2017-02-13 23:49:39 +00:00
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{"title": "Rehearsal Agenda for Jan. 3rd, 2017"}
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2017-02-13 23:19:26 +00:00
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2017-01-03 20:08:16 +00:00
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### Warm up, getting settled.
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Start practice with the first band member starting some groove, or small piece.
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As others come, they join, make up a part, check levels, etc.
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### Quick summary of band goals.
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The main band is optimized for experience musicians. There are some habits that
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make it difficult for new members to jump in. For example:
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* Song selection changes on short notice.
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* Material is given on short notice and not always entirely accurate.
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* There are lots of songs to learn.
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We need new people rotating into the music ministry in order to keep it
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healthy, but jumping directly into the primary band is not the an easy task. We
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need a different format that gives intermediate players and new members a
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chance to get up to speed with the music. That's what this band is intended to
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be. We are not creating a new, separate band in the music program but a new
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format to introduce new members and experiment with new practice methods.
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This band is pursuing excellence through rigorous preparation. We will:
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* Have songs chosen a month in advance,
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* Have accurate material available from the beginning in the correct key,
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* Prepare the song order in advance,
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* Not make changes to the song selection or material,
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* Have an agenda for each practice, and
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* Emphasize personal practice for learning parts.
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For band members we will have lead sheets with all the chord changes recorded
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and any runs notated. For the vocalists we will have individual parts recorded.
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For both we will have reference material. We want to make personal practice
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time meaningful so we won't make changes that waste the time our members have
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spent practicing.
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Our goal for every song will be first to be able to play it as well as the
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recording. Of course it will take time to develop that level, but that is the
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goal. First we will learn the music as it was written, and play it as close as
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possible to the original. Once we know the song inside and out we may begin to
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play with it as a band, but our first goal is to duplicate the professional
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sound.
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Ultimately the goals of this band are:
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* To develop a new culture of excellence through preparation at New Life,
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* Give new members an entry point to the New Life music program,
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* Create a place for people to learn new skills (or learn a new instrument),
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and
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* Prepare people to transition to regularly playing in the regular rotation.
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### Choose new songs
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### Short summary of my musical philosophy
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There are lots of different approaches to music. I'm going to massively simplify
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and distill down to two extremes. There are extremes, not actually what happens:
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1. Musical performance is a highly coordinated effort and the goal is to create
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a specific sound in concert. Replicating perfectly a pre-defined part is
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ideal.
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2. Musical performance is a form of self-expression and the goal is to
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communicate the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of the musician.
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Creating music that is honest about the feelings of the performer is ideal.
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Classical, orchestral music is the stereotype of the first model. The individual
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musicians subordinate their individual expression to the purpose and goal of the
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broader band. You have a part to play and you do not deviate from that part.
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Jazz is the stereotype of the second model where an emphasis is placed on the
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improvisation of the members. Often the written music serves only as a
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guideline or structural base for what the musicians will play.
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Of course, these are simplifications. Actual musical performance lives in
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between these extremes. In the orchestral setting obviously emotional playing is
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crucial to the performance, but it's happening on the level of the group, not
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the individual. And in jazz you still have structure, even if it is emergent:
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not scripted. Any time you have more than one person playing you have to have
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some sort of syncronization. There is a reason that you very rarely see large
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groups of player all improvising at the same time. Look at big band jazz, for
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example, and you see a lot of the same structure as the orchestra!
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So where do we sit? Well, close to the middle, I think. We have music that we
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are asked to play. But this is not just a performance. We are part of the
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worship service so our playing is a personal expression to some extent. Music is
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part of how I express myself to the Lord, how I worship Him. A lot of that
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happens on the platform here.
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But, we are also leading the congregation in worship. It is not purely about our
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self-expression of praise to God, but also about creating an atmosphere that
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makes it easy for members of the congregation to express their praise and
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worship. We do this as a part of a larger team. I'm working together with the
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other musicians, and with the praise singers.
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In many ways a worship team can be more free-flowing and improvisational than a
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typical band, because it is this expression of worship. At the same time that
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freedom of expression exists within the larger context of the church body. In 1
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Corinthians Paul talked about the body of Christ:
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> **12** Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts
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> form one body, so it is with Christ. **13** For we were all baptized by one
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> Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we
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> were all given the one Spirit to drink. **14** Even so the body is not made up
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> of one part but of many.
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> **24b** God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that
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> lacked it, **25** so that there should be no division in the body, but that
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> its parts should have equal concern for each other. **26** If one part
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> suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part
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> rejoices with it.
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This truth applies in the context of music as well!
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*Purpose for this section: setup the motivation for growth. Frame the musician
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as a thinking, feeling agent in the music-making process. All individually
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responsible for the collective end-result.*
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### Attitudes of the Musician
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* Humility: we are all in service to the music.
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* Curiosity
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* Playfulness
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* Tastefullness/Discernment
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### Paying attention/levels of thinking.
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There is this guy, Benjamin Bloom, who categorized educational goald into six levels of thinking:
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1. gathering knowledge
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2. comprehending and confirming
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3. applying knowledge
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4. analyzing: thinking about a whole in terms of it's various parts
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5. synthesizing: putting parts together to form a whole, many parts into a new
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whole
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6. evaluating: making comparisons and judgements. What worked best?
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I know a lot of what I'm sayin some of you already know. It's easy to zone out.
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I know because I catch myself doing it all the time. Instead, let's pay active
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attention, even to the things we know. Work your way up the levels. If you've
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already mastered what I'm saying, be analyzing it, or evaluating it. Maybe you
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have something to contribute.
