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Creative ways of practicing
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beno
Posts: 881
Joined: Nov. 3 2006
From: Hungary
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 Creative ways of practicing
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As recently I have very limited time to practice due my daily job + 2 little children I started to look for alternative ways of practicing. I'm eager about practicing 'cause constant practice makes me definitely more confident, play much better and gives me much more joy. This versus my no time situation gave me hard times and depression to say so...
Here are some thoughts on the topic for those in the same situation...
I've realized how important the good practice is, and I have to appriciate it with organizing my practice better. No noodling around, but making priorities and go for them.
When I'm at work, I try to take a couple of minute breaks and test myself with the quiz here:
http://www.circle-of-fifths.net/learn.html
Sometimes I use some softwares that help me learn sight-reading, Chords or scales etc ( GSM, AFT, GBET, Fretboard warrior, Chord warrior) - also just a couple of minutes 
Also a good site, that has Ear training exercises for intervals, scales, chords and so on:
http://www.musictheory.net/exercises
As I live in a 43 m3 flat, and my children sleeping the only time I could use for practicing, I often use a spounge, and play just left hand exercises.
But what I like the best is just practicing rythms with no guitar, just my right hand on my thigh.
I mean not just as technical exercise but, for compas.
Lets say this:
It's from Oscar Herrero - Claude Worms - Traite de la Guitarra Flamenca VOL 3.:
I also had problems with sight reading but not with the notes as I read them quite easily, but with the rythms. Now I feel I slowly overcome those difficulties.
I also try different ways to mental training, and practice things in mind while I'm off to bed.
I've also recorded the modes of the diatonic scale played over the root chord, and the chords bult on the scale, and playing it shuffle trying to guess which is the one I'm hearing.
Listening a lot..
and so on...
Maybe there's nothing new or creative in these ways, no new tool, yet I feel somehow I can develop further -maybe strange ways - rather than giving it up. May I can create something good from an utterly lost circumstances.
Share Your own ways!
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Aug. 17 2012 23:26:11
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Erik van Goch
Posts: 1787
Joined: Jul. 17 2012
From: Netherlands
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RE: Creative ways of practicing (in reply to beno)
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Actually i did get my best results practicing like this and i can tell first hand that this kind of exercises (studying left and right hand separately and especially playing mentally without the guitar) is superior to normal practice. So i did it out of free choice and not forced by conditions. Everything was done with full concentration/awareness and my first goal was finding and adapting a perfect tone and technique. I started doing very "simple" exercises like lifting a single finger and add/release 100% controlled doses of energy/pressure. It helped me to find, understand and appreciate every bone, nerve, muscle and cel worth knowing. On top i did excessive tonal exercises, investigating the possibilities (and limitations) of the guitar in a similar way. As soon as i found myself some new insights i started doing them mentally as well. So as soon as i knew how to lift a finger i drilled the movement in my mind only (not moving the finger itself) and as soon as i knew how a well played note developed it's sound i re-lived it's vibrations in my mind only as well. I started with single notes and strokes, than simple and more complex combination exercises (like the ones you shared) and at the end of the line i was able to play a whole pice in my mind, feeling every single aspect of real guitar playing. I could feel myself bringing my guitar and hands in playing position, i could visualize AND FEEL my fingers producing the notes and i could visualize AND FEEL the string vibrations and the guitars response. Everything felt 100% like playing the guitar for real but in reality i only played it in my head. And yes, whenever i piked up the guitar for real everything came out exactly like that, time after time after time.
I did a lot of discoveries in that period of time (80's and 90's) and most of them are confirmed by science and other experts over the past 20 years like these facts:
* Running true an exercise mentally gives the same nerve response as doing it for real.
(even seeing someone else doing it generates matching nerve response in your body)
* Mental excercises (building up from lifting a single finger over and over again in your mind to extremely complex things like playing a complete pice) works like mantra/meditation.... it unites body and mind and it can bring you in a higher state of awareness. If you are extremely lucky it can also open the door to your subconsciousness, which is the gate to what i consider to be duende.
* A couple of weeks of (30 minutes) meditation on a daily base (like the mental exercises we mentioned) does physically change your brain... your body will produce more grey brain matter which can be measured by science.
* After the first set have a break of at least 6 hours!
...* If you had a GOOD first set you need at least 6 hours to restore energy anyhow.
...* Your brain needs 6 hours to evaluate the first set as well.
...* Studies on university level confirmed my discovery that repeating the same set within 6 hours is contra productive.
.....(but you can do something completely different if you like, so vary your exercises)
I also find out another funny thing... sometimes the fingering in my mind was different from my real fingering. Those happened to be exactly the places were things went wrong in the pice itself as well. As soon as i changed my real fingering into the fingering suggested by my mind all problems disappeared instantly.
Somehow your subconsciousness has a blueprint for producing the goods and as long as you act accordingly you will experience that playing the guitar is very easy. I guess natural talents have a natural ability to connect body and soul. Other human beings can only experience that feeling on certain moments when they have "a good day"or more likely "a good moment".
