Past, present and future faculty, staff and students
Institute Good Practice Techniques
There are many skills, techniques, strategies etc. that the music "gurus" will say if you try this you will be a great musician. Of course you all being bright, intelligent and mature know this is just not true. Becoming a great musician though is a lot about "living with" your instrument, whatever that instrument may be and about "living with" the repertoire, whatever that may be. You will find story after story found in autobiographies of musicians who play for hours. I really believe that "playing" must be focused. While there is always something that can be gained from just playing your instrument, you will find yourself progressing more if you have a focus for your time, especially considering how little time we all actually have in any given day. Here are some suggestions:
Plan a specific period of time to work. Just as you would schedule to work on homework; or to workout at the gym; you should schedule a specific part of the day to work on your "musical self." While most will say you need to practice a certain amount of time eveyrday, I recommend that the time be consistent everyday. If you can work longer, fine, but never spend less time that you have set aside.
Plan to spend time just warming up. This could include blowing long notes in all of hte ranges of your horn. Move on to faster notes, to get your air flowing and your fingers and bow arms a bit of a work out. Using portions of your pieces to accomplish will get you into the music to apply your techniques. Change the rhythms or vary the tempos.
Then if you have more time left, really look at the passage that you "stumble" over. We all have them. Litterally take the passage apart. Look at the notes, the rhythm, the phrasing, the bowing, the breathing, the accents, whether it calles for vibrato or straight tone, etc. Practice the passage slowly so that each note and rhythm and technique is accurate. If you have even more time, play the passage with a metronome, faster and faster until you can play it accurately at any tempo. Add measures before or after the passage to ensure a smoot transition into and out of what used to be the difficult passage.
The next time you practice, you can use this passage as the warm-up and a new passage as the workout.
Plan a specific period of time to work. Just as you would schedule to work on homework; or to workout at the gym; you should schedule a specific part of the day to work on your "musical self." While most will say you need to practice a certain amount of time eveyrday, I recommend that the time be consistent everyday. If you can work longer, fine, but never spend less time that you have set aside.
Plan to spend time just warming up. This could include blowing long notes in all of hte ranges of your horn. Move on to faster notes, to get your air flowing and your fingers and bow arms a bit of a work out. Using portions of your pieces to accomplish will get you into the music to apply your techniques. Change the rhythms or vary the tempos.
Then if you have more time left, really look at the passage that you "stumble" over. We all have them. Litterally take the passage apart. Look at the notes, the rhythm, the phrasing, the bowing, the breathing, the accents, whether it calles for vibrato or straight tone, etc. Practice the passage slowly so that each note and rhythm and technique is accurate. If you have even more time, play the passage with a metronome, faster and faster until you can play it accurately at any tempo. Add measures before or after the passage to ensure a smoot transition into and out of what used to be the difficult passage.
The next time you practice, you can use this passage as the warm-up and a new passage as the workout.
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