From the Facebook:

So last night’s living room concert was awesome fun, though to be honest, I felt a little rusty. I’m noticing that this feeling really has a lot to do with the degree to which I feel fully free in expressing the emotion of a song. And last night I felt ever-so-slightly constrained. Could’ve been the tight quarters of a crowded living room, or the boots I was wearing (a little too tight and slippery on the floor), but I also think it had to do with not rehearsing as much as I’d’ve liked. Since I was packing up and getting ready for the roadtrip, I hadn’t been practicing/rehearsing so much. Part of consistent rehearsal is lubricating the muscle memory to make the mechanical part of the performance something that doesn’t take much mental energy. But I also don’t think it’s a zero-sum game, where there’s only X energy units to be shared between playing and emoting the song. I do think it’s about being able to fully connect with the emotion behind/in a song. Anyway, in rehearsals for the show, I noticed varying degrees to which I was able to fully let it rip and I was “on”, and other times when I stumbled. After last night’s performance, I am eager to take on a practice of performing with/from/in a context of “everything/all or nothing” instead of “pushing myself to do my best”. It’s a subtle shift, but I like the emphasis (and the experience) of fully revealing the emotive energy behind every song – of focusing expressing the energy instead of the structure of the music, if that makes sense. I do it to varying degrees all the time (I think this is true for many musicians, but I could be wrong), but I think my point is to declare this new practice in rehearsing and performance. So there. from the Ian Rhett Music Facebook page
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