The exercises i promote can help you to improve the connection between body and soul and "having a good day" can become "normal procedure". But it requires lots of focus, building yourself up from scratch on the base of not accepting anything that is less than perfect. That means severe 1 finger exercises to start with (both physical and mental) and find your way from there.....with the blueprint i mentioned it basically is a matter of hacking. Take some serious time to study the laws of hand/arm dynamics, energy generation/transposal and physical/mental relaxation in order not to waist time and energy to things that don't contribute, like wrong movements or putting in more energy than needed. Personally i had to change basically everything i learned in the previous 18 years, but it was worth it.
Unfortunately ones i knew "how to play" i soon get bored with it (how stupid can one be, but to me the voyage somehow was more exiting then the final arrival) and after abandoning the guitar for a couple of weeks i lost everything i gained and could start all over again. I repeated this circle 4 years on a row (with consisting results) only to find out i somehow get bored with it as soon as i arrived the "final station". As a result i decided to give up my live as a professional player and to become an amateur once again. I struggle playing the guitar ever since because the amount of concentration/energy exchange needed to reach/maintain that level of playing is so demanding that i haven't been able to face that demanding way of studying for the past 20 years. But as soon as i put in 1 hour of "super study" i start noticing the difference so i guess it still works for me if i want...in my good years i needed 40 hours to rebuild myself, postulated i was in the right state of mind. Finding that right state of mind is in fact more difficult than learning to play the guitar once you've found it and most of the time it did cost me a couple of weeks or even mounds to struggle myself to raise even 5 minutes of "powertraining". But as soon as i was able to find myself the right state of mind (after weeks of surging) i was able to study for an hour a day, raising to 2 hours in the second week and 3 hours in the thirth week.
So in my opinion you are doing an excellent job with good chances to come out even better than when you were still studying "full throttle".
(the story goes Mark Knopfler couldn't buy or use an amplifier at first and deprived from a full sound developed a very relaxed way of playing....the same happens when i apply your spounge, i will soon play more relaxed and more rhythmical after a wile. The trick is to remain that relaxed approach ones the spounge is removed and not to fall back into bad habits once again).
One of my best flamenco moments ever was in the Netherlands when i was part of the audience at a flamenco performance. I was very early and preceding the concert they played some very inspirational tracks from Camaron and many others. I rolled up the paper program and used it to produce a series of righthand flamenco rhythms, fitting the music into detail. Although i never heart the majority of songs before i really did a marvelous job, finding exactly the right strokes/rhythms, matching every single copla, falseta and llamada. My body, soul and the tracks somehow seemed to became one. Just before the real show started an elderly man approached me and whispered in my ear "muy, muy bien"...that compliment was worth more to me than every applause i ever received for my real playing.
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Aug. 19 2012 20:44:45
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beno
Posts: 881
Joined: Nov. 3 2006
From: Hungary
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RE: Creative ways of practicing (in reply to beno)
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Thanks Erik! That kind of answers I've been looking for...I'll have some more questions, maybe via PM
Elie, Ramzi: I'm glad You found this beneficial!
Max:
quote:
circle of fifths, sight reading...you play classical, right?
no I don't...how come that? 'Cause I've NEVER met the circle of fifths during my classical studies, BUT during jazz conservatory...
circle of fifths is not just for classical musicians, moreover in my opinion they are the ones that doesn't need it, 'cause they play mostly pre-written pieces.
This is just a stereotype of those who usually doesn't know it's essence...
On the other hand, I think, all other musician need these information, to switch keys easily, to color up Your progressions, to know what scales work over them, and so on...
There were a discussion here some time ago about learning the notes all over the fretboard, wheter it's worth or not etc etc
and I found it a little bit funny, cause it takes only a very short time, and helps learning a lot of things MUCH easier. This is somewhat the same story..
I actually practice palmas too, and I find clapping contratiempo not that hard....
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Aug. 20 2012 14:41:40
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beno
Posts: 881
Joined: Nov. 3 2006
From: Hungary
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RE: Creative ways of practicing (in reply to beno)
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Erik, I've enjoyed reading that, thanks again!
Now the difference in our situations that I don't always have 1-3 hour a day (with 3 hour regular practice I'd be happy for a while), and the time I have is usually limited volume-vise 
the other problem is that my practice time and cicrumstances vary a lot. Sometimes I don't have time for a couple of days, and suddenly then comes a whole day, that I wanna use up to 100 %... so I practice/play the whole day, lets say 10-12 hours. That's not so great 'cause if Your hands are not used to do that on a daily basis, then You can easily hurt them. I was lucky so far as I avoided injuries, and I try not to overdo just one thing, but switch between exercises quite often.
After I have 3 practice days in a row, I finally feel control and speed again, and feel that's a good zero point to start off from.... I gotta go back to work, family etc.
and feel the whole procedure was almost in vain....
but I love playing the guitar so much I just can't wait the next occasion.
I feel lucky when I'm playing public (festivals, restaurants, museums, events etc)
'cause I know I'll have a 3-6 hour play for sure
I'm so jelaous of those that can practice day by day or the amount they're wish/capable of!
So what do You suggest for those cicumstances? Do You ever have written down the exact exercises You've gone through?
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Aug. 22 2012 17:36:47
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