Description
Book SynopsisChoosing a career is one of the most important decisions we make in our lifetime. Career choice is more than working to earn a living but also an important window into how we identify and feel about ourselves. There are multiple issues involved in every career choice, particularly in the pursuit of a career in music performance.
Influenced by her hybrid background in music performance, psychology, and psychoanalysis, Julie Jaffee Nagel addresses the joys and challenges of career choice in music, with a specific focus upon the classical performing musician. She addresses a wide range of pressing topics related to such a career choice at a time when jobs and income for musicians are diminishing and COVID-19 has had a monumental, long-term impact on the arts. This includes feelings of burnout, career change and redirection, the need for self-care, mental health issues related to the lack of jobs and income, and the oftentimes crippling standards of professional performing musicians.
In addition, Nagel also points to potential opportunities and advocates new roles for musicians in the wake of a transformed music industry and society. Despite the numerous challenges performing musicians face in their careers, music can play a powerful role in mental life and society, helping us cope with the ravages and losses of the pandemic and other important events, and this can serve as much inspiration and reinvigorate professional musicians questioning the purpose of their career. All of these themes are developed through stories, clinical examples, anecdotes, research data, and personal reflection.
Trade ReviewJulie Nagel knows the field as a trained musical performer and a practicing clinician who is an international authority on work inhibition and performance block. There is none better!
-- Peter Loewenberg, history and political psychology, professor emeritus, University of California Los Angeles
Table of ContentsPrelude
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1 Work
Chapter 2 Musicians and Money in the Wake of the Pandemic
Some Financial Facts: A Wake Up Call
What Do Musicians Contribute?
The Musician as “Product”
Creative Responses to the Pandemic
Why Should You Care About Music?
Your Money or Your Life
Chapter 3 Musical Development and Psychological Development
Erik Erikson: Development Over a Lifetime
“Ratios”: Life as a Balancing Act
Carolyn’s Monkey
Erikson’s Eight Stages for the Musician
Early Stages (ages 1-4)
Middle Stages (ages 5-7)
Late Stage: Stage 8 (ages 65+)
Chapter 4 The Meaning of Money and “Psychic Income”
Early Issues about Giving and Receiving
Attention and Money: Symbolic Nourishment
What Do Money and Stage Fright Share in Common?
How Much are You Worth?
Patrons and Angels
Buying Love
Nourishing Starving Artists
Chapter 5 Four Types of Personality Who Seek Music Careers
The Identity Status Interview
The Four Categories of the ISI
What Does ISI Data Explain?
Ken: Integrating Past and Present
Conclusion: Research and Clinical Work
Chapter 6 Pursuit of Perfection
The Disillusionment of Omnipotence
Growing Pains and Emotional Growth
Pursuit of Perfection: All the Right Notes
Ms. G
Mr. D
Resolution of Disillusionment: Grieving, Mourning, and Moving Forward
Chapter 7 The Golden Allure of Celebrity: Reflections on Boundary Crossings in Psychoanalysis and Music
Planning for the Big Meeting
Temptations
Deeply Disappointed
The #MeToo Movement and Music Education
A “Perfect Storm”: Private Music Lessons
A Rescue through “Love”
A Higher Cost for Education
Institutional Collusions
The Bad Apple Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree
Treatment Issues
Coda
Chapter 8 Rethinking Music Education
Asked and (as Yet) Unanswered Questions
Teaching Talented Musicians: The University and Conservatory
Nurturing Healthy Musicians
How to Destroy Creativity in Music Students: A Paraphrase of Otto Kernberg
Educating Healthy People Who Are Musicians
A Healthy Music Profession
Chapter 9 Music and Mind Outside the Box
The Value of Music: Past and Future
The Impact of Music: Historical Precedents
Musicians and Mental Health Professionals as Non-Traditional First Responders
Music and Therapy in and beyond the Consulting Room
Beyond the Teaching Studio and Concert Hall
Has Anything Good Resulted from the Pandemic?
A Conclusion and a Beginning
About the Author
