Category: Practice Ideas

The Ten Coins

8/28/2016

This game was first described to me by Tom Booth during my time at SMU. The goal is to gain consistency in passages that you have already learned slowly by buzzing, singing, etc. I usually use this game with excerpts, but it can be equally beneficial when applied to difficult solo passages or technique exercises.

The game is pretty simple:

Get a stack of 10 coins (or buttons, pencils, or whatever) and pick an excerpt or passage
Play the excerpt and record it
Listen back, and if you hear no mistakes, remove one coin from the pile and start a new pile. If you do hear mistakes, use your big bag of practice techniques to make it better, then record it again until it is correct.
f you make a mistake (on any of the takes), put all the coins back in the first pile and start over.
Repeat this process, and you are finished when all the coins are moved from the old pile to the new. This means you have played the passage correctly 10 times in a row!

Although the process seems simple, this is one way of practicing most people neglect (including myself). We often work on something, finally get it right, and then go on to practice the next difficult thing. It is good when you get it right, but then you need to reinforce the correct way of playing the passage. For example, if you messed up an excerpt 3 times before getting it correct, your ratio of correct to incorrect is 1 to 3. Even if you don't have time to get 10 correct repetitions in a row, you always want to have more correct reps than incorrect.

There are lots of articles about how many correct repetitions it takes to "erase" a mistake, some saying 8 times, some saying 20 or more. Either way you look at it, you want to minimize the incorrect repetitions and maximize the correct ones. This game is most useful once you have learned the passage well, otherwise you are bound to play the passage incorrectly multiple times in a row. Even though there is no way to recreate the stress of an audition, I find that I experience similar feelings if I am playing this game and have moved 9 of the 10 coins to the new pile. There is some extra pressure just knowing that if this last run is not clean, I have to start all over as square one.

Try starting with something you are very comfortable with and see how you do!

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Listen to Yourself!

8/16/2016

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We all know we need to listen to ourselves, right? We tell our students to listen to themselves more closely, and our teachers tell us to listen better. We can try all we want, but when playing a new piece that consumes most of our attention, it can be hard to hear everything that is going on in our playing. In auditions or performances, we tend to have a heightened sense of perception compared to our typical practice, which leads us to hear more of what is going on (for better or worse). This could be due to nerves or just the excitement of performing.

     There are a lot of articles out there that link nervousness and performance anxiety to the idea of practicing with less attention than performing. If we slack off in practice and all of a sudden pay close attention when performing, it makes sense that we will hear more things (including more mistakes), and that will make us nervous, scared, and even angry. To really hear what is going on in your playing, try recording yourself. A recorder can act like an unbiased listener that tells it like it is, and if you know the red light is on you will play differently, as if someone is actually listening. This is a good idea in general, always play as if your favorite musician is listening!

   An exercise I learned from Tom Booth at SMU is the "down the page method". The idea is to get a recorder, a legal pad (the extra long pad of paper), and an excerpt or a couple lines of an etude. You record a take, and immediately listen back. Write as many comments as you can using only one line on the sheet. Continue this process until you are all the way down the page. This can take a while, but the listening acts as built-in rest for your face so you don't get too fatigued.

Notice as you get towards the bottom of the page, your commentary will likely change from missed notes and rhythms to more subtle qualities such as tone quality, phrasing, centering, and pitch. Even if you miss notes towards the bottom of the page, the unconscious shift in your attention is the beginning of improving your ear so you eventually hear all these details while playing.

If you have ever taken an unsuccessful audition and asked for comments from the audition committee, you probably have received some that were a surprise to you; "I didn't realize I was doing that!". Many of these things can be easily fixed by first knowing how to play the excerpt (through lessons, listening, etc), and then making sure you are actually doing what you intend, or in other words playing it the way you believe it should be played. Weird things happen in auditions or public performances, and recording yourself doesn't necessarily guarantee a mistake-free performance, but it can at the very least bring your attention to the mistake in the practice room, rather than on stage where it is a surprise and can lead to even more mistakes.

