We’re Back! 🎉

Christopher: I am so excited to be here with you, streaming live, something we do regularly inside Musical U, but we don’t often do out in the world, as it were, and it’s something you were trying. I’ll be explaining in a little bit why we’re doing it and how it’s going to work, and I would love to hear from you in the comments. If you’re watching live, type “live”, if you’re watching the replay later on, type “replay”. We’re, like I said, giving this a try. And the more feedback you give, the more engagement you give us, the more we’ll do.

But it’s very much a way of rebooting this show, Musicality Now, which is near and dear to my heart. I hope it’s near and dear to yours, too, if you’ve been with us a while, and I do want to say a very warm welcome to this special live edition of Musicality Now. Whether you have been following us for years and following every podcast episode, every email we send out, every YouTube video, every short, or this is your first time tuning in, maybe you’ve just come across Musical U today… And whether you are a Facebook fan, YouTube subscriber, Instagram follower, email subscriber, or even a fully-fledged member of Musical U, I very much want this to be for our member community as well.

A very big, warm welcome to you, wherever you’re joining us from. I’m so glad you’re here.

And today I really just wanted to kick things off with a bit of a “lay of the land” episode.

We are going to be featuring all kinds of different episodes, some we’ve done before, some new kinds. And today I just wanted to take a moment to kind of take stock of where we’ve been, where we are now, and where we’re going, as it were. And before I talk about Musical U and what we’ve got going on, I just want to take a moment to talk about you, who is watching this, and to reassure you you’re in the right place, if you’re in the right place.

And I say that to mean there’s a certain kind of musician that tends to find their way to us at Musical U. And it’s not a particular instrument, it’s not a particular style, it’s not a particular ability level. It’s a particular, I’d almost say personality.

But it’s really more an attitude and an approach to music and to what it means to you. So if you’re the kind of musician who’s been learning for a while could be a few weeks, months, years, decades. And you’ve really been working hard at it, and you feel like you’ve been doing your part, you’ve been putting in the hours, you’ve been putting in the practice, and it’s just felt like a bit of a bumpy, slow journey.

First thing to say is just you’re not alone. And as I talk about this, you’ll probably hear the emotion coming through in my voice that I can relate to a lot of this. I’ll tell you a little bit about my backstory in a moment.

If we haven’t met before, but just to say I feel that pain when you’re devoted to music, and it just doesn’t seem to be getting you where you want to go. And I’m guessing, you know, your motivations come and gone a bit. You’ve set goals, and then sometimes you follow through on the plan, and sometimes you don’t.

And really at the heart of it, I think for the people who tend to find their way to us at Musical U and particularly into our membership community, there’s a real deep sense that you’re made for something bigger in music. And that’s not necessarily something you’d be willing to admit even to yourself. But there’s this feeling of the musician you want to be, the musician who can step into any musical situation with confidence and play something that sounds and feels great. And you feel the connection to that. Sometimes you can even feel what it would be like to be that kind of musician.

But chances are, if you’re like 99% of music learners out there, everything you’ve tried so far just doesn’t seem to be turning you into that kind of musician. And you probably wonder whether you’ve got enough talent or whether you’ve got what it takes to ever be that. That’s the kind of musician who tends to find their way to us at Musical U.

Sometimes, fortunately, very early in their journey and other times literally after decades of struggle. And where we step into the picture is to try and fill in what is almost always a missing piece of music education. You’ll hear us talk a lot here at Musical U about musicality, and it’s this sense of bringing the music out from inside yourself in an easy, natural, flowing way.

And there’s all kinds of definitions of musicality. If you check out our YouTube shorts and some of our other platforms, you’ll see we’ve had some fantastic music educators sharing their own answer to “what does ‘musicality’ mean to you?” It’s certainly not a question with one short answer. But I think we all have that instinctive sense of what it would be like to be more musical, be more naturally musical.

And so, in my own journey, I very much was that struggling music learner. I really had a lot of self doubt for two decades of learning music, and it was through my own journey of discovering what I would now call “musicality training”. Back in the day, I called part of it “ear training”, but really developing those inner skills that let you bring the music out from inside yourself in a creative and expressive way.

