Author: socajai

Become Familiar, Not Good

Insight!

Practice to become more “familiar” with the material, not to get “good” at it. Assume the getting good part, and focus on really “knowing” the material. Becoming aware if it, and, simply becoming very familiar with it. Intimately aware, like you are old, old friends, or hey, family. Hey! Familiar, family! Yup. There ya go.

The body with execute with ease if it is allowed to. Let it travel down well worn roads, in a favorite old pair of sneakers.

Focus is the challenge, especially if you been playing for years and years. You don’t realize how little your attention is really trained on the task at hand. You’ve gotten good enough to sale through a lot, fooling many, even most, including yourself.

You just want to be efficient and get “good” fast. After all, you’ve got a gig to do in 3 days or whatever. Focus. Become familiar. Good happens.

 

Have Concrete Goals

If possible, set real, quantifiable, attainable goals.

This mean that you’ve seen or heard someone do or perform whatever you goal is. Whether it’s local or a legend, if it has been done by another human, you can possibly attain it.  At least in guitar technique. I’m not talking about dunking and things of that nature, there are limits imposed by size and gravity.  But, even then, there are those who have managed to attain what most said was impossible. I don’t believe there are these types of physical limits on musical skill, if you’re an average person with no disabilities.  I could be wrong. This is one of the things I aim to discover.

For example, I’ve seen and heard plenty of legendary gypsy jazzers perform triplet picking, down-up-down, down-up-down, etc across strings at 200bpm. Eight note triplets at 200 bpm.  This rate also coincides with 16th notes at 150 bpm.

So, both of these are my goals and they are measurable.  I set exercises, licks, patterns that I aim to bring to these tempos.

Real. You’ve witnessed it in one form or another.
Quantifiable. Can be measured.  BPM. Or playalong at speed with recording, or Etude at verified tempo.
Attainable. Again, you’ve witnessed another human being doing it. Theoretically, you should with proper work be able to attain it.

It may take a long time. It may take many different paths to uncover the method, secret tricks. You may have to unlearn many things first.  These are all subjects for other posts.

Some people love the metronome, some hate it.  I think it’s both great and bad. My advice, use it, but not exclusively.  Use it to measure.  Turn it on, and turn it off. I will weigh in on the great metronome debate eventually.

Definitely play along with recordings. This is an opportunity to play with great masters. You may learn by osmosis.

Measure your progress in a small notebook. Keep track of dates and tempos.

Be consistent and patient.

And don’t try to do too much at once.

 

 

Sound is Everything – Tone

Focus on tone.

Listen deeply to what you are practicing. Think good tone. Let your body do it. It will adjust.  (You may have to stop and study why good tone is not being produced, depending on your level and experience. )

I often multitask or let my mind wander. I have found this may be the single biggest mistake I have made. Tuning out, just repeating, letting my mind wander, hoping that when I tune back in, the sound will be there. I am often deluded into thinking that I am still tuned in, but I am not. It takes effort.

If you are bored, listen more deeply. If still bored, changed the pattern you are practicing. Or the exercise. Do a circuit.

When you tune out, return your thoughts to the tone.  Speed will come. Other exercises focused on speed on used.

Focus on tone.  Speed without tone is worthless. If you can hear the notes, it doesn’t matter how fast they are.

Focus on tone, not technique. Think sound. Let the technique happen. Much other practice is spent on technique. Especially with the mirror. Spend much time on tone.

You will learn the sounds more deeply. They will be useful in your improvisation and composition if you know them intimately, by sound.

Take breaks. Concentration is hard.

 

some thoughts on practicing

  1. Every session. Find mistake. Ask why? Create exercise to remedy. Reintroduce to tune
  2. Have a clear target. Not just a goal, a target. Goals seem too broad. A target is narrow and precise.
  3. 10,000 kicks
  4. Pick a good hammer. Choose a few choice tools/devices/licks and make everything a nail. It seems to be what the great improvisers of old did.
  5. Listen Deeply when you practice.
  6. Belief may be essential. You have to believe you are special. You have to believe you are magic. But, it must be uncovered. It is buried deep beneath much rock and clay. You must dig it out. Dig most every day.  Some days, rest.
  1. Practice is for practice. Don’t spend too much time on stuff you already know, except to warm up.
  2. Forwards and Backwards. Creates variety and the ability to use the device elsewhere. Scales, fragments, licks, etc.
  3. Rehearsals are not individual practice time, they are focused on ensemble playing. Get you stuff together on your own time.
  4. Guitar is an athletic endeavor, especially if you play acoustic, in particular gypsy.
  5. Relax
  6. No, Seriously, Relax
  7. Muscle it. Contrary to the relax. You need to develop volume and tension. Then maybe you can blend the two. But volume won’t seem to happen without it.
  8. Use metronome- to mark progress and push yourself.
  9. push yourself
  10. relax
  11. push
  12. Have fast days and slow days. Don’t try extented fast every day, you will hurt yourself. Don’t only do slow days, you will never get fast.
  13. Don’t use metronome. Forcing yourself to listen more closely to articulation and rhythm without metronome covering anything or making it sound more driving than it really is.
  14. Different strokes for different folks. Getting to the same place as others may take a different path for you. Depends on which habits you need to correct.
  15. Practice can be meditation. Single-minded focus.
  16. Real practice is hard.
  17. You can’t just flail away and hope fir the best. You must dig into the nitty gritty. It’s taxing.
  18. Record or use play alongs. They can be a great help and barometer.

  19. “Adapt what is useful, reject what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.” -Bruce Lee (Bruce Lee Quotes)

  20. “I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who had practiced one kick 10,000 times.” -Bruce Lee

  21. “It’s not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential.”  ~Bruce Lee
  22. “Rule number one: for speed you must compromise volume. There is no other way, you can’t play ultra-fast and ultra-loud at the same time.” Thomas Lang
  23. Take a walk. A walk makes everything better.
  24. Areas of developement:
    1. Muscle development
      1. RH
      2. LH
    2. Scale patterns
      1. LH patterns
      2. RH patters
      3. symetry between both
    3. Arpeggios
      1. LH
      2. RH
      3. Symetry