Practicing alone vs. Band practice vs. Performance

Jazzaferri

Doesn't matter whether one is improvising or playing something exactly as written. If you watch the great composed music soloists they don't play with music in front of them.

Kenny's EM book works just as well for those who are improvising ass well as those playing someone else's notes.

Jim Kaznosky

@Jazzaferri I think I may have asked you this before, but how do you use EM in practice? I had a lesson specifically based on this, where his take was slow and deliberate practice and creating a good head space, prior to beginning a practice session. With the amount of time that I can reasonably dedicate to practice, I've not incorporated the routine he uses into a daily practice schedule...it took him at least a half hour to get through it. I am always interested in hearing how others have adapted this to guitar.

Jazzaferri

@Jim Kaznosky As Kenny notes in the book that it isn't always possible to spend all ones practice time in the zone.

Spend about 10-15 minutes a day practicing in the zone and then go on to finish your practice on the rest of the stuff you want to work on.

These days I spend some time most evenings watching tv with my wife so we have some together time. I play on an unamplified electric and either improvise around what is going on musically on the tv or working complicated moves into muscle memory really slowly. I know I am on the right track when I can play it correctly without losing the thread of the tv program. Its a tip I learned from Vic Wooten.

When you have followed this long enough you can instantly tell when you are in or out of the zone. When I think when I play (as opposed to practice) I suck. When my ego starts to get involved I usually try for stuff I cant quite do and end up out of the zone.

The zone comes and goes for me, on or off stage, but more often inside now than out. Generally, if I am not onstage, if I drop out I just stop playing for a while.

Jim Kaznosky

Thank you

Jazzaferri

You will know if you really have something mastered if you can have a conversation with someone while playing and not lose a beat or a note,

For me I know I have a tune really grooved if I can sing the song at the same time as playing the rhythm

Jim Kaznosky

Ahh...so when the guys in my sitch are talking to each other over my solo, they're really just executing their mastery of their instrument. That's good to know. I just thought they were being jerks.

Jazzaferri

If you are not rehearsing then they are being jerks LOL. Unless working through something the point of playing with others is to focus all your energy to listening to what they are playing.

In another venue I play lead alto in a big R & B band. Its fun but I stay because its good for my reading. But I find I get tired of people showing up to rehearsal to practice their material instead of having it down and learning how to fit it in to the performance. RANT over

Shemi

I was reading this thread and thinking about the whole "thinking about it thing"lol, and for me if I have something really dialled in it's not like I'm "not" thinking about it all per se, it's more than it runs in the background. I can almost feel the "thinking" there, but it's like a conversation in another room. That's when I feel free and can really connect to whatever is around me, or when I can sing and play or talk at the same time. I don't necessarily have to know the piece from memory although I usually do, but I can also achieve it when reading if I know the piece well enough.

I can suffer with nerves when performing. I'm trying out some Wim Hof breathing techniques which were recommended by a friend. I'm out of gigging much at the moment, but I can get quite worked up mentally trying to record something difficult on video so it's a bit like the way my brain betrays me in performance from time to time. I've also been posting videos of me playing on Facebook as a sort of therapy. It doesn't have to be a finished product and I sometimes purposely leave the take with a mistake in (it's only friends anyway!) to try and show myself the world won't end if I flub something from time to time. I think, at least for me, the times I feel no fear of making mistakes are also the times I'm less likely to make them!

Buco

I know Shemi, same here. I've been putting all kinds of junk to my YouTube channel for the same reason. And it's been liberating to have some of my worst out there and not worry about it.

It's good to be reminded of Kenny's writing, I haven't revisited that for a while. He must've had the same issue, else he probably wouldn't have come up with this method.
Only thing, these days my whole practice session might last 15-20 minutes.

Bones

Since I'm not an expert musician and I took up music late in life (please take what I say with a big grain of salt) I think of it more in terms of athletics since I have done sports at a fairly high level all my life. But I think it applies equally. If you want to label it as the 'zone' or 'groove' or whatever, I just think (ha ha) of it as 'not thinking about it'. Of course, there is 'thinking' going on in that your brain is processing info but it is not what I think about (ha ha) as 'conscious' thought and I don't want to get all mixed up with semantics. Again, since I've done sports at a higher level than music to put it in a sports context there is no internal dialog going on at all. It's all reflexive and total concentration and focus on the task at hand. At least that is what it is for me and that is a LOT of what I like about sports. It's a great way to switch off that internal dialog and since I've done sports since a young age I know what it feels like and I can get there automatically and instantly because I know the feeling so well and I have the technical facility to work with on auto-pilot. With music it is harder for me since I don't have the technical facility but I can drop into it if I am playing something that I am very comfortable with (like say a relatively easy/familiar song or a blues at a medium tempo something like that). Maybe it could get to that point with music for me (I hope so) but with sports I really don't 'think' at all, I just let it happen. Conscious thought is way too slow and would just get in the way and cause a flub. Maybe with music it is not exactly the same way, again I can't say as I am not an expert, but I hope it is somewhat that way when performed at a high level.