So this place is all about motivation. It can be difficult to keep your practise up when you don’t feel like there is anything to work towards so here are the top 3 things I do to kickstart my own playing. 1. Go to a jam. If I tell myself I will make it to a local session in the next week, it usually get me to try and learn some new tunes or brush up on tunes Iv been working on. 2. See a gig. Every time I see a local musician or famous international star play, as soon as they finish the first song I will be thinking about how I can improve or incorporate what I liked from the gig into my own music. 3. Listen to a whole album. This is the simplest one but it always helps me pluck up the courage to get the violin out and maybe work on something Iv just heard. BONUS. Post a video in here. Last week I posted a video in here of me practising Anthropology. I then posted a second one later in the day to see if I could get it sounding better in a few hours. It really helped me stay focused that day and I did feel like I made some progress with it. I urge anyone who is struggling to stay motivated to try this out! Matt

We all have that achilles heel. The thing that we hear in recording so fourself that we dont like. Mine is my intonation. I can be in tune, when I practice slowly and with intent. However I often hear videos of myself playing gigs and I cringe. I have improved a lot with it over the years, even in the last few months. It's always there in the back of my mind though and if I had a magic wand, that would perhaps be the first thing on my list. There is no magic wand, just practise, which thankfully I do often enjoy. I work on it in small ways all the time, annoyingly, the ear improves much quicker than your fingers so I'm always chasing the next milestone in my improvement. This is an issue that I think we can all relate to, regardless of our goals. Whats yours? Let us know in the comments. If you fancy a little help with your own goals, Im taking on a few more 1-1 students. You can get hold of my 1-1 coaching programme in the classroom. Its a package of lessons with me with details lesson reports and plans with the aim of helping you achieve what you want to in your own playing.

Back next week! Once in a while when we have more than 4 Mondays in a month I take a week off. See you all soon! Matt

Here we are, definitely not perfect but I did get through it in one take without too many mistakes. More to be done for sure.