Practicing = slow change

Good morning!

I often read the blog by Leo Babauta called "Zen Habits" and really enjoy his insights into meditation and self awareness.  Today's post by Leo is great, and totally applies to the art of practicing.  It is called "The Frustratingly Slow Pace of Change" and while he's talking about exercise or diet most of the time, just replace those words with "practicing" and you'll see how the post applies.

I know there are many teachers reading this blog now, and you may ask: this is great, but how do I help a young player understand that the process is worth it, even when the results take weeks or months to show up in their playing?

I have no idea.

In my studio, I try to help students be aware of the sounds they are making, and connect what physical actions they take that make those sounds.  That way, there's no "bad" sounds, just ways to identify what caused a particular sound (very close to bridge? super firm right hand?) and the sound itself.  Especially in the case of playing extra ponticello, I'll let them know about the times we DO want that sound - Stravinsky, and many of our contemporary composers use that electric sound.

As they develop the ears and self awareness, I'm always hoping they can start to connect this action=this sound.  And I praise them at every new sound/action they can figure out.  Hopefully that helps to keep them going during the months it usually takes to get a great tone the majority of the time.  Remember, great tone isn't one thing, or we'd all have it mastered rather quickly.  We're always compensating for the string length, dynamic, amount of bow we can use on a given note, etc.  It's always a moving target!

Here's Leo's post for your enjoyment:
http://zenhabits.net/slowchange/

Happy practicing!

Gaelen

Bass Boot Camp

You heard it here first:

What?!?!

I'm proposing this idea to you all:  After a lovely summer, spent doing what you love, eating ice cream, playing in the pool....aaaaah!.....it will be time to get your bass chops back in working order.

Why go it alone?  Let's get together for a day of refresh and remember all things bass!  Everyone will be welcome - from newbie to seasoned veteran, to get together and talk about easy stretches, natural posture in sitting and standing, drawing great tone, practicing advice at all levels of performance, and mini jazz lesson for everyone to try out, and a faculty recital at the end.

There will be two "tracks" happening - one for students and one for teachers.  Some classes will be everyone in the room working together on the basics, and some break outs especially for teachers to talk and demo pedagogy ideas.

So.....

Are you in?  

What specifics would you like us cover that day?

We are looking at the week of August 18, for one day only, and I'm working to get teacher's credit through ASTA for coming to this workshop.

Happy practicing!
Gaelen

Practicing with your eyes closed

So I have this fabulous little 5 year old violinist of a daughter, and I'm new to the whole parent as practice coach thing.  Which is weird, since I teach - a LOT - but not so much this very young set of people.  So I'm used to kids who can listen, follow, ask questions, and basically NOT jump and squirm and pick their noses.  All at the same time.  But I digress....

At Clara's lesson recently, her teacher thought it would be a good time to try string crossings, no left hand, with her eyes shut.  And I was amazed at how quickly she sensed where the next string was, and clearly heard when she was scraping two strings at once.  I really didn't think she'd be able to keep her eyes shut and not fall over.  I underestimated her, clearly.

So this got me thinking about how infrequently I ask my own students to shut their eyes and do a very simplified technical task like that.  Recently, I've been asking my college students to do more lights-out practice to really listen to their tone, and make them memorize a bit of their recital repertoire.  But the simplicity of just closing your eyes, and really feeling and listening to a very simple task is what I want to hold up for all of us today.

I noticed right away in my warm up that I spend more time thinking and feeling my shoulders and arms, and allowing more warm up to take place if they are tight or jerky.  That happens a lot with the freezing weather we're having here lately.  It's like my shoulders go up and stay up until I'm smothered in blankets at the end of the day.

You, of course, may discover something totally different.  Give yourself a fighting chance in this one: cell phone off/silent, other distractions at bay for a few minutes (at least) and let it be ok to feel funny about playing with your eyes closed.

