Speaker 1: Play is learning, playing with each other, learning how to
Speaker 1: balance on blocks, building things, watching it crash over because wow,
Speaker 1: it was so hot. These are all how we learn.
Speaker 2: On this episode of the Psychology Podcast, I had a
Speaker 2: delightful chat with Umi Kendall, Assistant Principal Cellist of the
Speaker 2: Philadelphia Orchestra. Umi began studying cello at the age of five,
Speaker 2: following the Suzuki method, and at age sixteen, she made
Speaker 2: her solo debut at the Kennedy Center with the National
Speaker 2: Symphony Orchestra. Umi is a very multifaceted, thoughtful, and creative human.
Speaker 2: In this episode, we discussed her experiences in Waldorf education,
Speaker 2: classical music's role in human flourishing and creating a feeling
Speaker 2: of all and transcendence, and her interests surrounding organizational flourishing.
Speaker 2: More generally, we also discuss her life changing experience as
Speaker 2: a mom and the development of her talent over the years.
Speaker 2: You and I have something very special in common that
Speaker 2: I want to share it with you all. Both of
Speaker 2: our grandfathers are the reasonably learned how to play the cello,
Speaker 2: and in fact, her chair in the Philadelphia Orchestra is
Speaker 2: the same exact chair my grandfather Harry Gourdett's are occupied
Speaker 2: in the Philadelphia Orchestra for fifty years before her. So you,
Speaker 2: me and I clearly have this very special bond, and
Speaker 2: I'm so excited to shine the spotlight on her today.
Speaker 2: So without further ado, I bring you Umi Kendall.
Speaker 1: You me.
Speaker 2: How old the heck are you.
Speaker 1: It's great to be with you. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for having me.
Speaker 2: Great to reconnect. We are going to talk everything good
Speaker 2: and beautiful today.
Speaker 1: That sounds like a plan. I still remember that first
Speaker 1: day at the Positive Psychology Center for me and realizing
Speaker 1: that your grandfather was a connection that was amazing.
Speaker 2: Well, there's an interesting connection there in multiple levels. One level,
Speaker 2: you currently hold the chair in the philip Orchestra that
Speaker 2: my grandfather held for fifty years. He's the last one
Speaker 2: that was hired by Stakovsky and Normandy together. They were
Speaker 2: in the same room together. So Stakovski's last audition, Wow.
Speaker 2: And then he was in Fantasia the movie, the original Fantasie. Wow.
Speaker 2: He was a graduate of Curtis and yeah, I went
Speaker 2: through uh, Eugene Normandy and then Ricardo Mouti, who was
Speaker 2: a good friend of the family. And yeah, so anyway,
Speaker 2: So there's that amazing connection you currently hold you, I mean,
Speaker 2: you hold that chair, you're carrying on the torch in
Speaker 2: a beautiful, beautiful way, and then you're carrying on the
Speaker 2: torch bogo. And then secondly, it turns out, as I'm
Speaker 2: reading deeper into your work, that that well, both of
Speaker 2: our grandfathers are the reason why we both play cello.
Speaker 2: I play. I play cello too, not to the extent
Speaker 2: you do, but both of our grandfathers are responsible. So
Speaker 2: can you tell me a little bit about your grandfather
Speaker 2: and how he influenced you, because I guess there's multiple
Speaker 2: grandfather levels here.
Speaker 1: It's amazing to have those family connections, both between us
Speaker 1: of course and within my own family. And of course
Speaker 1: we can't help who we're born to, so it's just
Speaker 1: good luck on my end that I feel this way.
Speaker 1: My American grandfather, John Kendall, is largely credited with introducing
Speaker 1: the Suzuki method of music education to the Americas back
Speaker 1: in the nineteen sixties, and he yeah, of course, my
Speaker 1: Japanese grandfather had no idea about classical music in Japan,
Speaker 1: like in the rice fields and no electricity until I
Speaker 1: think I was twelve or thirteen, and it was no
Speaker 1: running water until I was until we were visiting. So
Speaker 1: really beautiful contrasts and in life in our family backgrounds. Grandfather,
Speaker 1: American grandfather John Kendall was always a violin pedagogue and
Speaker 1: saw a video of several hundred violinists all playing Japanese violinists,
Speaker 1: little ones to teenagers playing all together a violin concerto,
Speaker 1: and you couldn't believe. These teachers could not believe that
Speaker 1: what they were seeing was actually happening. And they thought,
Speaker 1: oh gosh, ninety percent of them they must be ringers.
Speaker 1: They're not actually playing, They're just leaning on the five
Speaker 1: or ten folks who are actually playing their hearts out.
Speaker 1: And they this contingent of teachers flew over to Japan
Speaker 1: to investigate, is what we saw on this video actually happening?
Speaker 2: Is it a magic trick?
Speaker 1: Is it a magic trick? Right? And in fact, all
Speaker 1: of these children were actually playing and well. And so
Speaker 1: that that was from the suzuki a suzuki conference or
Speaker 1: or a group group session that was being toured around
Speaker 1: the US. That's that was what they saw. And so
Speaker 1: that's how grandfather got connected to the suzuki education. And
Speaker 1: then to Shinichi Suzuki himself, and Suzuki education started in
Speaker 1: Japan post World War Two. Suzuki believed that if all
Speaker 1: children learn how to make a beautiful tone, they will
Speaker 1: also have beautiful hearts. And this was partly in the
Speaker 1: aftermath of the traumas of the of World War two,
Speaker 1: at least on the Pacific Front for Suzuki in Japan,
Speaker 1: and the atrocities and the traumas, and and a humanitarian
Speaker 1: kind of belief that music can make us beautiful people
Speaker 1: and that every child can. In fact, that is the
Speaker 1: prerequisite course for Suzuki teacher trainers, which I took my
Speaker 1: teacher training. Before you can even take the teacher training,
Speaker 1: there is a course every every teacher in training must
Speaker 1: take called every child Can. And that is the innate
Speaker 1: belief that every child has potential. And yeah, a world, right,
Speaker 1: this is all your school.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying that should be the title of my
Speaker 2: next book.