Set up your recorder next time you practice and try to find at least three things (good or bad) that you only hear on the recording and didn't catch in performance. This will point you in the right direction of what you are not hearing and consequently need to focus more on when practicing. It could be anything from too much vibrato, unclear multiple tonguing, and unsteady rhythms to surprisingly good phrasing and clear articulation.

   Comment below with any other creative ways you like to use a recorder to supplement your practicing!

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Style

8/2/2016

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From heavy metal music to completely improvised free jazz, there are certain characteristics that we associate with various types of music. We all categorize the music we hear differently. What we are told as students, what we teach to our students, what we read, infer, and assume from listening all make up our own interpretation of each "genre" of music. Many groups attempt or claim to make music that is "genre-defying" and does not fit one single style of music. This may be the case, but the same bands often use multiple genres to describe their music. In other words, they use the same categories they are challenging to define their art. The bottom line is these categories exist, whether we want them to or not. No matter what type of music you are passionate about, each band, ensemble, performance, soloist, and genre has its own characteristics.

Next time you are working on a piece, think about the style you wish to convey, and find unique words to describe each passage or section of music. Your interpretation should always be a work in progress with constant updating and tweaking, but when practicing, try using many styles to work on a tricky passage. Try to play an etude while imagining a salsa, rock, or funk accompaniment. It is kind of unusual to think about, but ends up being really fun once you get into it. If a passage is technically difficult or you just can't figure out the best way to phrase it, you will have new ideas about the phrase by looking at it in a different way.

Try playing it slow and lyrically, and then contrast that with fast and aggressively. You can change rhythms, use a straight vs swing feel, or take a different excerpt to use as inspiration for the one you are currently studying. For example, try playing Petrushka in the style of the opening of Pictures, then intensely like the opening of Mahler 5, and finally lyrically using the solo from Shostakovich's Piano Concerto No. 1 as your inspiration. Sometimes I just take the notes from an excerpt and improvise the articulation and rhythm. In doing this, I am still working on centering the pitches of the music, but keep the music fresh by changing parts of it.

Another easy way to accomplish a style change is to use a drum machine instead of a generic metronome. Changing the style from jazz to reggae to pop will give you a different background and feel, even if you play the excerpt the same way over each back beat. We still need plenty of practice playing music the way we will ultimately perform it, but it doesn't hurt to break the monotony by changing styles. Try it out and see if it works!

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Rhythmic Variations

7/24/2016

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Other than all the methods in the last post, another great technique we can use with a metronome is the process of changing the rhythm from what is written to make the passage more simple, or more difficult. This technique is common among string players, but is also very useful to us as wind players. We will use any passage with a constant rhythm as an example (ie. eighth notes, sixteenth notes, etc.). Once you get the idea, you can apply this to literally any passage of music you want!

So, the idea is to ingrain the technique needed to play a line by practicing it many different ways rather than the same way over, and over....and over again. When teaching I always use a sports metaphor to describe this; If Leo Messi can only hit a good shot consistently from one single spot on the field, he is not that useful is he? The reverse of this is true also, if you want to be able to have decent consistency from anywhere on the field (within reason), you better practice from many different angles, distances, etc. For us as musicians, one of these variables is rhythm

Now that we have our constant eighth note lick, here are a few ways to rhythmically alter the group.

Groups of 4:

dotted eighth - sixteenth
sixteenth - dotted eighth
quarter note - three triplets
three triplets - quarter note

These are pretty simple and self explanatory. The benefits gained from practicing with these permutations are coordination, accuracy and time awareness, to name a few. Now for groups of three:

Triple:

even triplets
dotted triplet, sixteenth, triplet
triplet, dotted triplet, sixteenth

Duple:

eighth - two sixteenths
two sixteenths - eighth
sixteenth - eight - sixteenth

   Be creative and make up your own rhythms. One thing I like to do us use a pattern that purposefully does not fit the phrase. For example, if I have a run of sixteenths, I will use the second or third pattern listed under the "triple" meter exercises. Or, take a phrase of all triplets and play them as dotted eighth - sixteenths. We are essentially at this point creating a new passage using only the notes written, but coming up with our own rhythm. Using these unrelated patterns helps to emphasize random and odd notes that might otherwise be ignored.

