Practice Methods Suggestions

[darticus]

Is there a suggested way to practice and remember old tunes as well. Suggestions welcome Thanks Ron

[BW77]

Is there a suggested way to practice and remember old tunes as well. Suggestions welcome Thanks Ron

Certainly....just play them 10000 times and your fingers will never forget them what ever your mind does. What your neighbours remember is another story...there is always a certain risk you never come that far..... I usully don't....

[RAc]

Is there a suggested way to practice and remember old tunes as well. Suggestions welcome Thanks Ron

 

Is your question how to keep your active repertoire alive and prevent old tunes from falling of the shelf when you work on new tunes?

 

To prevent that from happening, I resolved to a karaoke strategy; I record myself playing my tunes under metronome control once I master them reasonably well. Then I add the resulting .wav to a collection I dubbed "karaoke." Every few weeks I replay the (growing) collection in shuffle mode and play along to my own recordings. That forces me to keep the old stuff as active as the new tunes. Right now it takes about 45 Minutes to get through one karaoke session; hopefully one day it'll take an entire day... ;-)

Edited January 22, 2017 by RAc

[darticus]

Thanks all!

In the past have been playing my older tunes first each day and than trying new work but not enough time for new work. Is this the common practice or just play new work and once a week review the other older work. Thanks Ron

[adrian brown]

I've said it here before, that if you want to be efficient in practising, only practise the bits of a tune you have difficulty with. If you play a tune 10,000 times yet always have to slow down at a certain spot, or always make the same mistake there, it's not really done you much good! Isolate the spot(s) where the problems are, slow it down to the point where you don't make the mistake, play the section as a loop, then crank up the metronome a click at a time until you can play the passage at the correct tempo. If speed is an issue, it's wise to also practise the passage that bit faster, so you can cope if for whatever reason the tempo is faster than what you've been used to.
If you use this method, revising an old tune is exactly the same as learning a new one, except you can expect it will go a lot quicker second, or third time around. I also firmly believe you will make faster progress with the instrument in general.
I hope this is of some help to you.

Adrian

[Steve Wilson]

Good advice Adrian. It is exactly what I do and it fact I keep a list of "tricky bits" which I work through regularly and don't cross any off until a bit is thoroughly nailed. I also list my entire repertoire and have date columns to the right and just tick off an item when it is practiced on any particular day. Looking back across the page I can see immediately if I haven't practiced a song or tune for a week or two. A book keeping type of book is good with their many narrow columns or of course one could do it on a computer. I find if I don't practice a song at least every week or two I will sometimes start to lose it which means wasted practice time getting it back up to scratch.

 

Cheers, Steve.

[darticus]

Thanks all!

Great info! How many tunes does one usually hold in their usable repertoire? Thanks Ron

[David Barnert]

Thanks all!

Great info! How many tunes does one usually hold in their usable repertoire? Thanks Ron

 

I suppose it depends on what you mean by “usable.” There might be a big difference between what you’re prepared to play in a solo performance, what you’re prepared to play as part of a band for a dance, and what you’re prepared to play in a session.

[adrian brown]

Good advice Adrian. It is exactly what I do and it fact I keep a list of "tricky bits" which I work through regularly and don't cross any off until a bit is thoroughly nailed. I also list my entire repertoire and have date columns to the right and just tick off an item when it is practiced on any particular day. Looking back across the page I can see immediately if I haven't practiced a song or tune for a week or two. A book keeping type of book is good with their many narrow columns or of course one could do it on a computer. I find if I don't practice a song at least every week or two I will sometimes start to lose it which means wasted practice time getting it back up to scratch.

 

Cheers, Steve.

 

I think if I tried to keep all my repertoire 100% up to scratch, I wouldn't have enough time to work on new stuff! I do find I can pull an old song or tune set out of the 'archive' and reasonably quickly get it up to performance, but I keep quite detailed scores of all my stuff and will often have a recording, even a scratch one to draw on. The line in the sand for me is whether I've performed it or not - somehow a performance always seems to ingrain a piece in a way endless practice doesn't, though I'm quite prepared to accept this is probably only a feeling between my ears! Still, it means I can pick it up quicker than a piece I've only played for myself.

 

 

Thanks all!

Great info! How many tunes does one usually hold in their usable repertoire? Thanks Ron

 

I suppose it depends on what you mean by “usable.” There might be a big difference between what you’re prepared to play in a solo performance, what you’re prepared to play as part of a band for a dance, and what you’re prepared to play in a session.

 

 

I think it will also depend on the technical level of what you are playing, how complex the arrangement is, whether you are playing melody, or a full accompaniment too. Singing will add a whole new level of memory games, which potentially limits the size of your available repertoire. If you can read music, you don't really have to worry about the memory at all, but might want to do away with it anyway in performance, so you'd still be dependant on how much programme you can safely remember.

 

Adrian

[Anglo-Irishman]

We have to bear in mind that the proportion of practice times for learning new pieces and meainaining old ones shifts over time. As a beginner, you're chiefly occupied with getting to know your instrument and building up a repertoire. When you've been performing for a few years, most of your time will be spent filing and polishing your existing pieces.

 

As aybee says, having performed a piece somehow cements it into your active repertoire. And the programme you've put together for your next gig focusses your practicing of the pieces in question - whether old or new.

 

When I haven't got a gig coming up, I keep my hand in by giving myself little concerts, just for fun.

 

Cheers,

John

[darticus]

Thanks all the suggestions. Ron