Speaker 1: It's a really beautiful concept. Beautiful, a beautiful world. And
Speaker 1: when it's applied, well, this Iszuki method of education. When
Speaker 1: the approach is applied, well it is you know, it's
Speaker 1: not intended to create child prodigies. It's intended to create
Speaker 1: citizens of the world who know how to play music,
Speaker 1: who appreciate music, who appreciate beauty, beauty and creating beauty
Speaker 1: and effort.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, there's so much more to Suzuki method. You
Speaker 2: know it as you just illustrate in like a couple
Speaker 2: of minutes, you know, there's so much greater depth to
Speaker 2: Suzuki method. Then I think what comes to immediately mind,
Speaker 2: what comes immediately to mind for people? So that is
Speaker 2: really helpful, immensely helpful. I started on Suzuki method with violin.
Speaker 2: Oh that was two two or three two?
Speaker 1: Were you even like out of diapers? I had a
Speaker 1: three year old, So that's why I'm she's not she's.
Speaker 2: My second I think my second birthday. My my grandfather
Speaker 2: got me a violin for my birthday. But yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: it's just I very I don't have that many memories
Speaker 2: of this is, you know, fleeting memories. But yeah, it's
Speaker 2: so it can be really helpful. You your own education
Speaker 2: path was unique. You were in Waldorf education, which I
Speaker 2: really think and what must have influenced you and the
Speaker 2: way you see the world and your playfulness and your
Speaker 2: creativity and your spirit. Can you tell me a little
Speaker 2: bit about what is Waldorf system while.
Speaker 1: Their education is It started last century early last century
Speaker 1: in Germany Austria by Rudosh Steiner, and it is a
Speaker 1: now a worldwide movement, much like Suzuki is. And it
Speaker 1: is about educating the whole person. We don't have tests,
Speaker 1: we don't have anything extrinsic motivators. It's a it's about,
Speaker 1: at least in early childhood, play is learning, playing with
Speaker 1: each other, learning how to balance on blocks, building things,
Speaker 1: watching it crash over because wow, it was so hot.
Speaker 1: These are all how we learn. And it was so
Speaker 1: interesting for me when I went through MAP at Penn
Speaker 1: for Positive Psychology and hearing one of the presenters talk
Speaker 1: about positive education and how the data is showing how
Speaker 1: effective positive education is and all of the criteria and
Speaker 1: parameters for that. It was very, very similar to Waldorf education.
Speaker 1: And the problem quote unquote problem with walderf education is
Speaker 1: because it doesn't test, at least in the lower school
Speaker 1: through the first eight grades. There are no formal tests.
Speaker 1: There is no data to show how successful it is
Speaker 1: as compared to another group. Because it understands the approach
Speaker 1: of education, understands that creativity and play and letting children
Speaker 1: learn at their own pace, in their own environment with
Speaker 1: each other, of course, in the social structure that is
Speaker 1: part of the school, meaning there is social network. It's
Speaker 1: not in isolation. We know from experience. I knew from
Speaker 1: experience how wonderful my childhood was because of my Suzuki
Speaker 1: and Wilder educations. And the problem with the Wilder of
Speaker 1: education was that it wasn't being measured because that's not
Speaker 1: part of the education system is measuring those things. So
Speaker 1: it was like an intrinsic problem. And I loved seeing
Speaker 1: this presenter at school at Penn doing this presentation because
Speaker 1: it just validated everything from a data perspective of my experience,
Speaker 1: of my positive experience with Wilder of education, and it
Speaker 1: Let's see, I think there were three tiers we learned
Speaker 1: at the end of senior year. The first sort of
Speaker 1: tier is children learn through their through their senses. We
Speaker 1: learned through feeling, our sense of set we're taking in
Speaker 1: the world through our senses and so soft beautiful textures,
Speaker 1: natural fibers, wood, beautiful craftsmanship, soft cloth and rainbow cloth,
Speaker 1: and all of the texture in sight and sound and smell,
Speaker 1: like the baking that happens in kindergarten, that we all
Speaker 1: get to bake and roll the dough together and smell
Speaker 1: the bread as it's baking while you're going to go
Speaker 1: outside and play. It's very it sounds very idyllic, and
Speaker 1: it is. The belief is that children first learn through
Speaker 1: their senses. The next phase, more through elementary school, is
Speaker 1: that we learn through our hearts, through our sense of
Speaker 1: goodness and through our innate sense of human kindness. And
Speaker 1: then in high school we learn more cerebrally, more cognitively
Speaker 1: and become more more the complete sort of thinking the
Speaker 1: whole person through the goodness in our sort of hearts,
Speaker 1: as we've hopefully been established in the younger years. But
Speaker 1: that's that's why the whole weald of education is is
Speaker 1: about teaching the whole or cultivating the whole person. It's
Speaker 1: not about teaching like putting things in and you regurgitate
Speaker 1: correct facts out. It's about cultivating, like watering a plant.
Speaker 2: Makes sense, Yeah, I really like that approach. Well, so
Speaker 2: you started playing when you were five, Celle, you know.
Speaker 2: And there there's a there's a term in psychology that
Speaker 2: Howard Gardner coined called a crystallizing experience. A lot of
Speaker 2: people who are very creative. They can point to a
Speaker 2: crystallizing inexperience where they encountered something and they're like, oh wow,
Speaker 2: this is me, this is what I want to do
Speaker 2: moving forward. Did you know Yoyama passed? You know, I
Speaker 2: believe he passed. You know when he saw cello in
Speaker 2: a window and he's like, oh cello. You know Jackuin
Speaker 2: Duprez heard heard it on the radio and she's like, oh,
Speaker 2: I want to play that instrument. Did you have a
Speaker 2: crystallizing experience?
