Steve Neff Music Blog » practicing

Variations On A Pattern Lesson

steve — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 16:48:04 +0000

In this lesson, I reveal the secret to practicing patterns and licks. Most people just practice a pattern exactly how it is written or played. If this is the way you always practice your patterns than this lesson is for you. I show you how to really get your mileage out of each pattern you learn by practicing improvising with it as you practice. If you can alter one pattern 20 different ways then you will have a much more powerful tool to use while you improvise! I give you a sample II-V-I pattern from my book and then show you 9 ways that I can alter it to come up with many more patterns. I talk about how to practice this and the many benefits of doing this. If you get the concepts in this lesson down you will discover and amazing increase in your jazz vocabulary. Instead of playing the same tired and dead licks on your solos you will be able to alter those same licks to be new and fresh sounding. (28 minute Video,Audio & PDF)

Lesson Level: Beginner = 1 - Advanced = 5 ★★★☆☆

Practicing away from your instrument! Part 1

steve — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 04:08:11 +0000

I had a lesson the other day with a student and I realized that he was really having a hard time coming up with melodic ideas and phrases. I asked him “Do you ever sing?” ”No!” ”How about humming?” “No!” ”How about in the shower?” “No!” This really got me thinking about things and are started asking my other students about this. The thing that I’m noticing is that the students that hum and sing a lot are the ones that have an easier time improvising and creating melodic ideas. Why is that? Well I think the answer is that they are spending hours everyday practicing creating melodic ideas and improvising. Hours that the other students are using.

To be honest, when I practice something on my sax for an hour or two, you will usually find me humming or singing what I was practicing for the rest of the day. I noticed this last week when i was practicing a tune that I didn’t know. It was “I remember you” I played it for about an hour and was really trying to memorize the melody and the changes. Later that day as I was taking a shower I was humming the tune and scatting a little improvised solo over the changes. Later in the car I was doing the same thing! It suddenly struck me that I do this all the time without even thinking about it. It’s a way to practice what you love all the time. The more you sing and hum a melody the more you will internalize it and be able to reproduce it. The more you practice coming up with melodies and scatting solos the better you will become at playing them on your sax.

I have had many students over the years that refuse to sing or even try. I think they are doing themselves a great disservice. I freely admit and tell people that I am one of the worst singers I know. I can sort of carry a tune and match pitches but it isn’t pleasant to listen to. Sometimes I’m a little flat, sometimes I’m a little sharp………the point is that I don’t think that’s important. The important thing is to practice these melodies that we are learning and to practice creating melodies by ear. Sometimes I will sit at the piano and just play the changes to a tune I’m working on and try to sing the melody while I play. Sometimes I sing guide tone lines to it. After that I will try to sing a little solo and try to hit the changes. The thing is, improvising is creating something musical from the ideas in your mind. the fastest way to do this is by singing. It’s right there coming out of your mouth.

I have also learned through the years that if I can sing a song then I can figure it out and play it. If I can’t then I don’t have a chance.

If your serious about music and jazz improvisation then sing a little. Maybe you’ll like it. Think of it as self improvement and a way to improve you playing while you are away from your horn. It will do you a world of good (even if those around you can’t stand it.)

Practicing With Focus

steve — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 19:25:52 +0000

One of my biggest weaknesses when I was a kid was practicing without a focus. I wanted to do it all, play everything, be the best. I wanted results now. I would spend endless hours in the practice room practicing everything. My problem was I wasn’t focused. I didn’t set goals. Instead of getting excited that I was getting good at the one thing I was practicing, I would feel anxiety that I was missing out on something because I was too focused on that one thing. I would bounce from one thing to another. Learn bits and pieces of things but not truly master them. The greatest thing I’ve learned as I’ve grown older is that I do best when I focus on one thing and set goals. The times I’ve grown the most are when I did this. ex. 1.) One summer I spent the whole summer practicing my Major and Dominant bebop scales 2.)One time for 4-5 months I just practiced my Major approaches in every key. 3.) One time I practiced my Major and minor scale patterns in every key for 2-3 months………. These times stick out in my memory because I focused on one thing. Set some goals and practiced like crazy. I have them down. I might get a little rusty but I can still play those things I practiced even 20 years later.
Many of my students tend to make the same mistakes I made. They just play to play or they have a list of 20 different things they are working on everyday. if you can do that and it’s effective, great. As the teacher I recommend getting focused on one thing and getting it down. I tell my students they have to learn things so well that they don’t even have to think about it. It’s an exaggeration but my point is that jazz happens at such a fast pace it has to be almost like a reflex. You don’t want to spend all your mental energy thinking about scales or chords or licks. You want to be spending your time thinking about what you will play or listening to the rhythm section your playing with so you can communicate musically.
My advice is to usually work on 3 things. 1. Ear training 2.Learning a tune 3.An improvisational device. For me, this has been the most effective way to practice. If I do those 3 things everyday I keep moving ahead and growing as a musician. Thanks, Steve

A Fresh Approach to Practicing by Greg Fishman

steve — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 19:18:59 +0000

I recently bought two of Greg Fishman’s books and am waiting for them to arrive as I write this. Greg sent me this article and I thought it was a great one so I’m posting it here. I’ll let you know what I think of Greg’s books after I get them and play through them. I’ve heard nothing but good things about them. Thanks, Steve

“Students often ask me how to develop a good practice routine. A good practice routine is essential in order to take your playing to the next level. When I think about the way I used to practice as a young player, all I can say is: “If I only knew then what I know now about the art of practicing!”

