Re: Competition Amplification

Russet McMillan (mcmillan@astro.psu.edu)
Tue, 6 Aug 96 18:59:38 EDT

Your workshop suggestion might be a good idea, but I would add
in a practice suggestion as well. I have given this advice to my
students, and they were all flabbergasted that an authority figure
would suggest it, but here's what I do: practice while watching TV.
Especially during commercials. Don't turn the sound off. Keep more
than half an eye on the TV while you're playing (after all, you
wouldn't want to miss the end of the commercials, would you?). It's
an excellent practice for learning to play with distractions. I
hardly even notice pipers, or patterned carpets, or microphones, after
a little practice playing with the TV on and the dog begging me to pet
him and throw his toys for him.

As far as re-using pieces between competitions, I don't know
what the rules are. I prefer to avoid the practice myself, but I've
done it a few times when I had significantly improved on a piece and
wanted to be re-judged, or when one I had used before was simply the
best choice for the set I was putting together. Last year, Carol Rose
Duane won the amateur division in the Nationals and then kindly
competed in the professional division the following day, since there
was a severe dearth of interested bodies. She used the same three
tunes plus one extra -- but competitions separated by less than one
day could be considered a special case, I think.
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