Speaker 1: My crystallizing experience. I'll tell two anecdotes. The first one
Speaker 1: is I did not have a young age crystallizing experience
Speaker 1: because my whole childhood was surrounded by family playing music.
Speaker 1: Doesn't every family play like string quartets with the second
Speaker 1: violin subed out for French horn at the holidays gatherings?
Speaker 1: And doesn't everybody sing four part harmony carols or even
Speaker 1: get neighbors together to sing versions of handle Messiah? You know,
Speaker 1: doesn't everybody do this? Isn't this normal? So? I had
Speaker 1: my older brother plays violin. He's in Nick Kendall. He's
Speaker 1: in a group called Time for Three. I have an
Speaker 1: older cousin who is principal Viola of National Symphony. His dad,
Speaker 1: my uncle was second chair of Viola of the National
Speaker 1: Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center. Of course, my grandfather,
Speaker 1: I have an uncle who is in the arts performing
Speaker 1: arts world as well, and so and everybody plays or
Speaker 1: participates in music in the family, in the American my
Speaker 1: American family somehow, so at holiday gatherings and birthday parties,
Speaker 1: and we were all in the same area, and it
Speaker 1: was just normal for us to participate in music, and
Speaker 1: so as an invite for me. Children, you know, children
Speaker 1: are a mirror of their environments and are and that's
Speaker 1: a Suzuki sort of philosophical belief that we will learn
Speaker 1: by imitation and positive encouragement and repetition. That triumphant is
Speaker 1: like one of the main teaching tenets in music in Suzuki.
Speaker 1: And so for that imitation, of course, I wanted to
Speaker 1: do what my family was doing because that's what I see.
Speaker 1: So my turn came when I was five and grand
Speaker 1: and grandfather had a pawn shop cello under their piano,
Speaker 1: and that was my that became my cello. It was
Speaker 1: my aunt Nancy's cello when she was a little girl,
Speaker 1: and they just kept it and it became my cello,
Speaker 1: and so there was a sense of family connection. Although
Speaker 1: I was not aware of it at the time, I
Speaker 1: just knew I would get to start advancing. Instead of
Speaker 1: playing from cereal boxes with little rubber bands attached to
Speaker 1: it to pretend to participate in making music, I would
Speaker 1: get to play this this cello that was from a
Speaker 1: pawn chat that was Aunt Nancy's.
Speaker 2: What was it like a one sixteenth maybe so Phoebe.
Speaker 1: My daughter's right now is a one tenth and she's three,
Speaker 1: so it might have been more like a one eighth.
Speaker 1: But you know, it's all like jumbo size cereal black
Speaker 1: size with the pins like in the bottom.
Speaker 2: So well, yeah, I'm super interested in the development of expertise.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is I'm obsessed with this time, and
Speaker 2: it's interaction with talent. I think talent matters. I mean
Speaker 2: it's you know, I think that people who want to
Speaker 2: say there's no such thing as talent are are blind.
Speaker 2: But but the idea of what what does talent mean?
Speaker 2: You know, what does that really look like when you
Speaker 2: really dissect it? I think that's a really interesting question.
Speaker 2: So some people do get more bang for their buck
Speaker 2: out of particular things, particular training regimens. Kobe Bryant got
Speaker 2: a pretty good bang for his buck with basketball. You
Speaker 2: know that that others would not get the same bang
Speaker 2: for their buck for you know, you got a great
Speaker 2: bang for your buck with the cello. You know. But
Speaker 2: but can you describe to me your first person experience
Speaker 2: about the acceleration of that curve and and you know
Speaker 2: what it was experientially like for you to work your
Speaker 2: way up to the Philadelphia Orchestra.
Speaker 1: Well, I can say that, Well, first of all, the
Speaker 1: Philadelphia Orchestra is called the Destination Orchestra in much the
Speaker 1: same way you've described it. Like once, if you've been
Speaker 1: validated and being accepted by a jury of your peers,
Speaker 1: meaning other musicians, you know you're gonna be okay, You've
Speaker 1: pretty much you're good to go. But I can say
Speaker 1: I'll give a couple of moments that when I was
Speaker 1: a teenager and I definitely put in the whatever ten
Speaker 1: thousand hours by the time I was fifteen or so.
Speaker 1: When I was I remember this passage in shastakovich First
Speaker 1: Cello Concerto on the second to last page that has
Speaker 1: a very fast thirty second notes with scales and some position.
Speaker 1: Each one is slightly different than the previous, very very challenging,
Speaker 1: and it was the first time in my cello playing
Speaker 1: experience ever that I cried. I was so frustrated because
Speaker 1: I did not know how to overcome that challenge. It
Speaker 1: was the first time that I was so challenged. I
Speaker 1: didn't know how. I know I had work ethic, I
Speaker 1: know I had repetition. I knew how to practice. I
Speaker 1: knew how to break things down so that I could
Speaker 1: work them back up again at tempo in different patterns,
Speaker 1: in different permutations and backwards and forwards and slurs, articulations,
Speaker 1: all these different techniques that I knew of from my
Speaker 1: grandfather actually practiced techniques that he would call unit practice.
Speaker 1: And that was the first time I was so frustrated.
Speaker 1: I felt like, I don't know if I can do this,
Speaker 1: And that was very good for me to go through that,
Speaker 1: to have that humbling experience. Eventually, the perseverance just kicked in.