Through discovering that, I became more and more obsessed, I guess, and devoted to the idea of bringing this into the mainstream. And so Musical U as an organisation, we really exist in pursuit of a particular vision of the way we feel the world should be. And that is one in which every single person on the planet feels empowered and able to become that kind of natural, talented musician.

And I’ll talk in a minute. I think about the four pillar beliefs we have that tie in with that, but really, the world we see and the world we’re devoted to trying to create is one in which it’s not the talented musicians over there and then the hobbyists over here and then the people who think they’re tone deaf or unmusical over there. It really is one where we all feel connected to that deep, biological birthright of music making.

And so that’s our vision that we’re pursuing at Musical U, and we do it through the mission of creating the very best resources to help people prove to themselves that they’ve got what it takes and collaborating with other music educators and developing this community, this movement of musicians who are all in pursuit of this vision.

Like I said, we have four pillar beliefs at Musical U. And I think it’s really important, as we kind of reboot the show like this, to just lay those out briefly.

It’s fun, a bit of behind the scenes info. We have a new team member joining the team today, which is super exciting. And so later on on the team call, we’ll be running through these four pillar beliefs in more detail and just really kind of refreshing everyone’s awareness and commitment to them, because the idea is there can be all kinds of music organisations, music teachers, who actually are aligned with that same vision and maybe even have that same mission.

And we’ve been really fortunate over the last 14-15 years to collaborate and connect with a lot of these amazing people doing great work in music education. But these four beliefs, in a sense, they’re what set us apart from anyone else. This is how we pursue that mission.

So other people might be going after that same ideal of empowering the musician towards greater musicality, but we do it in particular with these four pillar beliefs.

The first one we call “musical inside and out”. And a moment ago, when I talked about, like, bringing the music out from inside you, that’s what this one is all about. The idea that being a musician, being musical, isn’t just about operating an instrument and making music out there in the world. It’s really about developing yourself so that it always feels like the music is coming out through an instrument or through your voice, from inside you into the real world.

The second pillar belief is “universal potential”. And this is a biggie because, you know, depending on your background, you may be very much ingrained in that mindset of talent, and I’ve got it or I don’t. And if I try and I can’t figure it out, it’s probably that I’m limited and I can’t do it. And this is a really fundamental belief for us that anybody has the potential to become that kind of incredible musician.

And it’s been so exciting over the last 14-15 years to see that again and again with all kinds of musicians, all kinds of limiting beliefs from background, all kinds of emotional, psychological baggage, all kinds of struggle in the past. And we see them make that transformation. And it just, you know, it makes it very easy for us to believe in universal potential because we see it day in, day out in our community. But I know from the outside that takes a bit of a leap of faith to open your mind to the possibility that you, too, could be musically talented.

The third pillar belief is “better together”, and this is a funny one for an introvert like myself to talk much about. I know I was a late convert and a slow convert, but this is really about the idea that learning music is not only more enjoyable, but much more effective when you do it in a community of like minded friends and peers and other musicians, as well as it means for us, collaborating with other organisations, other music educators, and really taking that collaborative approach rather than, like, competition mentality.

So you’re never going to hear us say, like, “don’t do that”, and “don’t go buy that person’s course” and “don’t do anything except Musical U”. We are always, always recommending and encouraging and connecting our members and our audience with other great resources, because it’s that spirit of better together. If we all work together and alongside one another, we can achieve that mission a lot quicker and a lot more easily.

And the fourth pillar, last but certainly not least, is “enjoying the journey”. We believe music, learning music, is a lifelong journey, and it’s one with endless, exciting horizons to explore. And it’s really important, particularly for adult learners, to remind ourselves it’s okay to enjoy that journey. And a lot of what we teach at musical u is done from that perspective of how can we make this not only ultra effective, but ultra enjoyable? And so that enjoying the journey pillar is really near and dear to our hearts. To make sure that you succeed and do it in a way that’s joyful throughout, not just when you get to some eventual end goal.

So that was just a brief intro to who we are, what we do, in case you’re new to us or in case this is a good refresher for you. Like I said, even inside the team, we review these things regularly to make sure that all our stuff is pointing in the right direction and based on these fundamental principles that we really, truly believe in. It’s funny for me to jump on live like this and kind of reboot the show, because in my head, in a way, we’ve only been on break for a week or two! And I know if you’re a podcast listener in particular, and if you haven’t been on our email list or seeing any of the other stuff we’ve been doing, it’s been two or three years, I think, since we put out our last official episode of Musicality Now.

