through them, but I was so nervous that I am sure that I was rushing the tempos, smearing though some of the 16th note runs to say the least. When I was done, I went back down the stairs feeling about as badly as I have every felt. The auditions were in rounds of 10 bass players where at the end of the round, they indicated who in the group made it to the finals. It was some small comfort that no one in our group of 10 was selected for the finals. It didn’t really make me much feel better. I left the hall feeling a huge disappointment in how I had completely blown the audition by being so ultra-nervous that I couldn’t play up to the level I was prepared for. Even at my best, I might not have been selected, but I was decimated by my poorer than normal performance. This was so far away from “Performing in the Zone”.
A few weeks later, I had an audition to be the paid principal bass player for a local symphony, and I was much improved at that audition and even got the gig. For years afterward, I passed many auditions for groups, and had a wonderful experience playing. However, to this day I am still uncomfortable with auditions. The techniques in Jon’s book, Performing in the Zone have already helped me and have motivated my to use this technique in my work environment when preparing for meetings. in addition to performing music. Thanks, Jon.
You can find and buy the book here, I highly recommend it.
March 24th, 2010 — REVIEW
Performing in the Zone by Jon Gorrie sets out to define the obstacles to mastery of optimal musical performances with reference to managing performance nerves. This is a how-to book, which offers a number of solutions such as mantras and rituals, visualization, yoga, mock performances and physical exercise designed to aid the performer in managing “arousal anxiety” and understanding how it is used to attain self insight and control.
Gorrie has been a classically-trained trumpet player and a music educator for the past 15 years. Performance nerves and their management are of great interest to him particularly because they are, at one time or another, the nemesis of performers of all kinds. His priority is to aid performers to enhance their self-awareness through learning tools and anxiety concepts.
Gorrie writes with passion and conviction about the research that has consumed him for his entire career. The book is faultlessly organized and approachable. His sense of humor pervades throughout. It is clear that he has written from personal experience and with thoughtful insights.
– Louise Lepley, American Music Teacher Magazine
March 17th, 2010 — Inspiration, Interesting sites
I found out about a new resource recently – www.medici.tv
This website broadcasts streaming video on demand of classical music concerts, with great sound and close up footage of the performers!
What an amazing resource!
Anyone, anywhere in the world (providing they have a computer and high-speed internet) can enjoy these *free* performances!
It doesn’t get much better than this!
Check it out!!!
www.medici.tv
March 11th, 2010 — Inspiration
January 19th, 2010 — REVIEW
From the November 2009 issue of The Strad magazine:
I’m not a big fan of self-help books – although does anybody ever admit to being a fan of them? – but the more I read of this one, the more I liked it. It’s aimed not just at musicians, but also actors, public speakers and sports people, to name but a few, and is trying to help you to get into the ‘Zone’ – a place where optimal performance is possible.
Inevitably, browsing the contents page would be enough to put off the fainthearted: references to ‘laughing yoga’ and ‘visualisations’ made my heart sink a little, and it was impossible not to give in to a smutty snigger at the constant references to ‘performance arousal’.
But suspend your disbelief for a while and press on – it’s worth it. The book is written by New Zealand-born trumpeter and fellow at London’s Trinity College Jon Gorrie, and cherry-picks from different schools of thought as diverse as neurolinguistic programming and sports psychology to compile a raft of different techniques for performers to try in order to get into a positive frame of mind, in a way that is sure to have an impact not just on performing but on life generally.
It opens with a chapter on the theory behind the techniques, but suggests that if you’re not too bothered about the research you could dive straight into the second chapter, which focuses on the techniques themselves.
Gorrie explains that ‘performance arousal’ is a phenomenon that can have positive effects by improving our level of performance or combatting negative effects that can prevent us from performing to our full potential. The book offers practical exercises to learn how to control these effects. There’s a lot of repetition in the theory chapter, but the techniques portion has some very useful suggestions, for example on breaking the cycle of anxiety about performing; the importance of feigning confidence in speech and body language; ways of practising performance; and meditation to help you into a relaxed frame of mind.
