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Those who know me, know I read a fair bit. On an average month I read 2-5 books a month, typically one fiction and the rest are non-fiction.

This week I’ve been re-reading one of my favourite books on learning, which is one I think everyone should dip into (number 1 below). It then occurred to me “what other books do I think people should read?“. Hence, I thought I’d feature my current five book recommendations. Each of these dives into some aspect of learning in life. Picking even just one of these would – in my opinion – do everyone a world of good.

1. ‘Mastery’ by Robert Greene

Robert Greene is someone who is considered an ‘author’s author’. He is a voracious reader, and as he reads, he makes notes on the various topics he is digesting. He makes these notes on note cards, and categories these by subject into enormous notecard boxes. That way he is able to digest enormous topics bit by bit, then – when he is ready to publish – the material is already written and just needs to be knitted together.

In this book, he covers the goal of attaining ‘mastery’ of any given subject. The book itself is not just a commentary on great masters and the paths that led them to their own mastery – Da Vinci, Franklin, Darwin, etc – but it weaves those stories together with specific lessons drawn therefrom. The chapters then form an overarching trajectory that one needs to follow to get on the same path to mastery. Each chapter is engaging in it’s own right, but fits together neatly to give specific lessons that each of us (at any stage of skill development) can gain immensely from. It’s an absolute goldmine for those at any level of skill development. If you want to be a master at your craft, this is the book for you.

2. ‘Ego is the Enemy’ by Ryan Holiday

The only reason this book is listed as number two, is to provide a natural segue from talking about Robert Greene.

Ryan Holiday was one of the directors of American Apparel, and he acknowledges he was on a self-destructive streak of repeatedly making millions then losing millions during his early working years. Eventually he sat down to try and work out why he kept going the way he was going, and this book was one of the resulting works… which he produced under the advice and guidance of Robert Greene.

This book is about the danger and folly of ego. It covers great examples from history where people either exhibited great ego or great humility, and what that won or lost them. The ability to align our perception of ourselves with reality, to not take offense because someone says something that rubs against our self-perception, to not insist that something isn’t so even when the facts say otherwise – these are (as the book points out) clear examples of ego, and highlights the dangers that flow therefrom. If any of the above comments resonate with you, then this is a great book for you.

3. ‘Meditations’ by Marcus Aurelius

One of the key inspirational figures that Ryan Holiday references in Ego is the Enemy (and many of his other books) is Marcus Aurelius.

Aurelius was one of the last Roman emperors, and he kept a personal journal of his thoughts and insights. This was not written for public consumption, but for his own reflection and philosophising on life. The book ‘Meditations’ is this journal. It is considered essential reading for the Stoic school of philosophy. These are short little notes to himself, rather than lengthy chapters. It is like a little pocket book of helpful reminders to see things as they are, to not take things to heart, and to do your best. I’ve actually highlighted and tabbed mine up, and I find these thoughts extremely helpful when in some tricky situations.

The book is pocket sized, so very helpful for stowing in a jacket pocket and just diving into whenever you need some help to level out your thinking. If this sounds like you, it’s a great book to pick up.

4. ‘Bounce’ by Matthew Syed

Syed was table tennis champion at a time when one little street in Reading had produced more table tennis champions than the rest of the country put together – he was the best of that group. He dissects the factors that went into that, and many of those had nothing to do with him – they were purely circumstantial good fortune. This is a massively interesting aspect to any arena where one wishes to rise to the top, but it is only one aspect of this excellent book.

The book as a whole goes through the key factors involved in rapid and effective learning, and also draws essential lessons from top sports-figures and other disciplines. It’s also a lighter read than ‘Mastery’ by Robert Greene. If you want to learn similar lessons, but you know you (presently) lack the attention span, then this is the book for you.

Speaking of attention span…

5. ‘Deep Work’ by Cal Newport

Cal Newport hates social media. He doesn’t primarily do so out of principle, he hates it because of how it damages us as individuals. Social media has been proven to permanently erode our ability to concentrate for extended periods.

And given that everything of value, every high level skill, takes increasingly long periods of dedicated work and focused attention by individuals, social media is an enemy to self-development. While the book is not about social media, it IS about the importance in being able to focus on a given task for extended periods to truly rise to the upper tiers of ability, and to deliver something of value – whether for one’s own pleasure, or for commercial reasons. This covers various examples and draws lessons from their lives on the importance of cultivating this intense focus, and also the pitfalls of not doing so.

If you want to get a snapshot of what Cal Newport is talking about, he has an excellent Ted talk right here. Either way, I would highly recommend picking up his book.

Please… pick a book above that interests you, get it and read it. You’ll learn so much, and they all tesselate together very neatly.

There is a famous quotation attributed to the ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle:

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”

As it turns out, Aristotle never said these exact words. In 1926, author Will Durant gave this as a quasi-modernised summation of elements of Aristotle’s teachings.

But whether or not Aristotle said these exact words, this sentiment is very much rooted in his philosophies of actions, habits and virtue.