Speaker 1: I just had to believe in myself that I would
Speaker 1: get it, and I did. I performed it. It went fine,
Speaker 1: but it took longer than my previous iterations of typical
Speaker 1: practicing had taken and that was very good for me
Speaker 1: to go through that because I realized I really have
Speaker 1: to try. I mean, I was already trying, but before
Speaker 1: that point and even after that point, I had what
Speaker 1: I referred to as just lots of green lights. I'm
Speaker 1: so fortunate to have had the tools with a cello
Speaker 1: under my grandparents piano, to have had lessons which take
Speaker 1: financial resources from my grandparents it happens to be and opportunities,
Speaker 1: and that those opportunities were green lights for me. It
Speaker 1: didn't matter if I won second or first Pride, but
Speaker 1: there were performance opportunities that helped me grow. And all
Speaker 1: of those opportunities from you know, age five or six,
Speaker 1: my first recital to up through winning the Philadelphia Orchestra
Speaker 1: job and since then, which my my one my orchestra
Speaker 1: job twenty years ago in two thousand and four, all
Speaker 1: of those are not just about having the tools and
Speaker 1: the lessons. It's about having the opportunities to challenge myself
Speaker 1: in those competitions or recitals, low key, big key, small
Speaker 1: town to big national things. They're all growth opportunities. That's
Speaker 1: another thing I'd love to chat with you about, Scott,
Speaker 1: about is about increasing those opportunities for everybody because beautiful.
Speaker 1: Access to beautiful music and learning how to make beautiful
Speaker 1: music is for It's a part of the human experience.
Speaker 1: But anyway, the second story I wanted to actually tell
Speaker 1: you about as well was I did not decide to
Speaker 1: go into music until the day after my SATs and
Speaker 1: senior year.
Speaker 2: What did you think you were going to be?
Speaker 1: I didn't know the green lights. I had a biology
Speaker 1: teacher who was like, you mean you should go to
Speaker 1: med school, and I've become a you know, I was
Speaker 1: interested in setting the brain. I did a brain project
Speaker 1: in high school in Waldorf, right like my pe teacher
Speaker 1: wanted me to do. Wanted me to do track and
Speaker 1: fields because I was very fast. I just a very
Speaker 1: good sprinter. I did not have the patience for a marathon,
Speaker 1: but I'm a very good sprinter and sort of naturally jumpy.
Speaker 1: And you know, I had different teachers and in eurrhythmy,
Speaker 1: which is a sort of movement spiritual related movement, almost
Speaker 1: dance with music, classical music, I had very supportive teachers
Speaker 1: who were encouraging me to quote unquote go into their genre,
Speaker 1: study deeply in their arena, in their field. And I
Speaker 1: loved all of that, and so I didn't decide to
Speaker 1: go to take auditions from music school until the day
Speaker 1: after my essayts when my friends and I were discussing
Speaker 1: what at the time was personal essays for entrances entr
Speaker 1: or entrance applications, and I was struggling with what my
Speaker 1: personal essay content would be. And that's when I realized, oh, music,
Speaker 1: that's my personal story. That's how I tell my story
Speaker 1: is through music. And it all made sense then and
Speaker 1: then I so then I changed from doing homework first
Speaker 1: to practicing, to them doing practicing first and then my homework,
Speaker 1: and that wasn't until senior year. So I had many
Speaker 1: green lights when I talk about green lights and music,
Speaker 1: with the competitions and the recital opportunities and family recital
Speaker 1: opportunities when it's just a very safe space with people
Speaker 1: who love you no matter what, and it's just a
Speaker 1: chance to have fun with friends playing. We had four
Speaker 1: family get togethers where our four of our Suzuki families
Speaker 1: would get together and all the kids would play, would
Speaker 1: play Capture the Flag outside in the afternoon on a
Speaker 1: Saturday afternoon once a month, go in have dinner. We
Speaker 1: would program our own recital with each of us play
Speaker 1: in whoever's living room we were at, and then we'd
Speaker 1: play our little recital in whatever order. I remember being
Speaker 1: under the dining table, like right handwriting out the program
Speaker 1: and the order in which. You know, Jay, You're going
Speaker 1: first with Lafolio, okay, I'll go second with the swan.
Speaker 1: Who's got something fast to follow the swan okay, and
Speaker 1: then we'll all do a big group thing at the end,
Speaker 1: after all ten of the kids had played. And so
Speaker 1: it was just fun and all of these, all of
Speaker 1: these opportunities for green lights happened in each of the
Speaker 1: kind of arenas in which I was studying at Waldorf School.
Speaker 1: It was all just it was fun, it was intriguing.
Speaker 1: It was just I want to learn more, and okay,
Speaker 1: well now i'll study music, I'll audition for music conservatories.
Speaker 1: And that all worked out fine. But I always knew
Speaker 1: I wanted to know, I wanted I always want to
Speaker 1: learn more. It doesn't stop for me. I'm a I'm
Speaker 1: a forever student. Okay, i'll stop.
Speaker 2: I'll never stop, but i'll stop. I love all of that.
Speaker 2: You are a forever student. You're also there's a little
Speaker 2: bit of a well, there's a curiosity there there's a
Speaker 2: playfulness there. These are characteristics traits I see in in
Speaker 2: virtually all highly creative people, highly successful creative people. There
Speaker 2: was this like, well, my favorite celist besides my grandfather
Speaker 2: is Jack and Duprey. Yes, and there's such a childlike
Speaker 2: well I am thinking about her her age sixteen performance,
Speaker 2: you know, you know, with Baron Baum conducting, which is
Speaker 2: little interesting that they ended up and then they ended
Speaker 2: up getting together. Yeah, but we won't go there. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's just interesting. You know, there's this there's this like
Speaker 2: childlike wonder and and uh and excitement and they and
Speaker 2: I've seen you play too, and uh and and I
Speaker 2: see something similar. So do you think that's kind of
Speaker 2: an essential part of being a creative musician, whatever that is,
Speaker 2: whatever that essences.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't call myself a creative musician. I would call
Speaker 1: my brother a creative musician, because he's he. They in
Speaker 1: Time for Three, which is two violins and a double bass,
Speaker 1: and just yesterday we saw them play their concerto with
Speaker 1: the Baltimore Symphony, the same concerto that weave Philadelphi Orchestra
Speaker 1: recorded with them, and they won a Grammy for they
Speaker 1: Nicholas my brother has a playfulness and he does amazing improvisation.
Speaker 1: He's great with just hearing where something needs to be where,
Speaker 1: like musically speaking, ah, this needs to have a jam
Speaker 1: in it, just like this rhythmic rhythmic section coming along here.
Speaker 1: His whole group is super super adept at that, and
Speaker 1: I certainly could learn the language as as he is.
Speaker 1: But he never had any formal training in this. He's
Speaker 1: just been drumming his whole life in the basement, driving
Speaker 1: us nuts with upturned trash cans, and then climbing the
Speaker 1: streets of Philly outside Curtis, like banging on the lamp
Speaker 1: posts with sticks is drumming, and I mean he is.
Speaker 1: If you think I'm creative, Nicholas is oodles or what
Speaker 1: I would call creative. But I think to your point,
Speaker 1: playfulness and curiosity, which I think I do as a
Speaker 1: personality and body, I do feel like the help me
Speaker 1: continue to keep learning and growing myself. I'm never I'm
Speaker 1: not done, never finished. And you know, interviews when I
Speaker 1: first got into the orchestra, I was twenty two when
Speaker 1: I won the job. I finished Curtis and I started
Speaker 1: when I was twenty three, and I had some interviews like,
Speaker 1: what do you do now that you've reached the top
Speaker 1: of your twenty three? But this is always just the beginning,
Speaker 1: as soon as we think of ourselves as a finished product,
Speaker 1: which society often treats us as consumers, and we're just
Speaker 1: supposed to absorb things and turn them out, but we're living.
Speaker 1: I think the human experience is about varieties of interaction
Speaker 1: and creativity, of interactive interaction with creativity, and it's our
Speaker 1: opportunities and it's the tools that were given that can
Speaker 1: cultivate our creativity. So I haven't had less. I don't
Speaker 1: feel like it searching my brother to comparison with my
Speaker 1: to compare with my brother in improvisation, specifically in music,
Speaker 1: he is easily a stronger improvisation like just jam hands
Speaker 1: down than me. I'm really good at interpreting classical music
Speaker 1: that somebody else has written. Nicholas is really excellent at
Speaker 1: generating music on the spot. I'm also capable of generating music.
Speaker 1: It takes me longer, but the time. If we're not
Speaker 1: constrained by time, then the whole concept of creativity for
Speaker 1: me does change, because, like Adam Grant says, with procrastination
Speaker 1: and procrastination you know, everything that gels in our minds
Speaker 1: sometimes needs time. Maybe if we have a conversation again
Speaker 1: when I'm fifty or sixty, and we'll see when I'm
Speaker 1: not so sleep deprived other things that that grow.
Speaker 2: Gotcha? What are your what are your top character strengths?
Speaker 2: Then I don't want to put words in your mouth.
Speaker 1: My I have my top character strengths from five years ago,
Speaker 1: zest hope and kindness, and zest has consistently meaning enthusiasm
Speaker 1: or enthusiasm for life. Zest has consistently been in the top.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what I was commenting on Zest. I see
Speaker 2: when you play, it's wonderful, it's wonderful. You've you've described
Speaker 2: the experience of playing in an orchestra as being engulfed
Speaker 2: in the casmir of sound. It's a very poetic description,
Speaker 2: like you're wrapped in a beautiful blanket.
Speaker 1: Do you uh?
Speaker 2: Do you still feel that? Does that never cease? That feeling?
Speaker 2: Never sees.
Speaker 1: That to depends on what piece and of course what ensemble,
Speaker 1: but yes, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, I feel like sound
Speaker 1: is texture. Sound is feeling like I mean, feeling on
Speaker 1: my skin, like how soft cashmere feels is how it.
Speaker 1: That's my experience, that's my lived experience. Playing in the
Speaker 1: Philadelphia Orchestra. It is like being It is like sitting
Speaker 1: on your favorite couch and it just envelops you and
Speaker 1: you are covered up in your favorite blanket or your
Speaker 1: favorite cozy fuzzy if that is your texture of choice.
Speaker 1: But it is so it feels so right, and I'm
Speaker 1: so grateful every day that I get to go to work.
Speaker 1: And or as Amy, we're just a Nebsci would say,
Speaker 1: it's my calling. I feel like I get to do
Speaker 1: what I'm supposed to be doing. I call it work
Speaker 1: because it's functionally that's what it is. But it is
Speaker 1: I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, and I
Speaker 1: feel so fortunate to be able to do that. Is
Speaker 1: it challenging some days? Yes? Is it also rewarding while
Speaker 1: also being challenging. Yes, socially and also musically, meaning there
Speaker 1: are interactions, you know, with any workplace or group of
Speaker 1: a social network. We need to work things out and
Speaker 1: that's rewarding as well as it is to make the music.
Speaker 1: Sitting on stage. I still remember the very first day
Speaker 1: that I substituted as a student after winning an audition
Speaker 1: to be able to do that, and that lit my
Speaker 1: fire even more that when the audition would happen, I said,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, if I could do this every day,
Speaker 1: I would take it in a heartbeat. And what a
Speaker 1: blessing it is to get to do that. I was
Speaker 1: sandwiched at the back of the cella sections section, in
Speaker 1: front of the double basses, so as in the low
Speaker 1: dark chocolate register of the taste buds, like sixty seven
Speaker 1: percent dark chocolate is my favorite chocolate. And I get
Speaker 1: to I get to live.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you do?
Speaker 1: You do? You do?
Speaker 2: I think there is a transcendence there. There is that,
Speaker 2: you know that talk about transcendent experience. There's something that
Speaker 2: just transcends any individual ideology or belief system. I mean
Speaker 2: everyone in that room can feel that. Feel the chills, yes,
Speaker 2: the aesthetic chills, these set chills. You've talked about tiers
Speaker 2: of transcendence. Do you do? You do? You do? You
Speaker 2: have experience that while you're performing?
Speaker 1: I did? I actually talked about that with with Daker
Speaker 1: with Daker a little bit. Yeah, with some awe and
Speaker 1: these tingling the chills that happen. One of those was
Speaker 1: I cried in a performance of Mozart Requiem, and we
Speaker 1: did it at we performed it at Saratoga Springs, and
Speaker 1: I think I was crying because it brought me back
Speaker 1: to the week that my grandfather, the John Kendall's Suzuki Grandfather,
Speaker 1: that he died in January of twenty eleven, and at
Speaker 1: work that week in January twenty eleven, we also played
Speaker 1: Mozart's Requiem. And for me, there is a connection in
Speaker 1: time between myselves from the twenty twenty nineteen version of
Speaker 1: the Mozart Requiem at Saratoga to the twenty eleven version
Speaker 1: of the Mozart's Requiem that we performed in Reisenhall when
Speaker 1: grandfather died, and to honor him, I was playing it
Speaker 1: that week to honor him. Nobody else needed to know
Speaker 1: that was my own personal avenue of delivery in our
Speaker 1: performances that week. And so when I ended up crying
Speaker 1: in that twenty nineteen version in Sarahga, I, I was
Speaker 1: doing a lot of internal reflection and transportation of my
Speaker 1: sort of inner self, of sadness, of grief, of anger,
Speaker 1: of also the musical anger that happens in Konfutatis in
Speaker 1: the specific movement with dun lumpumpum. It's a very angry movement,
Speaker 1: and so that helped conjure my own emotional connection to
Speaker 1: that with the many layers of my own personal experience,
Speaker 1: so that that had, you know, grandfather's death, grief, the
Speaker 1: beauty of the piece itself just separate from me personally,
Speaker 1: to transcending time with myself, from my from my current
Speaker 1: then to the past self, sort of reliving some of
Speaker 1: the grief that I felt or maybe unacknowledged grief that
Speaker 1: was coming out eight years later. So there are a
Speaker 1: lot of layers in all of that that I live.
Speaker 1: When I perform piece, I'm thinking about my past self
Speaker 1: that introduced that first met a piece of music, that
Speaker 1: same piece of music to my current self, to sharing
Speaker 1: of course with the audience. Somebody in the audience is
Speaker 1: a grandfather, they're living it for the first time or
Speaker 1: sadly maybe the last time. Maybe they don't know it.
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of a lot of emotional
Speaker 1: connections for me in any given performance week, but that
Speaker 1: particular one, the tears of transcendence for me that that
Speaker 1: was really specific to that piece and those moments in
Speaker 1: time that I was just describing, does that make sense.
Speaker 2: Oh that makes so much sense.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I don't know if what I'm saying is just gibberished.
Speaker 1: It's my it's my lived experience, though, so it is
Speaker 1: to me.
Speaker 2: What it is. Yeah, you know, I think we can
Speaker 2: all kind of apply that experience to whatever it is
Speaker 2: we do when we feel like we're having a peak
Speaker 2: experience for what we're doing. You know, the peak experiences
Speaker 2: are pretty universal in their manifestations, and that's what we
Speaker 2: should be doing, right, is helping people find their own
Speaker 2: unique pathway to peak experience. Yes, I mean I think
Speaker 2: I know you're really interested in excellence, and you know,
Speaker 2: I think sometimes we make too much of excellence as
Speaker 2: being the goal, you know, as opposed to just self actualization.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, I love that because the striving as we
Speaker 1: have a say I'm a saying from one of my
Speaker 1: mentors at Curtis the music is always better than it
Speaker 1: can be played. There is a constant striving in specifically
Speaker 1: for me as a musician, I'm never good enough. I
Speaker 1: don't mean that in a downplay. I mean that in
Speaker 1: a sense of being humble and inspired at the same
Speaker 1: time to continue to grow. And so the constant striving
Speaker 1: is for me, what this reaching our potential? Yes, but
Speaker 1: also continuing to grow our potential because like I said,
Speaker 1: I don't stop learning, so we just keep growing, We
Speaker 1: just keep using, We just keep growing, keep being curious,
Speaker 1: keep being interested in things beyond ourselves that challenge us,
Speaker 1: that push me, that interest me. When I had the baby,
Speaker 1: I really couldn't doin anything else, So that was kind
Speaker 1: of a fermata, a pause button with self compassion, because
Speaker 1: we need the ebbs and flows of life or if
Speaker 1: someone has a grieving time or all of these. You know,
Speaker 1: the ebb and flow of life happens. But when we're
Speaker 1: when we're able, we I put my foot on the accelerator,
Speaker 1: not in terms of I shouldn't say accelerator. I fuel
Speaker 1: myself with the nutrients for growth, That's what I should say,
Speaker 1: because accelerator sounds like it's externally motivated and I want
Speaker 1: to be fast, and that's not That's not how I
Speaker 1: think of reaching or continuing to strive. For knowing our
Speaker 1: potential and seeing it. There's so much there, Scott.
Speaker 2: There is, and I mean, and I mean on one level,
Speaker 2: I'm like like, of course, with you on the constant growing,
Speaker 2: growth is so important but I guess what am I
Speaker 2: I'm trying to say also that I think it's like
Speaker 2: okay sometimes to reach a happy place, even for a moment,
Speaker 2: where you're allowed to just enjoy what the journey that
Speaker 2: you've been on, and to just not have the pressure
Speaker 2: to grow.
Speaker 1: Absolutely can't you.
Speaker 2: Have like a year of no growth exactly? But cultivation, well,
Speaker 2: I guess we know from appreciation of.
Speaker 1: Course, I mean the peacefulness and the self reflection that
Speaker 1: we need to just live like that. So two thoughts.
Speaker 1: One is in biology, like physiologically we need sleep to grow.
Speaker 1: We can't. If we don't sleep, your brain can't regenerate
Speaker 1: and grow and just be. So we need to sleep.
Speaker 1: In that sense, there's a metaphorical validation for what you're saying,
Speaker 1: and I totally agree with that from a lived experience
Speaker 1: as well. I can't if I don't sleep, if I
Speaker 1: don't let myself rest, if I don't pause, then how
Speaker 1: do you refuel? That's my and that's the big And
Speaker 1: even in nature in the season, of course, we are
Speaker 1: natural beings in nature. We have in the tropics anyway,
Speaker 1: we have the seasons where there's hibernation, the bears go
Speaker 1: into hibernation the plants, at least here in Pennsylvania, they
Speaker 1: the leaves fall off, the trees, the wind, the nature
Speaker 1: goes to sleep for the new springtime. And I think
Speaker 1: this is also Waldworf Like immersion in nature and appreciation
Speaker 1: for in connection to nature, I think is a key
Speaker 1: part of our understanding ourselves and how we work.
Speaker 2: Totally, that's totally.
Speaker 1: Totally agreeing with what you're saying about that need to reset,
Speaker 1: reflect and just yeah, we're human beings. We're not human doers.
Speaker 1: We're human beings.
Speaker 2: First, right, Yeah, because I just think there's such an
Speaker 2: emphasis and excellence even in like music conservatories, and it's
Speaker 2: just a lot of people get burnt a lot of
Speaker 2: musicians get burnt out, you know, and and end up
Speaker 2: not even enjoying it anymore. I've seen that before.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm doing some coaching. I'm teaching, and of course
Speaker 1: that that's often one of the most important topics is
Speaker 1: actually balancing towards that self compassion and just being just
Speaker 1: being enjoying remember why we're connected to this in the
Speaker 1: first place, or even just take a break. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: just so important to our ability to and that's yeah,
Speaker 1: being able to be like a rubber or resilience and
Speaker 1: being able to go back and forth, breathe in, breathe out.
Speaker 1: These are like the rhythm, the Cicadian rhythms of life.
Speaker 1: We need to emulate that absolutely. In fact, I wonder
Speaker 1: if there's studies on excellence without sleep like you can't
Speaker 1: or the equivalent, the analogy, the equivalent of sleep and rest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean ericson a lot of people quote his
Speaker 2: ten year, ten thousand hours or ten years to excellence,
Speaker 2: but they don't cite as much is that those who
Speaker 2: were the most accomplished musicians were those who had the
Speaker 2: most amount of downtime. Yeah, people don't. People don't say
Speaker 2: that as much as really finding Yeah, yeah, you are
Speaker 2: in You're very multi facet in your interest of the things.
Speaker 2: You've got this Masters of Positive of Applied Positive Psychology,
Speaker 2: which is where I met you at Penn, and I
Speaker 2: know that you're really interested in classical music's role in
Speaker 2: human flourishing and the importance of cultivating healthy organizations as
Speaker 2: pathways to serve the arts and public community. Where's your
Speaker 2: thinking these days around how we can cultivate healthy organizations?
Speaker 2: I know this is a deep passion of yours.
Speaker 1: Wow, thank you for asking. Interestingly, the reason I found MAP,
Speaker 1: the Applied Positive Psychology Program at Penn was because the
Speaker 1: Philadelphia Orchestra went through a pretty traumatizing Chapter eleven bankruptcy
Speaker 1: about fifteen years ago. Fourteen years ago, and I felt helpless.
Speaker 1: And I don't like feeling helpless. I like to know
Speaker 1: what I can do to help. I like to know
Speaker 1: how I can contribute, how I can participate. And we
Speaker 1: were still playing, we played all our concerts. We didn't
Speaker 1: We had to. The organization had to restructure for its
Speaker 1: long term health. So I'm not going to discuss disagreeing
Speaker 1: we're agreeing with the actual decision to go through that process,
Speaker 1: except to say from an experience point of view for
Speaker 1: the musicians, it was very traumatizing. And I found myself
Speaker 1: at the then Barnes and Noble at the corner of
Speaker 1: eighteenth and Walnut and Philly in Center City, at the
Speaker 1: Barnes and Noble in the business section, looking at a
Speaker 1: lot of red books like Power and Leadership Authority, you know,
Speaker 1: because I was looking at what do other organizations do
Speaker 1: when they go through a struggle. We can't be the
Speaker 1: only ones who are facing a challenge. What do other
Speaker 1: people do when they're struggling with motivation or employee connection
Speaker 1: and all of these I loved it. I just soaked
Speaker 1: up as much as I could, and I read specifically
Speaker 1: two books whose authors I ended up writing. Dan Pink's
Speaker 1: book called Drive subtitled The Surprising Truth of Intrinsic Motivation,
Speaker 1: and then Adam Grant's book Give and Take, and I
Speaker 1: wrote both of them and very brief emails saying, hi
Speaker 1: and Fanks, and do you have any knowledge of application
Speaker 1: of your research to the classical music industry blah blah blah,
Speaker 1: and the orchestra Adam Grant, I wrote on a Sunday
Speaker 1: evening at like eleven pm hits end, and at seven
Speaker 1: twenty one I got the auto reply, like very excellently written,
Speaker 1: beautiful auto reply, And then like a minute later got
Speaker 1: a personal reply from Adam Grant seeseing me into the
Speaker 1: directors at the Positive Psychology Center saying, ah, there's a
Speaker 1: bunch of interaction here, intersection here that might be interesting.