     Soon, I will put all of these different rhythmic ideas into Finale and have an attachment, which will undoubtedly be more clear and easy to understand than my descriptions in text. There are very few rhythms listed here, but challenge yourself to make the passage more challenging than it has to be, that way, when you go back to playing what is on the page, it seems easy. Off the top of my head, some trumpet excerpts that can easily be improved using this process are the opening or Ravel's Piano Concerto in G, Stravinsky's Petrushka dance, Ives' Variations on America, Smith's Festival Variations, and all of those pesky descending sixteenth lines in the first movement of the Tomasi Concerto.

Let me know how it works out!

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Metronome Ideas Vol. 2

7/18/2016

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Following up on my last post regarding working passages with a metronome from slow to fast, I want to touch on a few other ways to use a metronome to your advantage. Growing up in Texas, we used a metronome ALL THE TIME in band. This helped the whole band stay together, and was probably very helpful to students who struggled finding the beat, but was not always beneficial. Like it or not, you always had that steady beat blasting in your ear. This gave everyone a crutch to lean on for timekeeping. Instead of thinking for ourselves we just passively listened rather than counting and feeling time.

We all seem to rely on the metronome to keep time, when I think it should be more of a checkpoint to see if we tend to rush or slow down any given passage. Just like in this post where I wrote about buzzing a note and then checking it with the piano, we want to check our time, not have it spoon fed to us. The good news is, there are many fun and creative ways to do this!

A method I started using when working on jazz excerpts is setting the metronome to beat quarter notes at my intended tempo, but having the metronome sound on the upbeats. Using this for all practice tells me right away if my internal metronome is solid. If you take care of the upbeats, it is really hard for the downbeats to not line up. On the other hand, it is common to hear players have solid downbeats, but what happens in between is not always precise. This is exercise one, putting the metronome on the upbeats.

When I started playing a ton of combo gigs, I found myself relying on someone else (e.g., our drummer and bass player) to keep time. When playing with others, you obviously need to listen to them, but make sure your time is rock solid on your own. That way, everyone in the group can express themselves, even if rhythmic deviations are involved, and the group stays together as a whole.

Next, try having the metronome beat every other beat, or every three beats. For example, if you want to play the Promenade from Pictures at an Exhibition at quarter = 88, put the metronome on 44 bpm. Combine this with the idea above by having it hit on the first beat, and then having it hit on the second beat. Then, set it to 22 bpm and it will beat every 4 beats, and so on. This excerpt in particular is fun to play because of the frequent time signature changes.

Start with the metronome sounding every 2 beats, and then this can be taken to the extreme and you can have the metronome hit every 6 beats, or even more. When doing this, the metronome is nothing more than a check, and if you find it difficult to stay in time after 6 beats of silence, don't sweat it! It takes a while to get used to, but, at the very least, it will let you know your tendencies (to rush or slow down). If you can play the the Petrushka dance in time with the metronome only hitting every 3 measures, your time is pretty darn good. A lot of players have close but not exact time, so if you are the only person at an audition to play perfectly in time (when appropriate), you will stand out like a sore thumb... in a really good way.

Intersperse these two ideas in your normal metronome routine, and you will see great results, and quickly too!

Check out this video of Victor Wooten demonstrating his metronome practice. It is pretty intense! This is how you gain impeccable time rather than really close approximate time.

Comment below with your favorite metronome techniques!

-Justin

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Slow and Steady Wins the Race

7/13/2016

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When starting to learn a piece, we often are so excited to sound like our favorite recordings that we jump right in and attempt to play it in large sections, at tempo, with all the flair and gusto of our favorite performers. This excitement is a beautiful thing, and probably plays a large role in why we got into music in the first place. However, I believe that it can be even more beautiful to take a microscope to each piece (time permitting, that is) and learn it, I mean really learn it. After all, this is probably what your favorite performers did as well.

