That’s what a lot of people do; they practice in a room and they don’t get anywhere. It’s really about practice being life, and life being practice.

~Nicholas Barron

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Chicago singer-songwriter Nicholas Barron is another musician I interviewed for The Practice of Practice who told me, “I never practice.” What he meant was that he didn’t do conventional kinds of practice, the kind that’s done for classical and band music. You know: sitting in a room alone, playing scales, etudes, excerpts, and repertoire. Nicholas struggled for years with that kind of practice. He said that kind of practice “actually hurts my brain.” Nicholas has struggled with ADHD, and this has made it hard to focus in the practice room. Nicholas discovered that he could practice by performing. He took to the streets, playing in Boston, London, and eventually landing in Chicago where he played in the CTA stations on the south side nearly all day every day for four years. He says that’s he practiced. By performing.

In school music, we don’t perform enough. Three to four large performances a year (not counting marching band). That’s just not enough performance. Professionals perform that many times in a weekend. There’s something special about the demands of a performance, demands that push your skills and awareness to a higher level. We should all do more of it. Check out Nicholas Barron, singing Crazy below with Ameerah Tatum. (Side note: Nicholas is also a visual artist. The painting in the background was done by him. Check out his website.)

Want to learn more about getting better through performance like Nicholas Barron? In The Practice of Practice, Chapter 42: Performance Practice, covers the details about harnessing the power of performance to get better. To learn more about the book, check out a sample from The Practice of Practice.

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Interview: Nicholas Barron on Practice(mp3)

Nicholas Barron’s Music:

• buy CDs or mp3s
• FREE mp3 from  As I Am,  courtesy of Nicholas Barron: Devil Dog
• videos
• Link to story on the John Martyn tribute album, out this summer.

Mentioned in the Podcast:

• Elvis
• Otis Redding
• Ain’t No Sunshine
• Gunther Schuler
• 3rd Stream at New England Conservatory
• John Medeski
• Pat Metheney
• Keith Jarrett
• ii-V
• Berklee
• D add 9/ alternative tunings
• Robert Johnson
• Lightning Hopkins
• Son House
• Ray La Montaigne
• Wes Montgomery
• Sam Cooke
• Stevie Wonder
• Donny Hathaway
• Roberta Flack
• It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child. Pablo Picasso
• Wynton Marsalis
• Bessie Smith
• Louis Armstrong
• Albert Ayler
• Ornette Coleman
• Cannonball Adderly
• Charlie Parker
• Schubas
• George Benson
• BB King
• Albert King
• Freddie King
• Pat Harbison
• Mike Stern
• Bill Frisell
• Paul Motian
• Chris Siebold
• Howard Levy
• Leonard Cohen
• Grant Green
• Keith Jarrett
• Rickie Lee Jones
• Joni Mitchell
• Suzanne Vega
• Muddy Waters
• R. Kelly
• Tom Gullion
• J.J. Johnson
• Cedar Walton
• David Baker @ IU
• David Gray
• Robert Smith (The Cure)
• Beck
• Phil Collins
• Damien Rice
• Lisa Hannigan
• Beth Orton
• Cheryl Wilson
• Oh My God (band)

Here’s a video of Nicholas singing the song Angeline from the John Martyn tribute record: