Lifestyle » Harpist Angelina

Music and Motherhood – life as a professional musician with a baby

15 August 2024 No Comments

Having a baby has changed everything in my life massively, and my life as a musician is no exception to that.

Life before Sophie and life after Sophie are two very different places. Today’s blog post is going to explore how I’m navigating my music career alongside giving my baby the very best care and attention that I can give.

a photo of wedding harpist Angelina holding baby

She was born two weeks late, at the end of February. I had cancelled all work of any kind for all of February and March. I knew that I would need time and space not only to learn how to take care of a newborn, but also to begin healing physically from birth. If I’d have known she’d be so late, I would have taken more time off everything. The start of April felt really soon to be teaching again. As is often the case, hindsight is 20/20 and this is the first lesson I’ve learned. Give yourself more time than you think you’ll need.

Now she’s almost six months old, I look back on the newborn phase and see how wonderfully simple it was compared to what it’s like now. Snuggle, feed, change nappy, repeat. What a gorgeous bubble. Now I’m starting to deal with her refusing to sleep on her own, experimenting with solid food, and needing much more in the way of stimulation, toys and play. It feels like a much more ‘full on’ phase. But everything is a phase with babies. This is the second lesson: Nothing lasts forever. Some chapters feel harder than others. When she’s one I’m sure I’ll look back on this time and marvel at how wonderfully simple it was, she’s not even crawling yet. Food is just for fun and there’s still plenty of snuggles to be had.

It’s tempting as a mum to try to keep quiet about our struggles, for fear of the dreaded ‘just you wait’ comments: ‘You think it’s hard now?? Just you wait until x, y and x’. Maybe each chapter is hard in a different way, the struggle of one phase doesn’t negate the difficulty of another. Sure, the newborn phase seemed simple, but I also had a house to take care of while recovering from a Caesarean. I was exhausted and in pain. The house was a mess and laundry needed doing. We never slept for more than three hours in one stretch. It felt really hard at the time.

So where does music fit into all this?

Good question. I’m still trying to work it out myself. I’ve had to really boil down what I need to do and be very strategic in making sure the essentials get done. My practice – when I get the opportunity to sit and practice – is so laser-focussed, because it has to be. What gigs do I have coming up? What music do I need to prepare? Which sections of the music aren’t quite fluent yet? What is most urgent?

I can no longer book in gigs or students without checking that someone can look after Sophie. That has taken some getting used to. I’ve been a free agent for so long and now I have to be much more careful with my diary.

Admin tasks such as replying to emails, sorting invoices and contracts, working on my website are now relegated to the corners of the day. Straight after teaching, while Sophie might be out on a walk with Nana, or while Sophie naps in her cot (praise the sleep gods, she sometimes sleeps on her own!)

I just keep coming back to the thought that this is an important chapter. A phase of life in which the main focus is my baby. Yes, I’m trying to squeeze my musical life in as well, but as long as I can keep everything ticking over for now, I may have more free time in future chapters.

The moment she turns six months old, Tim is going to get a running buggy for her. That will mean a significant amount more time will be available when I can be alone at home, practising without distraction. I’ve been listening to Cal Newport’s podcast Deep Questions and reminding myself how important it is to do our work without distractions – which is pretty much impossible with a baby. When she’s one she’ll be going to nursery for two days a week. The thought of it kind of breaks my heart but it’ll be so good for her to socialise and it will be a chance for Tim and I to catch up on everything else we have to do.

If you’re reading this and you are a parent, please leave a comment and tell me how you coped during the first year of your baby’s life, I’d be so interested to hear your experiences.

I may write some more blog posts like this, if you’d like to subscribe and get future posts delivered to your inbox, just pop your email address in the box where it says ‘Subscribe’ towards the top right of your screen.

Click the link to read more about my work as a Wedding Harpist in York

Lifestyle

Soul Trader Podcast

11 June 2019 No Comments

Hello, I’ve been working on an exciting new project for a few weeks now so I thought it was definitely time to share it with you. I have created a podcast called Soul Trader.

What is Soul Trader about?

I want to share ideas of ways to be at our most productive when working for ourselves.

This will be from a holistic, health-driven perspective. I’m not interested in hustling 24/7. Sorry. I’m interested in living a balanced, healthy and sustainable life for as long as possible.

Recent episodes of Soul Trader take a dive into the world of Human Design – I’ve discovered that I am a Splenic Projector 1/3. In previous episodes I’ve also looked at handling finances, scheduling our time as freelancers, the importance of resting enough, and the pitfalls of too much screen time.