I too find myself starting too fast when learning a new excerpt or song, and it is understandable. We get the music, and think to ourselves, "Oh no, I have to have this down perfectly in a month for an audition!". This panicked attitude leads us to try to cram in the work so we get to our destination as quickly as possible because after all, we only have a month. Keep this in mind; If you have a whole month, why try to learn the piece in 3 days, or even 20 days? If you learn the whole piece halfway in 3 days and try to add in the other half for the rest of the month, you probably won't see much progress.

For any audition or performance you want to set yourself up to do your best on the day of the performance, not the day before, or after. Obviously different circumstances will necessitate learning music faster or slower than others, but try to always take the time you are given. A metronome is our best comrade to keep us in check of this, especially with technical passages. Below is the outline of how I work technical challenges from slow to fast.

Find a tempo (no matter how slow it is) where you can play the line, measure, or lick flawlessly.
Move the metronome up 2 bpm. If you had it solid at 60, go to 62. You will hardly notice a difference, and that is the point. You are taking many small steps toward your goal.
If it is still flawless, go +2 to 64. If not, use your large box of techniques to learn it correctly at that tempo. (see other posts for ideas, or make up your own!) If you still can't get it, slow the metronome down at least 4 bmp and start from there back at number 2 above.
Once you get it comfortable at 64, go to 66, and so on.
Always try to go at least 10 bpm past your goal performance tempo.
Mark down each day's progress so you know what tempo you start at next time.

Now I know, this is an ideal situation and easier said then done, but even if you fall of the wagon when using this process, you will still see many benefits. I personally have the tendency to do really well and even get up to tempo, but I sometimes finish the process a week or two before I need to, and then I have a few weeks where I don't know what to do! It is for sure not a bad thing to be prepared early, but make sure you have other methods in mind to keep improving for your remaining days until the performance. It is hard to simply maintain a technique, you either keep trying to improve it and hopefully you do (at the very least it does stay maintained), otherwise you start to go backwards down the progress hill.

Also, be smart when using this method. You don't necessarily need to play every note of every piece like this. Use it on anything remotely challenging, and you will find the challenge quickly dissipates when you practice this way. Also, be warned that this process can be especially tedious, so I don't recommend using only this method for 30 minutes straight. If you have 2 weeks and have to get a lick from 60 bpm to 130, that is only 5 bpm a day, which is VERY doable and will probably take 5 minutes or less each day. Try mixing this with learning from the bottom of the page, as outlined here.

Thanks for reading!
-Justin

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Started From the Bottom Now We're Here!

7/12/2016

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How many times have you learned a piece of music very well from the beginning, and by the time you get to the end you are sounding less than stellar? Probably many times, and if not, think of your students (if you teach) or maybe you have been a judge at some level of all-region or all-state auditions. The truth is, it happens to all of us. Here we have another simple albeit unconventional way to learn a piece of music.

We start out excited to learn a piece, and work on say the first three lines for a while, working out whatever technical or musical issues we find. The next day we get maybe to the fourth line, a day later the fifth, and so on. If we continue down this path, it is a week or so by the time we actually start to learn the end of the piece, maybe even longer depending on the length of the work. It's no wonder those all-region auditions sounded so much better when the audition cut was at the beginning of the piece!

