I never understood or tried to deal with my tendency to critique myself in the midst of a performance until Genevieve Anderson pointed the problem out to me.

She said, “Frankly, I’m already hard enough on you. Don’t try and do my job for me!”

Instead, she had a great way of letting me go until I’d used up all my leash…THEN she would pull me back, reorient me and let me go again.

It could be SO painstaking at times, but SO worthwhile come performance time.

For just before it was time to go on stage she would come to me and say, “You’re off the leash now. I’ll be here in the wings. Now show me what you’ve learned about yourself.”

As I’ve had the opportunity to produce a few vocal sessions for newcomers to studio recording, it’s very easy to see when they’ve brought the bogeyman into the booth with them.

Helping them get beyond that is one of the most satisfying things I get the chance to do in production.

Everything else is the engineer…;^)