So much media that we see on a daily basis glorifies the ‘hustle’, grinding 24/7 until we finally make it. We’re aiming for 5-figure months or whatever lofty goals we set ourselves, ‘inspired’ by social media. We can aim for these goals, but at what expense? Personally, my mental and physical health is my top priority, and I will not prioritise work over sleep or any other form of self-care. We work to live – not the other way around.

So if Soul Trader podcast sounds like it might be your cup of tea, I’ll see you over there. You can find it wherever you normally get your podcasts. It has been something of a passion-project of mine, so I hope it brings value to you.

If this sounds like something you might be interested in, please check out Soul Trader – the holistic approach to freelancing.

There is also a Soul Trader Instagram page, although I’m experimenting with taking breaks from social media here and there. Maybe a future episode will go more in-depth on our relationship with social media. Leave me a comment below if this would be of interest to you.

Career, Lifestyle

How To Be Productive At Home

8 April 2019 No Comments

It’s the start of a new week. Are you organised and ready for the next seven days? In this post I’m going to share what I do to give myself the best possible start to the week. Here are five tips for how to be productive at home.

how to be productive at home — Photo by Marcin Skalij on Unsplash

Tip #1 – Track Your Time

For me, a good week begins on Sunday evening. I learned a technique called Calendar Blocking from YouTuber Amy Landino, and I find it really helps me track my time. It also ensures that I am making time for the important things. I literally schedule everything. Mealtimes, exercise classes/gym workouts, harp practice, admin (emails, working on my website etc.), as well as chill time in the evening and what time I start getting ready for bed. Obviously appointments, students and gigs are all on there to begin with. For me, a to-do list is pretty much useless unless I actually put those things on my calendar and plan a time for them.

When you see all the hours of the day laid out in front of you, you quickly realise you probably do have time to get most things done. The trick is to do just one thing at a time, we get more done overall. Trust me.

Personally, I use my google calendar, because that way it’s easy to change things around. It automatically syncs with Apple ical that I use on my laptop, phone and iPad. You may prefer a paper schedule (reminder: it’s 2022) but do whatever works for you.

Tip #2 – Get Up Early, ready for a productive day at home

My aim is to get up at 7:30am every weekday. I have tried many, many ways of doing this (I love my sleep) but currently what seems to be working is to have my Lumie light up ready for 7am, and to have my phone alarm go off at 7:30am. Rest is just so important and I do prioritise sleep. I will admit to often – ok every day – having a cup of tea in bed before getting up and on with the day. We all need to find little pockets of our schedules for little treats and things we enjoy, otherwise – what’s the point?

The important thing is, I’m waking up at the same time each day. I’m allowing my body to get into the rhythm of this schedule because I know that mornings are my most productive time.

Tip #3 – Organise your tasks with intention

My mornings are 100% more productive than my afternoons, they just are.

So for me, I know I need to maximise this time and use it for the more mentally taxing tasks. I’m writing this very blog at 9:30am. Examples of good morning tasks would be:

Practising your instrument
Creating Content
Exercising
Making future plans and taking steps towards them

Not-so-good morning tasks would be:

Checking emails
Housework, which doesn’t require much mental energy and can be done later
Contracts, Invoices and other admin
Taking calls
Checking bank balances (~~too depressing~~ potentially anxiety-inducing)

I know sometimes we can’t have the perfect day and sometimes we need to reply to emails first thing. But in an ideal scenario, anything where your time is going to be governed by someone else should take place after you’ve spent the morning on your own thing. What’s the point of learning how to be productive at home when we don’t use that productivity to work towards our most important goals?

**Tip #4 – Decide when to stop for the day, and actually stop.**

When you often work from home, as I do, your work is never ‘done’, there’s always more you can do. But for our own mental health it’s important to have some down time. Schedule it in and you’ll feel fabulous when you reach ‘Chill Time’ and you know you’ve worked hard and have earned a rest.

I have tried scheduling every single day, seven days a week, and at the moment that is simply not sustainable for me. It’s easy to end up falling off the wagon completely and binging on Making a Murderer at 2pm during the week. Learning how to be productive at home means you have sustainable habits that you can do all the time. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

Calendar Blocking Monday-Friday is a good compromise for me and means that I can really relax at the weekend (often just in time for that week’s gig!) but you know what I mean, I’m not on the hamster wheel of practice and admin like I am on weekdays.

