1st International Piano Competition
The Masterclasses
D.ssa Laura Darsie
Making music involves a total involvement of body, mind and heart and there are many factors that expose musicians, especially professionals, to the accumulation of tensions and discomforts on both a physical, psychological and emotional level. It can happen that much-loved art turns into a source of stress. This can happen both in preparation for an exam, or in view of a performance or a concert: there can be many factors that combine to transform the pleasure of “making music” into a source of anxiety and stress. The consequences of excessive training and perfectionism can be different and, at times, painful on a psychophysical level.
Here in these cases, the discipline of Mindfulness can act in the professional musician, as a mental discipline which, through a meta-cognitive awareness of the present moment, focused on the interaction between mind and body, can prevent mental suffering and important disorders such as ” focal dystonia” and other painful syndromes of poor sensorimotor learning, to the point of compromising correct posture, movement coordination and, in the worst case, proprioception and neuromotor control.
The practice of Mindfulness is a body awareness meditation path inspired by the scientific protocol Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) by John Kabat-Zinn, professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, an expression of medical and psychotherapeutic research – mindbody medicine – which sees body and mind as a unity to be understood without rigid divisions. This is a methodology which, when applied to the musical field, allows the acquisition of body awareness aimed at managing anxiety and reducing stress during periods of musical preparation and performance at a high performance level.
Through the progressive acquisition of mindfulness practice exercises which occur through body scanning, breathing exercises and sensorimotor awareness – the musician develops a progressive and conscious bodily adherence to his musical instrument through the release of tensions and greater concentration on the score with respect to the passages techniques that are difficult to execute.
On the level of musical practice, mindfulness is thus oriented towards a “conscious” practice of the musical instrument, in the development of psycho-physical strategies for the neuromotor ability of the fine joints and muscles. This will allow the musician to learn a valid method of training the mind in the approach to the score, aimed at improving the attentional functions of concentration and aimed at emotional self-regulation, thus leading to the overcoming of emotional blocks and a reduction of anxiety and stress in performance.
The teaching of MINDFULNESS for MUSICIANS offers the possibility of knowing and experiencing mindfulness and its benefits on the musician’s psyche and on his system of self-regulation of emotions in musical performances. It can be defined as a practice of conscious attention with ancient roots, a way to come into deep contact with oneself, useful for awakening innate resources and coping with stressful situations. The therapeutic and liberating power of this state of mental presence is increasingly at the center of scientific interest and research in clinical, social, educational, work and personal care fields.
With a very specific protocol now adopted by many hospitals in the United States, the systematic practice of awareness (Mindfulness) – understood as the ability to bring attention in an intentional, open and non-judgmental way to the present moment – has proven itself in recent decades , a valid method for managing and reducing stress, both in the clinical and neurological fields, but above all in those professional fields in which the complex emotional management of a high level of stress can seriously compromise the performative aspect of the profession.
The most recent studies in the field of cognitive neuroscience of music have shown structural and functional changes in the brain in musicians and non-musicians, in all its components, both cortical and subcortical nuclei, suggesting that the effects of mindfulness meditation involve networks brain on a large scale. Neuroimaging techniques in relation to mindfulness practice have revealed an improvement in cognitive performance, in the ability to concentrate, in the emotional self-regulation system to the point of leading to a considerable reduction in the activity of the amygdala which, in the limbic system of the brain, represents our control unit of emotions.
– Participants are advised to bring a mat, a small pillow, a light blanket, comfortable clothing, non-slip socks. Ground practices are foreseen.
SUPPORT EDUCATIONAL MATERIAL:
Laura Darsié is a pianist, psychologist and psychoanalyst. She is a mindfulness instructor and currently teaches “Techniques of expression and body awareness” at the Claudio Abbado Civic School of Music in Milan and the Giacomo Puccini Conservatory in Gallarate. She is also Mindfulness Educator and Mindfulness Instructor (Ministry of Health for health professions and International Practitioners of Holistic Medicine (IPHM) in the study of the application of Mindfulness protocols in clinical psychology.
With a Freudian-Lacanian background, she was a founding member of the Freudian Knots psychoanalytic movement of Milan and a member of Opifer (an organization of Italian psychoanalysts with a registered federation). Today she is part of the board of directors of the Academy of Conversational Techniques of Milan and is a member of the Milanese Society of Psychoanalysis. She belongs to the GIRN (interprofessional rehabilitation group in neuropsychology. She graduated in Philosophy at the Catholic University of Milan and subsequently in Clinical Rehabilitation Psychology.
Over the years, his profession has taken place both in the private sector – as a clinical activity in affective disorders and in the psychological rehabilitation of the subject, expressed in the formulation of personalized paths – and in the public sector in collaboration with the Department of Public Education of Florence (from the Psychoanalysis workshops of musical fairy tales with primary school children, to the training of teachers in the activities of the Keys to the City). He worked with families and carried out supervision activities for musical and theater groups with the ETI (Italian theater organization – see publications for the Teatro della Pergola) in the field of disability. She conducted seminars on the Psychoanalysis of Music for the General Psychology course at the University of Genoa and was a teacher of Freudian Readings and Psychoanalysis of Music at the Erich Fromm School of Psychotherapy in Prato. He has also held several workshops and conferences on the relationships between Music, the Unconscious and Neuroscience at the Accademia Musicale in Florence, at the MaMu (Magazzino Musica) in Milan and at the Salotto di Filosofia sui Navigli. In recent years he has participated, as a member of the scientific committee and speaker, in the programmatic conferences of “Neuroscience and Music” (partnership with the Catholic University of Milan, the Besta Institute, the Maugeri Institute, the University of Pavia, the Mariani Foundation, Magazzino Musica Milan).
She was a professor of Neuromusicology and Psychoanalysis of music for the project “Making music and feeling good” at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan in the academic year 2019-2020. Currently his psychoanalytically oriented clinical practice and his research focus on the relationship between the unconscious and neuroscience with respect to the rehabilitative potential of music in psychological disorders and clinical pathologies. A training that specifically finds particular application in the psychological treatment of the musician’s focal dystonia and in “psychomusical” paths (see The Harmonious Womb) with expectant mothers, focused on the “sonic bond” that accompanies gestation. She also collaborates with the EAWBC (European Association Women Band Conductors) in conducting courses in Neuromusicology (Embodied Music Cognition) and Mindfulness courses aimed at the well-being and training of professional musicians in orchestras.
During her training in rehabilitation psychology she acquired the MBSR protocol with Alessandra Pollina – Mindfulness therapist, student of Jon Kabat Zin (University of Massachusetts – USA) – at the Careggi Hospital in Florence. She is also a Mindfulness Educator and Mindfulness instructor (Ministry of Health for health professions and International Practitioners of Holistic Medicine (IPHM) in the study of the application of Mindfulness protocols in clinical psychology.
He has published several essays and writes in specialized magazines. Lives and works in Milan.