Throughout high school and college, I put in many hours per week of practice time, often eight hours a day. Much of it was productive, but often I was just spinning my wheels by practicing things that I could already play well. I wasn’t always challenging myself. Today, I can accomplish more in one hour than I used to in four hours. This is because I’ve learned what to practice, as well as how to practice.

It took me many years to understand the ways in which I internalize musical concepts. It was a very slow and tedious process of trial and error, but I finally learned the techniques that got the best results. To this day, I still use those same techniques to keep my own playing level up, yet now use only a fraction of the practice time I once needed.

That being said, there’s no denying the fact that at some point in your early years as a student, to really get on intimate terms with your instrument of choice, you’re going to need at least a three or four-year period of many hours of practice per day.

In this article, I’ll outline the techniques that have worked well for me over the years. You’ll find that practicing can be one of the most rewarding aspects of playing.
TIME-ORIENTED PRACTICE

Some people tell me that they’re putting in an hour of practice a day, but they’re not improving and they’re frustrated. Practicing your instrument shouldn’t be like punching a time clock at work. If you force yourself to sit there with your instrument in your hands and practice while looking at the clock every few minutes to see if you’ve “put in your time,” you will not improve. As a matter of fact, you’ll start to dread picking up your instrument, because you’ll start to view practicing as a chore rather than an adventure.

Sometimes I’ll encounter students who tell me that they’re putting in an hour of practice per day, yet they’re not making much progress. In these cases, I’ll ask these students to show me exactly how they practice during that hour a day they’re spending at home. Inevitably, they’ll play through their scales, playing the easy ones quickly, then they’ll struggle through the harder ones with bad time and many mistakes, and then they’ll go on to a piece of music, which they play from the beginning to the end, full of mistakes, in a mechanical manner, with no feeling or interpretation. Then, they’ll play the song a few more times. After that, they usually lose their focus and start playing random licks. This is what I call “Time- oriented” practicing. The student doesn’t actually work on improving anything. He’s just playing what he can already play. Of course, any time spent on your instrument isn’t totally wasted. You will improve, but I think that this type of approach is the least efficient use of practice time.

RESULT-ORIENTED PRACTICING

Result-oriented practicing improves your productivity in the practice room. Your focus is now shifted from clock-watching to paying close attention to your progress on each musical goal. When practicing in this manner, it could take you four seconds, four minutes, four hours, four days, etc. You work on the musical goal until you start to hear improved results, and then you move on to the next item on your practice agenda.

Result-oriented practice focuses all of your energy on one musical goal at a time. This is a very efficient way to practice. For example, when working on scales, it might seem logical to think, “There are twelve major scales, and I’m going to work on them for one hour, dedicating five minutes to each scale.” In reality, you might need forty minutes worth of work in the key of Ab, Db and Gb and only twenty minutes or less on the remaining scales. A great solution for this is what I call the “Five Time Rule.” For the rest of the article go to Greg’s site at http://www.gregfishmanjazzstudios.com/practice.html

The Most Important Thing!

steve — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 19:14:07 +0000

The most important thing needed to becoming a great musician is a passion that fuels an intense work ethic. To me this is more important than natural talent by far.
I always tell people that I’m not talented at music. They just look at me in dis-belief. Honestly, I feel like I have many talents but I’ve never felt like music was one of them. My biggest talents are passion and dedicated hard work. Since I started playing in seventh grade I have worked hard to become the best musician I can be. If I couldn’t grasp something quickly like some of my peers that meant I had to spend more time in the practice room to figure it out. I remember spending hours in high school trying to figure out the altissimo range on sax. I remember spending countless hours until I figured out how to circular breath. I remember spending countless hours learning all my chords. I remember spending hours playing along with Dave Sanborn and trying to figure out how he played like that!
Sometimes I have parents ask me if there child is talented? I always answer that question by talking about how passionate the student is and how hard they work. If they have those two things they will excel beyond the talented student who is lazy or isn’t passionate. Maybe not today,and maybe not tomorrow but given enough time I will put my money on the former student everytime.
I would like to dedicate these series of blog posts to practicing. What it is? How to do it? Why it is important? How do you keep doing it when you don’t feel like it? How do you keep motivated when everything in life is pulling you away?
I hope I can get help on this topic from my students and their parents who might visit here and can add some insight on what works and doesn’t work. Hopefully, we can all learn as we travel together. Thanks, Steve