Another point on this, when it is chill time, for heaven’s sake don’t start checking emails on your phone. That’s not true down time and you won’t feel refreshed and ready to jump back in the next time your calendar says ‘admin’. Occupy yourself with something completely different. Cooking, reading, netflix, whatever, just try not to have your phone alerting you for work stuff.

Tip #5 – limit social media to be truly productive at home

This is a huge secret when it comes down to how to be productive at home. Quitting social media will probably have an article all of its own at some point. Take those social media apps off your phone and stand back in amazement at how much more you get done.

I am currently doing this and it honestly makes me not want to go back to Facebook or Instagram (I already deleted TikTok and Twitter). Bear in mind that I am saying this as a musician, and people love to tell us how important social media is to ‘get our names out there’ – out where, exactly?

I’d rather not be on there, have the time to practice, make sure my website is boom ting and get work that way. Not to mention the mental health issues social media creates. The way it is threatening our very democracy and putting young people in danger from predators and online bullying is quite frankly disturbing.

So those are my five tips that I personally try to use to have my most productive day possible. Learning how to be productive at home will be different for everyone, try different things and see what works for you.

I hope you find these tips helpful, let me know if you decide to try any of them out and how you get on. I wish I had had these tips when I was in college and freshly graduated. Maybe I wasn’t ready to properly knuckle down and go after the life that I want.

I am now. Are you?
A xx

Career, Lifestyle, Music

Setting up my Harp Practice Space

14 January 2019 No Comments

As I may have mentioned recently. I have now moved to York (hurray!). So the focus of today’s post will be setting up an ideal harp practice space in the new house.

I absolutely loved setting up this little space, as I feel it helps to set my intentions of all the focussed work and teaching that will happen here. I wanted it to be organised but still pleasant to be in.

When we were house-hunting I was determined to have my own ‘music room’ to put the harp in, but we ended up falling for the charms of this house. I think I’ll be just fine in this space between the living area and the kitchen. What do you think?

I’ll start with what’s on the walls:

a portrait of Spyder

a robin, hand-stitched by my godmother, Auntie Janet
a little harp decoration – when I played Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols with the Leeds Guild of Singers last Christmas, a member of the choir had this attached to his shirt button. I complimented him on his effort and harp-appreciation, and he gave me the little ornament as a gift. I recorded and movement and put it on my YouTube channel, you can watch here.

Here’s a look at what the space looked like before – arghhh clutter! I don’t know about you but my mind can’t think clearly in a cluttered space. I’d much rather have a tidy and serene environment than a messy and chaotic one.

The first thing that needed doing was to install Auntie Janet’s old set of desk drawers ready for my music. These drawers will also double as my table while I’m doing my harp practice:

Supplies for a useful harp practice table

On the table we have:

two 2B pencils
a pencil sharpener
a pen
a tuning key
my diffuser – I like to create an ambience and the refreshing scent of essential oils will help keep me focussed
a coaster for my tea/hot chocolate/coffee – a gift from Elfair and a reminder of Manchester
little photo of Auntie Janet that I found in one of the drawers – a reminder of her and a reminder to be grateful and appreciate all the ways in which she has helped me in my life. I think she’d be happy to know how much all her things are going to be used and loved. I think about her and miss her every day.

convenient table with harp practice supplies

I’ve sorted the drawers as follows:

Top drawer

Things I’m working on right now
iPad – which also contains music that needs practising, as well as a metronome, spotify, imslp etc.

organising music in my harp practice space

Middle drawer

teaching materials
harp hire leaflets
notebooks
syllabuses (syllabi??)

Bottom drawer

hanging files to sort my music alphabetically by surname of composer (I’ve been ridiculously excited about hanging files – no more piles of disorganised music for me!)

I found that there is no way that all my music is going to fit into this third drawer. Ha – I wish. I have put solo music in there for now, and left the orchestral and chamber music to be sorted at a later date. I may need a full-on filing cabinet at some point (don’t tell Tim).

There was something really satisfying about setting up this little corner. I know I didn’t do much, but I believe that putting a little bit of thought into the placement of things really sets the energy of the place and the intention that this will be a place of happy productivity.

Final harp practice set-up thoughts…

When you play a large instrument like the harp, I believe there is a tendency to almost apologise for its size – to put it in a corner and hope it’s ’not too in the way’. I am happy to report that I now live in my own house and no longer have to worry about this (I checked with Tim of course). Apologising for the presence of your instrument cements the fact in your mind that your instrument is an inconvenience, that it’s in the way and that the room would be better without it. Not great, is it? So, from here-on-in, the harp has centre-stage in my little harp practise space, and in my life – unapologetically.