Try this, learn the piece backwards. This can be a solo, etude, excerpt, or whatever. Start with the last note or beat, and add a note or beat before that with each correct repetition. I use the same rules of the Two Note Drill to determine if I move on or not. Unless it is exactly how you want it to sound, do it again! High standards when practicing lead to high levels of performance. Learning backwards helps with many issues other than simply learning the end of the piece first:

Endurance - If you struggle with endurance and usually start at the beginning of the piece, you will always be tired by the time you get to the end. Learn from the back a little bit at a time, and you will practice good habits when playing the end of the piece, so even if you are fatigued in performance you can rely on your reps of practice to carry you through.
Breath Control - If you have a long excerpt that must be played in one breath, start from the end adding a note or a beat backwards at a time (with a metronome!). This will gradually train you to be more efficient with your air and you will always end the piece feeling comfortable, rather than running on fumes! (I use this on the 2nd mvt. of Pines of Rome for this reason)
Phrasing - You will learn phrases more deeply by looking at them in a different way. If a piece contains mostly 4 or 8 measure phrases, going backwards by beat or measure will have you starting in sometimes awkward places, because you will often be starting within a phrase. You will never perform the work this way (unless you take an audition and there are awkward starting places), but if you know you can nail the high point of a phrase cold, it will be a piece of cake when you actually get to play the entire phrase from the beginning.
Accuracy - Similar to what was stated above, if you can sound awesome playing an etude from any and every starting point, running the whole thing and focusing on the piece as a whole will become much easier.

There are other benefits as well, one being that this will let you practice the same piece longer before getting bored with it. I find this especially helpful for younger students, especially those who always want to learn something new, not that there is anything wrong with that. I tend to get tired of pieces easily as well, so I use this method a ton! Each time you add a beat going backwards, it creates a new exercise and a new starting point. Otherwise, the student will always sound good at the beginning of the phrase regardless of how they sound at the end, simply because they start at the exact same spot every single time! I personally find this a more creative, involved, and effective way to practice. So next time you run an etude top to bottom and then get down to work, start from the bottom, and see how much better you are when you make it to the top!

The Top!

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The Two Note Drill

7/11/2016

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This is the first of many posts on practice methods and ways to learn music. The goal is for this page to be a resource with different practice ideas, so you can skim through posts and find different techniques to help improve different aspects of playing. For this first post lets talk about a simple yet very effective practice method I call the Two Note Drill. It is pretty self explanatory, and can be used in a variety of different ways. The TND is great for any ability level whether you are a beginner or a seasoned veteran. I first used this drill when teaching beginners, but now use it myself with very positive results!

     The general idea is that when learning a piece or passage, you start at the beginning and play only the first two notes. If you are rock solid move on. By rock solid I mean it has to have the sound (I usually go for a sound imitating my favorite recording of the opening of Pictures at an Exhibition), articulation, rhythm, intonation, dynamic, and direction (go to the second note or come away from the first?) that you intend. All of these aspects must be thought out before you play, otherwise how will you know if you nailed it or not?! It is a lot to think about at first, but the devil is in the detail, and with little work most anyone can play two notes in a row darn near perfectly.

     If the two notes are not as clean as you want them, buzz, sing, and play them (a later post will cover many different ways to solidify intervals). When you move on, the second note you played is now your new starting note. To make matters simple lets take a C major scale. Play C to D. If it is good, play D to E, then E to F, and so on.

   As I mentioned before, this is a simple method, but can be applied to a beginner learning a C major scale, or an expert learning the Henze Sonatina! Keep in mind that this is just one way to aid in hearing and centering every interval in a piece, and the idea is best used in the practice room rather than performing. You rarely want to only think of two note groups when playing music, especially on faster, technical pieces, but when starting to learn those difficult pieces, the TND will build a sturdy foundation much more efficiently than simply (and mindlessly) running the hard licks over and over.

     If you are ever having trouble hitting the bullseye on all your notes but can't seem to figure out where you first get out of the "zone", start at the beginning of the piece or passage using the TND and wherever you run into problems is a good indicator of where you need to work! You will be surprised how much work you can get done on difficult repertoire with just 5 or 10 minutes of this exercise. To spice it up, also try these!

TND singing (checking with the piano AFTER you sing it)
TND Buzzing (with both slurred glissandos and articulation)
Three Note Drill, Four Note Drill, etc...

Thanks for reading, and comment below if you found this to be effective!

-Justin

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