Speaker 1: And literally ten days later, this was December twenty eighth,
Speaker 1: so no, it was about fourteen days later. The map class,
Speaker 1: the pen class and Positive Psychology came scheduled came to
Speaker 1: a Philadelphia Orchestra concerto and then the roof just blew
Speaker 1: off with all the connections there because I met James,
Speaker 1: I'd met them backstage. We chatted. They invited me to
Speaker 1: come the next morning, Sunday morning, at like eight am
Speaker 1: to Penn to help the class debrief their concert experience,
Speaker 1: which for many of them was their first classical music experience.
Speaker 1: And that for me was the beginning of everything map
Speaker 1: for the applied positive psychology program. So, to go back
Speaker 1: to your original question, I believe that healthy arts organizations,
Speaker 1: healthy nonprofit organizations that deliver public good goods like arts.
Speaker 1: If those are we can only be as good as
Speaker 1: our arts organization is, right, the organization needs to run
Speaker 1: well in order to be able to be effective for
Speaker 1: the public good. And so I feel like the healthier
Speaker 1: the more we know about positive psychology and its possible
Speaker 1: applications to arts organizations, the healthier we can be, and
Speaker 1: the more effective we can be in our delivery in
Speaker 1: our concerts, in our and we're already giving our we're
Speaker 1: already pouring our hearts out on stage as the musicians,
Speaker 1: but from the patron experience to programming to EDI efforts
Speaker 1: that we're doing, you know, making strides on in an
Speaker 1: otherwise very antiquated industry, and antiquated because of its history
Speaker 1: in Western Europe aristocracy and so is this was the
Speaker 1: original sort of nucleus connection to positive psychology and the
Speaker 1: program at PEN And while I have not officially applied
Speaker 1: it back to the Philadelphia Orchestra, I feel that the
Speaker 1: organization has, for a variety of reasons, grown and flourished
Speaker 1: in ways. Maybe it's from post traumatic growth, maybe it's
Speaker 1: from just being aware of the possibilities, but we have
Speaker 1: definitely grown from the challenges of before and artistically, at
Speaker 1: least with the leadership of jan Nique, our music director,
Speaker 1: we are we are just poised ever more for continued
Speaker 1: beloved representation and delivery of arts messengers of music to
Speaker 1: Philadelphia and the country and internationally on tours. But that's
Speaker 1: the anyway, that's that's the answer to that question. Is
Speaker 1: that's where it stems from my my belief in strengthening
Speaker 1: arts organizations. Was that serendipitous email exchange with Adam Grant, Adam,
Speaker 1: thank you.
Speaker 2: I'll share this episode with him, and also I'll share
Speaker 2: this episode with Dan Pink. What did not.
Speaker 1: Respond, but Dan did not respond. I got the auto reply,
Speaker 1: and then like the possibility that I'm in like three
Speaker 1: months I might get to get a reply or something,
Speaker 1: but that never happened.
Speaker 2: He's usually really good at that. He's usually really good
Speaker 2: at that. I'll say, I'll stand up for Dan think
Speaker 2: for a second when he when he has time. But
Speaker 2: very cool, It's it. I mean, I could talk to
Speaker 2: you all day, but I want to be respectful of
Speaker 2: your time. Let's just end with just give me a
Speaker 2: little bit of idea of how having a child has
Speaker 2: enriched your life and has has it changed your music
Speaker 2: at all?
Speaker 1: Becoming a mom, becoming a parent has been the most
Speaker 1: humbling experience and also the most rewarding experience. Well, right now,
Speaker 1: I'm actually having a hard time with practicing at home
Speaker 1: because Phoebe stays awake when I practice, and she wants
Speaker 1: to hear. She says, Mama, are you going to play
Speaker 1: the divorceeac? Now?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Is that the Broms? Are you practicing the Broms Requiem?
Speaker 1: She's so verbal and so much interaction, is so much
Speaker 1: attention to what I'm practicing, that I've become aware that
Speaker 1: I'm keeping her awake actually or keeping her away from
Speaker 1: her things. So, and she wants to sit right next
Speaker 1: to me when I practice. And she also just started cello,
Speaker 1: so there's a lot of things that are happening. She
Speaker 1: wanted to start cello because I think she wanted to
Speaker 1: imitate me, which of course makes sense as a parent,
Speaker 1: and our connection is great, but it's been definitely a
Speaker 1: challenging thing to manage practice time from a practical standpoint. Emotionally,
Speaker 1: sense of meaning has skyrocketed because I just have.
Speaker 2: Beautiful, a.
Speaker 1: Deeper sense of being of my why is for her. Wow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a lot more there in the parent aspect and
Speaker 1: being a performing musician and managing time and all of this.
Speaker 1: But I know all parents go through this in some degree.
Speaker 2: Yeah, getting outside of your self aspect of human experience
Speaker 2: through your music, through children, through you know, it looks
Speaker 2: like you're hidden transcend in some multiple fronts. I always
Speaker 2: find talking to you a trans and and experience. Remy,
Speaker 2: thank you so much for being so gracious with your
Speaker 2: time today and for being on my show.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me Scott, and for
Speaker 1: you for all of your work. I've enjoyed reading your
Speaker 1: books about thinking about your perspective and your experience and
Speaker 1: how you're making the world a better place based on
Speaker 1: your experience and what you've been through. It's you're an
Speaker 1: incredible inspiration for education, for psychology, and for human the
Speaker 1: human experience. So thank you for being who you are.