Musicians: what does your practise space look like? Are you like me in that you need a tidy and tranquil environment? Or can you practise in less-than-perfect surroundings?

What do you think of my harp practice set-up? Am I missing anything? Let me know in the comments, in the meantime, if you need me I’ll probably be practising…

If you are interested in learning to play the harp, you can read more about it and get in touch here.

p.s. Thanks to Eira Lynn Jones for inspiring this post. You’ve been teaching me the importance of being organised and thorough since 2005. Thank you so much.

Lifestyle, Music

2019 Goals – HAPPY NEW YEAR!

8 January 2019 2 Comments

Hello and a belated Happy New Year. How was your first week of 2019?

The House.

As I’m writing this, a plumber is replacing our boiler, which of course packed in just days after Tim and I moved in to the new house.

So it’s been a cold few days for us.

Nevertheless, it’s taught me to be very grateful for our usual way of life – have you ever thought about just how amazing it is to have hot water on tap? How wonderful it is that our houses heat themselves automatically? How blissful it is to have a hot shower and dry yourself with a warm, dry towel?

I’m feeling very grateful for these little things today.

This is a time I’ve been looking forward to for a very long time. Tim and I are in the house, and things are finally starting to settle down into a rhythm. The only things missing right now are a washing machine (lost by the removals company *sob*) and internet (being installed on Friday *yay!*).

Life.

My plan going forward is to put these blogs up on Mondays, but as you can tell, this week’s is a little late due to not having sufficient internet/spending all my time doing laundry at my parents’/trying to stay warm in the freezing-cold house.

Last year I feel like I made a lot of progress with procrastinating less, achieving most of what I set out to do and generally staying a bit more organised. In 2019 I want to continue all of that, but I want the increased productivity to result in more income, please. It sounds shallow, but my goal is to make more than I spend. I don’t want or need loads, just enough to pay the bills and have a bit left over for a rainy day/doing up the house/getting married.

I’ve signed up for some extra work online – teaching English to Chinese children – which is actually really fun and will hopefully tide me over while I find work as a harpist and harp teacher in York. I’m very grateful to a friend of mine for recommending this to me – you know who you are – thank you babe.

My piano will be brought over from Congleton in the next week or so, at which point I can start giving piano lessons in York too – hurray! I am also starting to give harp lessons online (when I have internet) so that is a super-exciting new venture.

Health.

Another 2019 goal of mine is to prioritise my physical and mental health, I’ve gone back to the beginning with my running and starting to work my way through the Couch 2 5k app, I’ll be practising yoga and meditation regularly and trying to eat as well as I can – nothing too strict but my long-term goal is to have a good, healthy quality of life for as many years as I can. Of course, once our garage gym is all set up, Tim and I can do our strength training in there as well.

This may be the subject of another blog post (let me know if you’d like to hear more on this), but the life of a freelancer can be a little chaotic (just a little), with late nights, early mornings, disrupted meal times etc., so keeping our bodies on a schedule when it comes to eating and sleeping really helps our bodies and our health. So, as I’m reading The Circadian Code by Dr. Satchin Panda at the moment, I’m trying to stick to a regular eating/sleeping/waking up schedule to see if that results in an increased amount of energy. Fingers crossed.

So, that’s probably enough from me for now. I really hope you are well (and warm) wherever you are. Check back next week for another post.

Chat soon,

A x

Career, Music, Places

Countdown to Christmas – 2 weeks to go

11 December 2018 No Comments

I can’t believe how close we are to Christmas. Present buying has started and some gifts are wrapped and ready but there’s still a long way to go and not much time to get organised.

I am actually at home this morning! Having a chilled one with a cup or two of Lady Grey tea and Spyder the cat. In a little while I’m going to hop on the mat for some yoga and meditation, before packing for another trip to York, only this time I’m not 100% sure when I’m coming back, but more on that later.

This past week has been another mad one, I got some hang-out time with CLOUDS, which is always lovely. We managed to get all four of us plus four harps in one lift – photographic evidence doesn’t really do it justice but I’ll just leave this here:

harpist, harp quartet, clouds harp quartet

The gig of the week was on Sunday at a church in Adel, just north of Leeds. A real treat for me as it was Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols with the Leeds Guild of Singers.

leeds harpist, harpist in Leeds

I was also asked to play a solo, so I played an arrangement of Divinum Mysterium – people often know it as Of the father’s love begotten. One of my favourite Christmas carols. The Leeds Guild of Singers sounded really lovely so do go and see them if you live in or around Leeds.

