How much do you practice? 2020 in review (and now also 2021 in review).

Jim Kaznosky

One more comment: I met CVH in person when he came to DiJ the first time to begin teaching his method. We had a bit of a talk about learning in general as I am fascinated by the process and we were talking about "Peak" and the 10,000 hour idea in general. It was the beginning of me starting to discover what really made me tick and what the end game was. Before I say anything else, I do believe there is merit it tracking practice in any method you choose to do so.

This led me back to my experiments with the idea of mastery. First, I believe that everyone learns differently. I needed to figure out what worked well for me. I've had teachers, taken master classes (such as those in DIJ ...and mind you I believe every level at DIJ is a masterclass for that level, as they were immersive for that level of player). I've transcribed complete solos and licks. But I had to really understand what the end goal was and when to move. I also had to understand that it is not a race.

That all being said, I feel that working on a plan that requires mastery of small bits works best for me. If you minimize thinking, you can work on ii-Vs for the rest of your life and still not be done. You can work on repertoire and technical facility for the rest of your life. For me, the end game is making music and having a musical conversation when playing. We're lucky to be in a time where there is a wealth of this, but we are not alone in this style in achieving our goals. The beautiful thing that exists in all of this is that you may now discover pathways that are outside of this music. And the end goal of being a better musician needs to have smaller achievable goals of "mini-mastery" that help us move towards the larger mastery goal. Therein lies the genius of a committing yourself to a system: ensuring achievable but challenging goals are there.

That all said (and hopefully I'm not hijacking this thread), what is your end goal to practice today?

geese_com

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/104820#Comment_104820

Thanks for sharing. I do also believe that everyone learns differently. For me (and probably for a lot of other people), I just like to practice what sounds good to me and what I enjoy playing. I also keep in mind what my big picture goal is when it comes to practicing. I am not a performing/gigging musician but I do like jamming with others (looking forward to when we can do that safely again).

Since December I have been focusing on practicing one song a month. This stemmed from me realizing that when I improvise, it is very disjointed, does not flow, and is not very coherent. I picked the songs that we play most at our local jam and decide to work on those songs. I learn several different ways to play the rhythm over the changes. Then I break down the song into sections and work on phrases for those particular sections (for example with After You've Gone, one section would be the Am-E7-Am-Cm section and another would be G-E7). I would then work on connecting phrases or making them sound less like just copying and pasting lick. Then I would "quiz" myself by trying to improvise over a backing track over the whole song.

Jim Kaznosky

@geese_com Those are brilliant achievable goals. AYG is a great song to work on because it shows how to work on songs that start on a IV chord, which there are more than one in the repertoire (I'll see you in my Dreams for example). Staying with one song is great because you'll know it. Working on those individual sections is also really good because you're going to see these ideas repeat themselves.

Scoredog

This will go a bit sideways but does relate to practicing. Jim, I am going to disagree with your "throw it away comment" though maybe you did not mean it as I am about to state.

How many times have you heard a player and it seems they are not improving or sometimes are not as good as they used to be? I think it is important to keep an audio/video log once you are an intermediate or advanced player. Yes we want to keep improving but most players once they get tired of something move onto the next thing. It is not always better, just different. I have a saying I like to use "notes have no ego" they are just notes to be assembled in what ever matter we choose. Creating synapse in your brain takes time (that means assimilating ideas so they are natural). Why toss them out, I have gone back over ideas I thought were tired 5 yrs back and realized I should not of dropped them, they just sounded tired at the time once I over used them (that's where the ego sometimes steps in). Once a synapse is created it is easier to get back older ideas than to find new ones. Of course it is always good to strive for the next thing but tossing things one has worked hard over the years to acquire seems like lost time. Best to put them aside but don't lose them, the audio or video reference is my solution.

geese_com

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/104824#Comment_104824

Back when we used to have a weekly jam, I used to record them and listen back to my solos and dissect them. I would see where I was having troubles and note them to work on in future practice sessions. Nothing better than being honest with yourself and listening back and being critical with the goal of improving in weaker areas.

Jim Kaznosky

@Scoredog Yeah that looks bad and I certainly don't mean to discard and hope for the best for the exact reasons you state. I meant that I can get stuck and stay on an idea or a song indefinitely. I'll correct that for context.