And that kills me because this show was and is a passion project for me. It’s not the, you know, if I put my cold, hard business owner’s hat on, it’s not the easiest thing to justify in terms of resources. But I’ve always loved doing it and it brings such value to the people who love it.

And so it really was not an easy decision to put the show on hiatus. And like I say in my head, like, we’ve been paused for a week or two and we’ll get back to it tomorrow. And in reality, the last few years have been crazy and a lot of things have had to be put to one side or put on the back burner a while.

But what I’m really conscious of now, as we kind of spin things back up, is that if you haven’t been a member of Musical U and getting our weekly updates or you haven’t been on our email list, a LOT has happened since that last episode went out, and it’s kind of mind blowing how much has happened. So just like, a very brief nutshell catch up: Previously on Musicality Now – or on Musical U.

We developed a whole year-long transformational musicality program called Living Music and the team, our membership, were living and breathing this day in, day out for a year. Plus we went on to build The Fountain extension of it.

That whole thing sprang into fruition, I think, since that last episode went out, which is nuts. We’ve also launched our Next Level coaching program. You’ll be hearing more about that because we’ve got some really great content coming up from our Next Level coaches. But that’s a new program where you get one to one, help developing your musicality skills, developing your superlearning techniques, and really helping you in just one year, go from here to that vision of the musician you want to be.

We’ve also been hard at work writing a book, and that for legal reasons, I need to be careful to say it’s a working title of The Missing Manual. And that book has proved to be an epic and exciting and frustrating project. I know a lot of our community are waiting on tenterhooks for their copy of the book, and I’ve apologised before. I’ll apologise again for the delay, that the Missing Manual is, for now, missing. But I do want to assure you it’s in the works and on the episodes to come, I’m going to be sharing some of the behind the scenes, what’s been going on, where it’s at, what’s coming next, and give you some sneak peeks of that content so that you can be up to date on the latest. Because when that thing ships, it’s going to be utterly worth the wait is all I can say.

We’ve also been hard at work on a membership site revamp, improving how people get started when they come into the site, how we navigate, all that good stuff that we know our members are eagerly waiting for. And we’ve actually recently been developing a whole new membership offering. I need to be cautious what I reveal just yet, but we do have some big announcements coming up in May and in June about that membership opportunity that I know. In a sense, it kind of fills the gap between our current membership and the Next Level coaching program in a really exciting way.

So a lot of stuff in the works and part of why I’m so excited to go live in this way is that in the past when we did podcast episodes, they were very kind of produced and edited and released, and that was great in a way, but there wasn’t really much room for keeping you guys in the loop. And so people kind of, I often heard that, you know, people were a bit confused why they got membership updates over here, and then they got email list updates over there, and then the podcast didn’t talk about the thing at all. And, you know, it felt like we weren’t communicating directly in a coherent way, I think, at times. And so these lives are a great way for me to share some of that behind the scenes and very directly with you live, where we can interact and you can participate, and we can make sure you’re always in the loop. Whether you’re a member or you’re not, you’ll know what’s coming up.

So the idea is to go live like this, most likely daily for the foreseeable future. Because I know something we talk about a lot of Musical U is the importance of momentum and staying inspired and motivated in your training. And there’s just nothing like a daily habit for that.

So I’m excited to jump on live with you each day and have this chance to connect and chance to share stuff with you. And the plan is that we’ll then chop the livestream recording up into YouTube videos and podcast episodes. So if you’re listening to this on the podcast or on our YouTube channel, that’s already happened.

But just know that you can also join us live. I would love, love that. Or if you’re watching this live and you’re just a devoted podcast listener, just know the goodies will be coming to the podcast feed in due course.

So I would love to see as many live here as possible. Because if nothing else, it gives me the feedback I need to make sure we continue to put out the best stuff for you and really, the going live. It’s also just about, like I said, that clear, direct communication.

And in all honesty, it’s about me being a bit more visible. Again, it’s really funny. I hear comments sometimes, like “where’s Christopher? We haven’t seen Christopher in a while”.