So from Leeds it was then time to drive back to Manchester ready for my final shift at Chetham’s School of Music on Monday morning. I’ve been a member of the Practice Team pretty much since leaving college, but now that our big move is just around the corner it’s time to stop my regular shifts there. I’ll still go back to cover shifts here and there if need be but it will only be from time to time.

It feels so strange to be cutting my ties with Manchester. The massive things for me were saying goodbye to the choir of St. Ann’s Church, where I’ve been singing since 2012, saying goodbye to my Manchester private students, and, of course, Chetham’s. I know I’ve made friends for life, and I’ve had the time of my life in Manchester but it’s time to close this chapter and start a new chapter in 2019. As sad as I am to be leaving Manchester I am so excited to be going back to my Yorkshire roots, setting up a new home with my partner-in-crime and seeing what opportunities I can grasp east of the Pennines – and if you’re reading this, you’ll be coming with me every step of the way. Thank you.

So, from the new year I will be scouting out work over in Yorkshire so please do use my contact form to get in touch if you need a harpist in York for music lessons, or for background music for your wedding or social event. You can also email me – angelinawarburton@gmail.com.

As always, thanks so much for reading, here are my social media links if you want to follow me or say hi.

See you next week!

Countdown to Christmas – 3 weeks to go

4 December 2018 No Comments

Well this feels retro, I’m writing this in the break between a rehearsal and an evening concert. I’m sitting in the cafe of Leeds College of Music, having rehearsed with the Wind Orchestra before their concert tonight. We are playing an arrangement of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition (amongst other pieces that don’t require a harp). Here’s a photo of the pitched percussion section – harp, piano, celeste.

This weekend has been exceedingly busy, it began on Friday and finishes on Tuesday evening. Today (Monday 3rd) me and the harp are in Leeds, we were in Sheffield last Saturday and then there’s a CLOUDS meet-up tomorrow. Do you like how I’m including Monday and Tuesday in the weekend? Wednesday I will chill. All day. Burning the candle at both ends can only be sustained for so long.

Things actually calm down a bit from then on, which is unusual for December but not surprising as most of my teaching has now drawn to a close ready for the big move to York. Speaking of which, I’m still clinging on to the hope that we’ll be in our new house by Christmas, we just need to sign contracts and complete. Keep everything crossed. Our journey to a home of our own has been 18 months in the making and I cannot tell you how excited I am to get a bit more settled. Congleton is so lovely but the amount of driving Tim and I are both doing is crazy.

December is a great time to think about the year ahead and start planning and getting organised. What are your goals for 2019 – musical or otherwise? One of my goals will be to keep on schedule with my social media. That means weekly blog posts – pop your email in the box if you’d like to join my little crew (what shall we call ourselves?) and receive these posts into your inbox. It also means weekly videos on my YouTube channel, which you can subscribe to here.

The current plan with the videos is to alternate between a performance video and more of a vlog/life update video. I really enjoy making these and I hope you enjoy seeing a little snippet of what’s going on over here, any feedback is always appreciated.

In the meantime, from the new year I will be scouting out work over in Yorkshire so please do use my contact form to get in touch if you need a harpist in York for music lessons, or for background music for your wedding or social event. You can also email me – angelinawarburton@gmail.com.

As always, thanks so much for reading, here are my social media links if you want to follow me or say hi.

See you next week!

Career, Music, Places

Diary of a Wedding Harpist

18 July 2018 No Comments

There’s a new video up on my Youtube channel – a little vlog of a recent weekend where I had a couple of weddings to play for. Firstly I was playing in Liverpool’s gorgeous St. George’s Hall, then the following day I was playing for a church wedding ceremony up in Chorley.

Summer is a busy time for harpists and it feels so good to have a full diary for the rest of the season.

Career, Lifestyle, Music

June Life Update

4 June 2018 No Comments

Hello and welcome back to my website. June is here and summer is well on its way (hurray!) so I thought it was time for another life update.

Wedding Season has officially begun and that means me and all the other harpists I know are gearing up for a summer of Pachelbel’s Canon in D, several renditions of A Thousand Years by Christina Perry and maybe even some Ed Sheeran thrown in there. For me, my next free Saturday is August 18th, I’m not sure how it happened but my Saturdays are completely booked up until then. I’m already taking bookings for 2019 and even 2020 so if you are planning your wedding please do get in touch and we’ll have a chat about what you would like for your special day.

