Category Archives: Teaching

Time

I subbed for another voice teacher this weekend, which can be tricky business when it involves girls ages 9-12.  The 5 girls were great, though.  They paid close attention, sang their hearts out and gave one another very thoughtful and positive feedback after singing solos.   Near the end of the hour, I received the best compliment a teacher could get.  “Wow,” Maddy said as she glanced at the clock, “this class is flying by.”

Then there’s NPR.  Where else would Alec Baldwin’s interview with Laura Linney be put on audio display?  I listened to the two actors talk as I drove home from teaching.  They started with a discussion about Linney’s current role in “Time Stands Still” on Broadway, and ended with her quoting a past stage director.  It seemed to contradict Maddy’s compliment.  “Okay, we don’t have a lot of time, so we have to work very slowly.”

Maybe a contradiction, but probably not.

A good friend just had collarbone surgery.  Ouch.  “Healing happens way faster in the movies,” he jokingly complained the other day.  Oh, cutting room floor, how you make a mess of our already slippery notions of time.

When we work slowly, which I imagine to mean very focused and intently, do we automatically edit out all the boredom, the ineffective stress of rushing, and the overwhelming jumble of thoughts that make time lag or pass without our noticing?  Is that what the stage director (I didn’t catch her name–Josie something) was getting at?  I might be starting to understand what the proverbial They mean when they say “live in the present.”

Pay attention, sing your heart out, allow your body to adjust, let time fly, and work slowly.  It’s my new mantra.