And it’s funny to me because I’m, you know, I’m living and breathing Musical U all day, every day for the last 15 years. And the team know that. And to some extent, our members know that, and they see me at the month, monthly masterclass of and so on.

But because we have such a phenomenal team at this point, like, it’s not me on the drop-in calls, it’s not me on the instrument pack calls, it’s not me on the monthly Q-and-A. And because we haven’t been putting out podcast episodes and YouTube videos, I know, I can understand why they’d be like, “where’s Christopher gone?”. And particularly, again, if you’re someone who’s just been listening to the audio podcast, and then it disappeared for a while, you might be like, “where’s Musical U gone?!” And so I really, I felt it was time for me to be a bit more visible again.

And so what you can expect is I’m going to be acting kind of as your host, your live host, day by day. And we’ve got a lot of really great stuff lined up for me to share with you, and some of it is pre-recorded. We’ve been stashing away really good stuff for months now, and some of it is going to be just live solo episodes.

I’ll be bringing on some really cool guests, people from the team, other music education experts, all kinds of we’ve got some really, really cool guests lined up that I’m not allowed even to hint at yet, but I’ll be joined on the show live by various people. But we also have, like mini-interviews with the guest experts who’ve been coming into Musical U over the last year or two. We also have excerpts from their masterclasses which are going to give you a peek into the great stuff they presented.

And like I mentioned earlier, we’ve actually been doing this fortnightly thing with our Next Level coaches called Coaches Corner, which has been one of the most fun things for me over the last few months. I basically get together with our coaches and I say, you know “what’s one amazing thing that’s happened in your coaching recently?” And it just creates this really awesome kind of grab-bag of tactics and ideas and techniques, and some of them are mindset and some of them are very practical and it’s just, it’s proven to be a really fun format. And we haven’t released those episodes yet. We’ve just released little snippets from them and so I’m going to be sharing those as well in the weeks ahead as well as, like I said, behind the scenes info and sneak peeks of the missing manual and what’s been going on and so really, really exciting stuff lined up for you in the days and weeks and months ahead.

Speaking of sneak peeks and behind the scenes, I wanted you guys to be the first to hear about something exciting that’s coming up. So this is, just for today, it’s just to save the date.

But on Saturday, the 4 May at 4 p.m. UK time, which I think is 11 a.m. Eastern in and I’m literally forbidden from doing anything related to timezones in the company because despite my attention to detail kind of personality, I always screw it up.

So you’ll get a more official announcement, but I’m pretty sure it’s going to be at 4 p.m. UK time, 11 a.m. Eastern, Saturday the 4 May we’re going to have a really special live training.

We’ve been developing these new ways to help you unlock what’s been holding you back and what you could achieve in music. And some of it we’ve never shared outside of Next Level coaching or just conversations in the team. And so this training is going to be the first time we’re kind of teaching this stuff and sharing it with you.

It’s going to be an interactive workshop kind of format, probably just an hour or so long, but my goal is to, to make that hour of your time as intensely mind expanding as possible. And so if you’re devoted to music, this is something you’re not going to want to miss. This is your early save the date and we’ll be following up by email.

And I’ll mention more on these livestreams over the next week or two because it’s coming up quick in two weeks. So “Star Wars Day”, May 4th, that’s Saturday the 4 May at 4 p.m. UK time, 11 a.m. Eastern I think: save the date. I would love to see you all there.

So that’s what I wanted to cover on today’s episode.

Really just a welcome back to the show, a little explanation about how these are going to be going out live in the days and weeks ahead. I am really glad to be here with you live. I hope you’re enjoying it as well and I look forward to engaging with you in the comments.

If you’re watching the replay, I’ll be checking the comments after and responding to any questions or suggestions there. So do keep that feedback coming. You can also email [email protected], I always love to hear where you’re watching the show, what you want more of, what you want less of what you have enjoyed in the past that we should bring back. Do let me know and we’ll make sure we get this as valuable for you as possible.

So join me again live same time tomorrow for the first of our new series of mini interviews with someone I absolutely love. And you’re going to love him too. So join me again tomorrow.

I will see you then. Cheers.

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