Many pedagogues and coaches cite this quotation to inspire people to practice, to knuckle down, to cultivate a habit of excellence. I have done and will continue to do the same. Such a message focuses on the second clause of this quote.

But there’s something wonderfully insightful in the first clause also, that we can often miss, especially as it pertains to the very on-trend topic of labels and identity.

“We are what we repeatedly do”.

The Problem with ‘Identity’

I bring this up, because I’ve recently had a lot of conversations – within the context of music and outside of it as well – about identity, especially when it comes to creating labels for oneself.

Worry not, we’re not going into the weeds on this. It’s a huge topic, with many facets, each with far more nuance, psychology and depth than I could possibly bring justice to. Instead, everything that follows is said within the context of voice.

Singers, like every human on earth, want to feel like they have a handle on who they are and what they should be doing – in our case, vocally speaking. They want to figure out who they are, what their voice is capable of, what they are good at, and cultivate artistry.

WHile this is a great goal, this tends to manifest in overly definitive, declarative statements beginning with “I am “. Moreover, people typically want to acquire their own ‘vocal manifesto’ ASAP in their vocal development, even if it is way too soon for them to ascertain such characteristics.

As such, often these labels are initially inaccurate, as less experienced singers frantically try to firm up a complete vocal identity for themselves. Labels are also static, whilst we as people are dynamic. We are never just one thing, and no one label ever sums us up fairly, accurately or completely.

Herein lies the danger I want to highlight for you: the danger of clinging so tightly to some label or immutable ‘identity’, such that it one cannot let go of this identity even when it doesn’t fit where one is at.

This can inhibit development massively, but even worse, it can be a huge source of unresolveable anxiety to the singer, especially when events in reality don’t marry up with some internally held standard. Let me share a few examples. Continue reading “The Danger of Labelling Yourself as One Thing or Another”

A while ago I wrote an article called 5 Reasons: Why singing is like clothing…. While the article is not the most read article on my site, it is (in my opinion) something that is critically overlooked by far too many singers.

When it comes to building your voice to be capable of whatever you throw at it, having an appropriate ‘vocal aesthetic’ in mind is crucial. This is to both build your voice to be the best it can be (now and in the future), and also to minimise otherwise avoidable frustration. It’s this topic that I want to revisit this week.

Why ONLY looking at range can lead you down a dead-end

As it happens, I was working with a particular client this week. They have a great voice, and they brought in a selection of songs to look at towards the end of their session.

Now, every single one of the songs they had brought in, was well within their range and existing style capacity. Even just based on where we were taking their voice during vocal exercises, the melodies of the songs were less demanding in their range. So the natural question most would ask is, which song did we pick?

Answer: None of them

We looked at another singer entirely, one we had discussed and tried previously, but a different one altogether. But why? Continue reading “Vocal Aesthetic: Find Singers That Reflect YOUR Voice”

I had a call with a prospective client the other week, and they asked me whether it was possible for someone to teach themselves to sing. Now, whilst every single client I teach is “self-teaching” when they practice at home with our session recordings, whether singers can “DIY-build” their voice in isolation is something I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about… and also trying for myself, in fact.

Self-teaching is exactly how I started out. I started out with DVD courses, online lessons, even looking through the early days of Youtube for information, etc. Surely those avenues could work well for self-tuition, right?

Well, as I found out, self-building your voice really doesn’t work that way. In my opinion, this is for three primary reasons:

1) A guitar/piano is a finished instrument, the voice is unfinished and needs to be built

Continue reading “Why Trying to Teach Yourself to Sing Doesn’t Really work”

If we ignore any political baggage that comes with the term “conservative“, the root of the word is actually very easy to get: it means to conserve.

To conserve means to maintain, to preserve, to keep hold of. And at least from a vocal perspective, I want to keep my voice. I don’t want to sing it ragged, or feel worse for wear. I want it to feel as fresh at the end of singing a setlist, as it did at the start. Ideally, I’d like it to feel better for having sung for an hour or two, rather than feeling worse.

This is perfectly feasible, but it involves taking a far more conservative approach to our voices. Whichever way you lean politically, when it comes to voice, I’m hopeful that the following five reasons will convince you to become a “vocal conservative“. By doing so, your voice, your music, and anyone you choose to sing for will appreciate you all the more for it.

1. Don’t write cheques your voice can’t cash

How many singers have you seen (either live or heard in a live recording) where they completely fail to deliver the money notes of their best-known songs? Or they change the key so radically that the song loses all the life and zest of what made the original so enjoyable? Or worse, they just come off the microphone and let the crowd have a bash at it.

Maybe you’ve even been that singer, worrying every single time about whether THAT note will come out right.

The studio enables one to stitch together a final version that could never be delivered live. This is a great tool for delivering a polished result, but the real problem with this approach is that now the singer now has to weasel their way out of an unsingable song every time they sing.

For those of us singing originals or covers, we often set the bar too high and add songs to our set list that our voice can’t deliver… or at least consistently enough that we never fret over it. This leads to vocal problems, and a growing complex about whether or not you’ll “make it”. It’s not worth it. Continue reading “Five Reasons for Vocal Conservatism”