My private teaching is really building up at the moment too and I seem to have had an influx of new students recently, which is so lovely. Hello if any of you are reading this. The more I teach the more I love it so if you fancy trying out piano or harp lessons and you live in or nearby Manchester please get in touch. In a rather geeky way I also love teaching music theory so I often teach that alongside our instrumental studies.

Moving away from music now, so much is going on at the moment. If you know or have spoken to me before, you’ll probably know that I absolutely adore greyhounds and would love one as a pet one day. That day may not be anytime soon however, as my cat would definitely freak out and I live in rented accommodation. So, in order to get my contact hours with greyhounds I’ve started volunteering to walk to greyhounds at a local shelter. I had a lovely time and fell hopelessly in love with all the dogs (obviously) so I really look forward to adding that to my weekly schedule.

This urge to walk dogs that aren’t mine came from reading Rebecca Campbell’s ‘Light is the new black’. Some of the book was a bit ‘out there’ for me but the parts about answering your soul’s calling really resonated with me. Of course music is my life and how I make my living, but there is so much more out there that I’m passionate about and it’s time to start jumping into these passions with both feet, finding what lights me up and doing that. I owe it to myself to live as authentically as I can. When I was little I always wanted to be a vet because I was just obsessed with animals, So to take action and indulge my passion for animals while actually doing a good thing is something of a no-brainer.

Going back to the topic of books for a second, I highly, highly recommend Elizabeth Gilbert’s ‘Big Magic’ – she delves deep into the subject of creativity. Listening to it on audible was so powerful and I feel like parts of it could have been written just for me. Grab a copy and give it a read (or a listen), let me know what you think. Perhaps I should start a book club? I just love devouring non-fiction, especially when it pertains to being our best selves. On my bed-side table currently are The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle and the Calm book by Michael Acton Smith and Alex Tew.

Some of you may have noticed that I’m not on Facebook anymore, I really am loving life without it and honestly haven’t missed it at all. I am still on twitter and instagram though so feel free to pop over there and say hello. My Facebook harpist page is still active but I hardly check it and have made my partner Tim the one and only admin. My thoughts on life without Facebook could (and probably will be) a whole blog post on its own, but I feel so much better now I’m not in the habit of scrolling through endless nonsense content, and love that I have to ask what people have been up to rather than already knowing through Facebook. Creepy.

Right, that’s definitely enough for now. Do leave me a comment and say hi, and if you’ve read any of the books I’ve mentioned let me know what you thought of them. Also, tell me what lights you up, what does your soul call you to do?

Let’s chat soon,

Angelina x

Career, Lifestyle

Bank Holiday Monday

7 May 2018 No Comments

It’s the Bank Holiday! It’s sunny! These two events almost never occur at the same time, and this post is here to remind you to enjoy it.

One of the joys of freelance life is that you get to make your own schedule. One of the pains of freelance life is having to make your own schedule.

I’m now 29 years old, seven (seven?!) years out of college and I’m only just learning what my actual ideal daily schedule is and how to properly GYST (that’s Get Your Sh*t Together). Giving up alcohol, getting more sleep and exercising are a huge part of it, as are motivation and self-discipline.

Once we get into these habits, it can be hard to switch off into relaxation mode. For me at least, my harp lives in my living room and my computer is my office, so emails are just always there, waiting for an answer, and the harp is always there, looking at me accusingly as if telling me I should be practising. It’s easy to slip into the mindset of productivity being the most important thing (and a way of putting value on ourselves, yikes), and time off is seen as sacrilege. Why rest when there’s money to be made?

This type of thinking leads to burnout pretty quickly, and gradually we become less and less productive, and more and more self-critical. Not good. Today I’m making the case for working to live, not living to work.

Bank holiday weekends mean pretty much nothing to most gigging musicians, I had a concert yesterday – The Dream of Gerontius with Oldham Choral Society – honestly one of my favourite pieces ever. Students still came for lessons, I still answered emails.

But here we are on Bank Holiday Monday, no gigs, no students, and I’m going to give myself the day off emails and practice. Switching off allows us to return refreshed and keen to GYST, whereas working through every weekend leaves us exhausted and uninspired (or is that just me?).

You could argue that I’m here, writing for my website, isn’t that work? But I’m literally writing this in the garden, in the sunshine, plus, I love writing so this feels good. I want to fill the day with things that feel good. I officially give you permission to do the same. Emails will still be there tomorrow.

Have a great Bank Holiday Monday everyone, and, if you need me, I’m out of office til tomorrow. Go and enjoy the sunshine.

A x

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