I have two areas that I generally focus on daily. One is my dry erase board, which is stuff I am working on during this period. If I feel like I've played the heck out of it and I'm hearing it in my sleep, I send the idea to a new home. The new home is one of several bound books of ideas that I revisit every so often to refresh ideas, especially after a crappy gig. Discard my crappy handwriting or what I'm working on.It's my shorthand.

Jim Kaznosky

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/104825#Comment_104825

And when you feel like you've played badly, you might find some stuff you've done well too.

Lango-Django

And when you feel like you've played badly, you might find some stuff you've done well too.

Yes! The only sport I ever play is tennis and with some warm weather here in Ontario I was out playing yesterday.

it is SO easy to obsess about all the shots you missed...

Truth is, there is no tennis player in the entire world who never misses any shots.

You’ve got to expect to miss some shots, and lose some games, and accept that it’s inevitably gonna happen.

That’s just part of the game.

Similarly, there will probably never be a gig where you feel like you were in top form all the way thru...

But you accept that because you love that guitar...

Christophe22

Hi All,

Writing from France here. I am in my late 40s with a family and kids. Work as a full time teacher and this job allows me quite a lot of vacation breaks. Basically I have a practice plan which I follow everyday and weekends while I work. I almost stop practicing during vacation breaks to be 100% available to my kids. No TV (and series) at home, the minimum in terms of social life, I am almost entirely dedicated to practicing and playing guitar. I started playing when I was 20 but never played nor focused seriously for 25 years then realized time flies... I also discovered gypsy jazz and fell in love with it. I also realized that as a Frenchman I am lucky to be in a country with so many fantastic players in the style. I started about three years ago with a strict working plan. I am 100% self-taught and digged a lot into DC Music School (great great resource) or just downloaded You Tube video of my favorite rhythmic players and just mimicked them. I also use a super useful software called 'Transcribe' which allows me to reduce the tempo. So I start practicing like 70% of the temp then gradually move up. I also realized that when you get stuck on a technical difficulty or a song, there is no point in insisting. The best strategy is to let it rest for a few weeks and even months. Then you move to different pieces. And magically, when you go back to the tune on which your were stuck, you'll overcome the difficulty or at least make some progress. Never insist and let it rest for some time. During those years I have 'naturally' increased my time practicing. I started low, like 40 min a day, then 1 hour, 1 hour and a half, 2 hours, etc. Now I set my minimum weekly guitar practice time at 20 hours, so more than 3 hours a day. I cannot imagine playing less than 2 hours a day. And I love it, and could play even more. The more progress you make, the more you want to practice. Obvious but true. I also cannot imagine skipping a day. The most difficult thing is fatigue which affects your ability to focus. When I am too tired after a day of work, I nap 15-20 min and then start practicing. I use a daily log, I time myself, and work 100%, fully focused on the musical pieces. More generally, I have also moved from gypsy guitar methods with exercises to spending 80-90% on my time working on tunes. I remember Adrien Moignard and other stellar guitarists in Selmer 607 School who said: "I practiced and developed La Pompe technique by just playing over CDs, full ones, and after a while... it just comes". Think also about Gypsy camps. People would just grab a guitar and start to play. No theory whatsoever, no tedious exercises. Just music. I just practice scales with a metronome to gradually develop speed. Most of the time, I play over the tunes I want to learn using earbuds, and I start at a reduced speed using Transcribe. I also stick to the rest stroke technique. In addition to Gypsy Jazz, I play a lot of fingerstyle jazz using the Barry Greene arrangements (a world-class jazz guitarist who sells lessons of his wonderful versions of standards, in my opinion the best on Internet) and some Brazilian bossa. I hope some of this empirical observations and advice will be of help. To conclude, what's fascinating along the path of learning guitar is how much you change your work habits, focusing areas, interests as you move forward. A quick example. At some point I was very focused on trying many picks in order to find the perfect one. I spend a lot of time (and money) in this quest. Now, I do not mind. No a problem at all. I exclusively play on cheap Dunlop gators 1.5 mm rather than $20 fancy ones. Imagine you're offered to jam but you do not have your cherished pick at hand. Basically you have to be able to play decently with any pick. Bireli plays on cheap regular Dunlop picks and almost all of the Selmer 607 guys use 2 millimeters Dunlop gators (the black ones).

Christophe22