Musicians practice for many things: learning notes, rhythms, fingerings, choreography, bowing, breathing, articulation, phrasing, balancing, and much more. Yet the most important result of effective practice is the transformation from fear into confidence, from uncertainty into security. When that understanding motivates and clarifies practice, all else falls into place. Confidence does not banish negative emotions like nervousness, stress, self-consciousness. Instead, it assumes the development of coping processes, so the discoveries made in practice become consistently accessible.A passage lacking fluency doesn’t become miraculously better through a lucky performance. If we know it’s lucky, we don’t trust it. If we don’t trust it, we can’t rely on it. Conversely, a passage whose success has been scrutinized and subjected to various executional variables will be trusted precisely because we understand how and why it works, and what to do and think to recall it. That trust allows for the accommodation of slight mishaps: when the overall intent, shape, and gesture of a passage is secure, small slips will not impede musical persuasion.This session will demonstrate ways to determine the effectiveness of practice. We’ll indulge in examining minutiae, those little bits of gesture and thought necessary to the fulfilment of bigger elements. We’ll view the misrepresentations of physical and musical realities in scores (like beams, barlines, physical connections, and durations) to help determine the real underlying technical, musical, and strategic demands of the music.We’ll confront frustration. Of all the emotions that can interfere with successful practice, frustration is probably at the top of the list. A well-trained musician confronts a difficulty as a challenge: a chance to analyze what is difficult, and particularly, a chance to break down the issue into smaller, trustworthy parts. Frustration interferes with the confidence we develop not only in our talent, but in our methods for dealing with challenge. Successful practice requires the recognition of that negative feeling and notes that the right point-of-view can transcend it with patience, insight, and a willingness (even eagerness) to keep exploring.Practice based on confidence-building provides its own natural reward. What was uneasy becomes dependable. What was untrustworthy becomes performable precisely because the successful discoveries result in heightened clarity and assurance.