Learning "Music" and not just Exercises.

[mark wein]

This week its all about making sure that you don't get lost in "Exercise Land" with your practicing. One of the best things you can do for yourself is to make sure that you're learning actual pieces of music that push you ahead as a musician and to also use the difficult parts in those songs to make your own exercises that are more relevant to the music you want to play.



Remember that you can also subscribe to my twice weekly podcasts via iTunes!

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/m...ry/id432020611

If you dig it please give me a rating on there or a comment my iTunes page to let other folks know.

[progrmr]

^^ This is very true - in my piano lessons, my weekly studies are about 50% technique (scales/timing) and 50% song study - granted you learn some technique by playing songs with the added benefit of not being as mundane as scales can be. Definitely have to have a mix to keep the practice enjoyable and your mind fresh.

[mark wein]

^^ This is very true - in my piano lessons, my weekly studies are about 50% technique (scales/timing) and 50% song study - granted you learn some technique by playing songs with the added benefit of not being as mundane as scales can be. Definitely have to have a mix to keep the practice enjoyable and your mind fresh.

Absolutely.

In my own studies this week since I'm coming off a couple of months of gigs into a really light month this week I'm actually going to work on my right hand attack and try to get a few good transcriptions under my belt. The right hand stuff will be a combination of picking exercises and musical passages...

[Tig***]

Ah, the never ending balancing act between practical (song study) and exercises (technique, theory, timing). It is cool to see you adjust this balance as your gig situations change. For some of us, the balance is between keeping it interesting and enjoyable versus technique and ability advancement through exercises. Too much of either can either slow down our progression or burn us out. We all have to adjust as we go while maintaining the discipline required for growth.

I left a review in iTunes that may show up within the next day or so.

[mark wein]

Thanks!

To give you an idea of what I'm doing this week, I'm working from this:



Learning this (and it will probably be featured in tomorrows lick of the week)



and working on my right hand mechanics with the metronome and either scale patterns or a practice etude that I wrote for the purpose.

[sunvalleylaw]

^^ This is very true - in my piano lessons, my weekly studies are about 50% technique (scales/timing) and 50% song study - granted you learn some technique by playing songs with the added benefit of not being as mundane as scales can be. Definitely have to have a mix to keep the practice enjoyable and your mind fresh.

I am attempting to add more skills work and drills in. I tend to go straight to songs, and often show significant progress only when I am preparing songs for performance level play. I love that sort of progress, and being forced to keep up with the others in the band is an excellent way to achieve it. But to reference something Spud says, that is more a "racing your strengths" thing for me, while I tend to ignore "training your weaknesses".

I went back and started in on Mark's basic rhythm exercises again, to springboard me into working some rhythm and right hand drilling into my routine. Lots of good resources and exercise ideas for that here, and on Mark's site. I intend on developing some new training habits as part of my playing routine over the remainder of June. . .

. . . and learning a couple new songs to apply said skills to.