Happy practicing!
Gaelen

procrastination and practicing

I came across an article on procrasting "hard tasks" today, and loved it.  Basically, replace "practice" everywhere you see "hard task" and you're up and running.  Now, fair warning, it's from a zen blog I follow, so it may strike you as touchy-feely.  There, you were warned.  But to chime in on one of the biggest things I see happening with my students (and myself), it's the dread of the hard thing we need to work on.  It all seems to big and daunting, and I'd much rather indulge in facebook, angry birds, even washing dishes if it means I can avoid having to practice arpeggios against the drone.

Of course, if I set my mind to WHY I'm doing that drone practice in the first place, it's really not so big and scary anymore.  Here's my personal why's for that one part of my daily practice:
1. to stay loose in my arms, paying attention to where I tend to hold tension
2. to hear/sing my next note well before I shift
3. to maintain a big, open sound in all registers (this is a 2 octave cycle I'm working through, and take this from the open E up to the high D harmonic on G through a progression)

Once I look at what/why I'm doing this, it's really pretty easy.  I use a drone pitch (on iTunes, The Tuning CD) which plays each key for 3 minutes.  Granted, I'm going to go through about half an hour of this if I do the whole thing, but break it down ...... 3 minutes in each key... and my arpeggio cycle has 8 different chords I outline, so there's plenty to focus on, one step at a time.  I play each of those chords several times, each pass asking myself about the goals of loose arms, hearing ahead of shift, big sound.  I keep it simple and keep coming back to the basic questions.

I think that's the part we fail on - breaking it down from Big & Daunting into lots of small little chunks to work through, step by step.  When I was working on my book, my husband asked me why I hadn't published it yet.  I had already had it tested in many studios, but there were soooooo many little edits that just felt like the thing would never be done.  He said, "put it into action steps, rather than focus on the whole block of work."  Boy did that make it a lot easier.  One etude per day, where I knew I had the time to do it.  Of course, work makes for more work as I discovered more and more that I wanted to add or change.  But, even that got put into steps that were "do-able".

So friends, take a minute to read the zen post on procrastinating (now that you're done putting off other work by reading this).

http://zenhabits.net/read-now/

Happy practicing!
Gaelen

Mastering the Bow -a few note changes

I've finally had a few days off  - in a row!- which gave me the opportunity to sit down and play through the entire book of Mastering the Bow (ok, I did this in two sittings) and get at the tiny details that are not quite right after the editor had his/her way with the manuscript.  While Carl Fischer is going to add my changes, I think any of you that already have the book ought to know about them too.  So.... here they are!

As far as the fingerings go, the errors don't make or break the etude, but they sure are confusing where there are, and a few are literally impossible.....

As you work through the book yourself or with your students, and find you have questions, I will be HAPPY to answer them here!

Happy practicing!
Gaelen

A video on sitting posture by Dr. Kertz

I hope you all are aware of the great resource we have in the ISB - International Society of Bassists. They provide so many connections for learning, performing, and great community. Recently they've been hosting a series of stretching and wellness videos by Dr. Kertz and the latest is about sitting posture. While I don't agree with everything he says in this video, and plan to make a follow up to offer some advice to shorter folks like myself, he does raise some good points about what happens when we sit without considering the stresses we place on the back and legs (and bottom!).

Check it out here: http://isbconvention.com/body-bass-november-2013/#.UpZC8I1Ra7Y?utm_source=Body+%26+Bass+November+2013&utm_campaign=Stretch+November+2013&utm_medium=email

Happy practicing!
Gaelen

Kurt Muroki offers some tips

Happy December 1st!

I'm catching up on my reading, online and in print, and following up some links I wrote down a while back that I wanted to preserve here for ya'll.  So today, let's look at what the fabulous Kurt Muroki has been doing with some technique videos he made.  Kurt is the new professor of double bass at Indiana University (a great bass school!) and Stony Brook University (another fantastic school of music) and he brings lots of experience as both a performer and teacher to bear in his work.

First this: a video on left and right hand coordination http://vimeo.com/80002688

But wait, there's more.  A video on warm ups: http://vimeo.com/80001307

I've got a whole list of things I'm going to share with everyone this month - a month of presents from me to you!  Meanwhile, please comment back with your favorite videos or exercises that help keep you in top playing shape.

Happy practicing!
Gaelen