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### On Practice
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*Discuss my views on "Natural Talent" vs practice & hard work.*
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Effective practice:
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* has well-defined, specific goals,
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Aimless exploration has a place, and just playing for fun has a place. Those
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are great, and I'm not saying you shouldn't do them. I probably spend just as
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much time playing for fun as I do actually practising, because I like playing
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music. But that's not practice. The point of practice is to improve something.
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When we do sit down to practice, we should have a clear, measurable goal. For
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example, I want to learn the chorus pattern from Glorious by Martha Munizzi.
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Or I want to improve my sense of rythym. Good goal, how are you going to
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measure it? I'm going to choose some rythmic pattern and play it along with a
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metronome. I'll record myself and that's how I'll judge my progress.
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* is focused,
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Practice is not always fun. Y'all are all adults, so this is probably
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something you have already learned. I learned to enjoy practice because I
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enjoy the results. I try to choose things the practice that I like doing. But
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even then, often I don't want to get started. Practice needs to be focused,
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with effort.
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* incorporates immediate feedback,
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Again, the whole point of practice is specifically to improve something. The
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time we spend practicing affects how we play. When I was in band in school we
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had practice logs. You had to practice so long a week and get your parents to
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sign off on your time. You would sometimes see these kids who would have a
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full sheet, but still play horribly.
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"Did you practice?"
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"Yeah"
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"How did you practice?"
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"I don't know, I just played the music."
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What happened is they just mindlessly played through the music over and over,
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not paying particular attention to how *well* they played it. They'd practiced
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for hours playing it poorly, so of course when they performed they played it
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poorly. When you are practicing, if you make a mistake, stop and immediately
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correct it. This is why many teachers tell you to play it slow first until you
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have it correctly, then speed up. You will play the way you practice, so make
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sure you practice it correctly!
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But this goes beyond just am I playing the right notes. This is where
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tastefulness and discernment come into play. When I personally practice I am
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constantly asking myself, "Do I like what I just played?" or put another way:
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"If I was in the band recording this for a record, would I be proud of it?"
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How does it compare to the original artists? Does it sound good? Is it good?
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This requires that you have good musical taste and discernment!
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It's also very subjective, and I've found that there is a difference between
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how things *feel* while you're playing, and how they *sound* as a listener.
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So, one of your best practice aids is a small audio recorder. Record yourself
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as you practice, then play it back and listen to yourself critically. Be mean!
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This requires courage! You have to be able to say, "OK, that sucked, but I'll
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get better." Don't quit playing. It can be easy to get drowned in all the
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things you did wrong, but if you can learn to ignore how far you have to go
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and focus on what--specifically--you can improve, then you are in a good
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place. Comes back to humility.
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Here are some of the kinds of things that I have noticed in my own playing
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when doing this:
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* My timing is off.
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* I'm wrong on some of the notes in that run.
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* It doesn't feel like it does when Y plays it. He sounds so smooth, my run
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sounds jerky/stilted/not grooving.
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* I'm not getting the dynamics quite right.
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* He's playing some other stuff I missed when I first learned this. I need to
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go back and re-listen again now that I know the line better to pick up
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those subtle differences
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* They're voicing this chord a little different than I am.
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* The tone of his bass is different and sounds better in this situation. What
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is it about that tone and how do I replicate that? Is he playing that part
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higher on the neck?
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Then you identify how to fix that, and work on it. This is where a teacher, or
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others can help. I'm happy to offer ideas about how to practice things
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The key is, you need to get immediate feedback and address it. Working with a
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teacher is great because they can offer feedback based on their greater
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experience, but to maximize the effectiveness of your practice you need to be
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evaluating yourself as you practice.
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* pushes the boundaries of your comfort zone.
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If you are practicing something that you are already really good at then you
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are not improving. The point of practice is to improve something. That means
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you have to work on something that needs improvement.
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Howver, it is possible to overreach. You need to work something that is far
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enough outside your comfort zone that you have to strecth, but not so far that
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you can't reach it at all. We want to fail, but be able to learn from the
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failures.
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You can and should adjust the difficulty of your practice on your own to find
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the sweet spot. Too easy and you don't progress. Too hard and it's no fun,
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it's frustrating, you burn out, and you don't progress.
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Learn to simplify. For example, if I'm learning a new song on drums, first I
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may try to get the basic pattern and stick to basic fills. Then when I can
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easily keep the tempo steady and navigate the fills without drifting from the
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tempo, I'll learn the accents that the drummer who recorded it added. Then I'll
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work on the specific fills they used.
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Or on bass, first I'll learn the basic bass line based on the chord
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progression. Then I'll listen for alterations the original bassist added. Then
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I'll work on unison runs they do. Then I'll listen for ornamentation that the
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original bassist added and try to learn that.
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If I'm learning a run or a hard passage, I'll slow it down to where I can play
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it comfortably. Then I'll bump it up 5bpm at a time until it's hard but
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doable. Then I'll practice that, correctly. If it's too fast for me to play
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correctly, I'll slow down until it is easy at the slower tempo and possible at
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the faster tempo. Keep going until it is easy at the original tempo. Now I
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have the lick, and more generally, I've added all the patterns from that lick
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to my muscle memory. I can re-use the lick, or parts of the lick in other
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places. Maybe I'll even practice that.
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Practicing time: practice with a click. Set the click to 1-2-3-4. Practice
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your rythym. Now put the click at half the tempo, and make it only 1 and 3. Do
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it again. Same tempo, but put the click on 2 and 4 now. Do it again. Half the
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click again, only on 1. Again, only on 2, then only on 3, then only on 4. Take
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these excercises and vary the tempo. How slow can you go (in small increments)
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and still keep the tempo steady? How fast? It's not about showing off to
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yourself, it's about pushing your boundaries. If you feel like you have really
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solid time, push yourself more. Can you put the click on just the 8th after 1
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and 3? Move it around on other 8ths. 16ths? What if you combine these with
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other excercises?
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