Then there’s the twelve-week programme, which is a bit like a be-yourown-life-coach method. It builds from initially spending 30 to 60 minutes a day making sure your diet is right and working 30 minutes of moving and stretching into your daily routine, to week twelve, in which you should be spending two to three hours a day on exercises that include doing qigong or t’ai chi and ‘free writing’ to help free you from emotional barriers. This might sound tough to fit into your day, but Gorrie emphasises the importance of intelligent time management: locking the TV in the loft is one of his suggestions. Tough talk! But the techniques section in particular is great to dip into and covers so many different approaches that you’re bound to find a few that work for you. There’s also a reference section at the back listing a bibliography and online resources to follow up. If you ignore the occasional bit of psychobabble then this highly readable book could be of real value.
– Catherine Nelson, The Strad Magazine, Nov. 2009
January 14th, 2010 — REVIEW
From Vocals Magazine:
Has the mathematics and sciences taken center stage in your fundamental learning? Wondered if your anxieties ever affected your ability to perform in front of a crowd, or even one person? When performing, do you feel something is just not quite right? Does it rack your nerves wondering if you were a any good at all in your delivery?
Then get your copy of Jon Gorrie’s book, Performing in the Zone. This Performance ‘Wake-up call” can unlock your anxieties, grease the skids, and help you land the performance consistently. But really, what is the zone? How do I know if I’ve really entered the zone? Have I really mastered and have full control of when I want, more importantly, when I need to get and stay in the zone?
Jon’s extensive background in international study of music, theatrics, and performance, takes the guesswork out and delivers what every performer should have in their toolbox. This is a book that explains the physiological, psychological, and mathematical understanding of a ‘nailed’ performance.
Get your copy now, learn the techniques that have driven the success of performers around the world. From tinkering karaokes to 10,000 seat audiences, this book will answer all the ‘What If’s?’
Inside this book is a 12 week Performance Success Program. Success strategies are laid out in a chaptered ladder to your success. Overcome your fears, diminish your self-criticism, and accentuate your bravado in this pearl of the seven seas. Are you ready to get your dreams underway and live the life you know you have within you? Then what are you waiting for? The written invitation?
Well, you’re reading it here. Find it on amazon.com
– Vocals Magazine December 2009
November 24th, 2009 — Inspiration
November 24th, 2009 — General info
As a student of an orchestral instrument, one of the cornerstones of your performing world should be positive role models – individual musicians, ensembles, as well as people outside of your performing sphere – for instance, how would you like to be able to perform in an audition with the same in-The-Zone calm, confidence, and control as Barack Obama?
Often, especialy from younger students, I hear and read that so and so is the *best* trumpet player in the world, such and such is the *best* orchestra – as if a musician and group of musicians could be rated on a scale from 1 to 10.
I believe that this is an unfortunate miscalibration by many younger students, stemming perhaps from a competition-driven dog-eat-dog society or educational institution.
As I mentioned, positive role models are important, but the younger student needs to understand that music and musical performance is subjective, and that there is an immense difference between a person being the ‘best’ at something, and a person’s intepretation ‘appealing’ the most.
I’ll try to give a concrete example. On July the 6th, 1912, Don Lippincott was the fastest man on the planet, running 100 metres in 10.6 seconds. This is not subject to interpretation, rather, it is a concrete fact. On August the 16th, 2009, Usain Bolt was the fastest man on the planet, with his time for the 100 metres recorded at 9.58 seconds. The medium for determining who was the best, or fastest, is fixed – that is, time.
Using trumpet players as an example, there is no medium or method for categotically proving that one trumpet player is the ‘best in the world’. Even if official high/low note, loud/soft, or speed-playing competitions were to exist, these elements in themselves have nothing to do with music – and a trumpet player is first and foremost a musician. Yes, musical competitions do of course exist, and all things being equal, an excellent performer will come away with the 1st prize. However, at the highest levels, it is often a case of subjectivity which determines a ‘winner’ from a ‘runner-up’. In other words, perhaps a different judging panel would have chosen a different ‘winning competitor’.
So, philosophical discussion aside, the message to young musicians is this:
Listen. Listen to many performers – performers of your instrument, performers of other instruments. Listen to many orchestras. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Philharmonic, NY Phil etc etc – not one of these orchestras is the ‘best’ – but they are all excelent and all worth listening to. You may have your favourite – and that’s ok – but please avoid the trap of saying ‘such and such’ or ‘so and so’ is “the best”.
Now, with that in mind, my next post is of the Berlin Philharmonic performing a few minutes from Strauss’ Alpine Symphony. For a R.Strauss style and sound I prefer the Berlin Phil, but that’s just me
