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One music-related tip that you think helps the learning process.


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"Any note works if you play it fast enough. "

 

Which reminds me of a joke.  The music students were all very excited because the great pianist Thomas Tempestuous would be making a visit to their humble music school.  When the day arrived and with the students eagerly meeting the great pianist, one of the bolder students shouts out: "Maestro Tempestuous, we heard that you can play sixteenth notes.  Is it true?"  The Maestro sagely nods his head: "Yes, I can play sixteenth notes", he replies.  The students are amazed: "Please; play us one".

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Tho I never entirely stopped playing or listening to music (rock esp.), teenage years were definitely when I practiced classical the most. So I took some (30?) years off from the woodshed, but Covid (thankfully?) pulled me back in to jazz/classical mode. The most useful things I've learned the last few years:

 

Listening is as important as practicing, yin and yang. Have been finding great new albums everyday lately. YouTube interviews are great for steering folks in a cool direction. https://youtu.be/9kjvfn1AZNA

But also listening to Charlie Parker and Bach fugues/chorales/etc. often seems to help the playing. 

 

I haven't been meditating lately for allotted time etc., but relaxing in that manner and really thinking about what you want/need to learn and how to go about it can relax the brain, and let the fingers and soul get to work. 

 

Practicing in smaller chunks helps. (ex. Last nite, taking some short riff I made up or "Donna Lee" in segments through the 12 keys while watching Nuggets/Lakers game 1)

 

And on the opposite spectrum, harmonically/melodically/thematically analyzing everything helps to see the bigger picture. Growing up in classical world, I now notice analyzing jazz, classical & rock are often much different beasts! Rules vs. no rules vs. no key center etc. etc. This analyzing thing I need to do a lot more often. 

 

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If I can go back in time and give my young self an advice, it would be to not waste time with jazz. No, no, no, read further! It's not because of jazz itself. Jazz is great. It's because only a very few blessed ones are born to become masters. I was not. Not sure if other people have had similar experience but for me jazz was a rabbit hole. I always thought that I just needed one more scale to learn and practice, one more voicing to try, one more chord progression/reharmonization to apply, one more hour of mindless practicing of all that stuff, and it was gonna happen. But it didn't. Well, It wasn't a complete waste of time, I learned many things but ultimately it was a dead end for me. It's not my business to say to other people what to do but to be frank, I've seen many good (but not great) jazz musicians around me who seem unhappy. They would blame anything and anybody for why they have 10 people at their concerts, yet would somehow be oblivious to notice that they are just not top-notch, and unfortunately jazz (unlike other music) is 100% dependent on the skills of the musicians, there's world-class jazz and there's mediocre jazz, no middle ground.

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1 hour ago, CyberGene said:

If I can go back in time and give my young self an advice, it would be to not waste time with jazz. 

 

Depends what you want to get out of it.  I enjoy playing jazz just for the sake of it, to challenge myself, to sometimes surprise myself with whatever creativity I can muster.

 

Making more than pocket change playing jazz is a completely different thing.  That's where  many try and very few succeed.

 

Back on the general topic, some of the best improvement in my practicing over the years have been not what I do when I sit down to play, but what I do in the rest of my life to make that sit down time more fruitful and productive.   Clearing space in the day to practice when you're most focused, as opposed to when your tired and strung out.  Having a clear mind, which is whole topic unto itself involving diet, rest, moderate exercise, quiet contemplation, etc . . . The point is, if you just focus on what you do during practice time, you're not going to maximize your potential.

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2 hours ago, CyberGene said:

...and it was gonna happen.

I suppose a lot depends on what you were hoping / expecting this happening was going to look like. I'm going to guess that, on average, one has a better chance at earning money as a working chess grandmaster than as a working jazz musician (just averaging what I see on the interwebz). And I doubt anyone invests their life and focus into either one for the money, at least not initially.

 

But I think I see part of what you're saying. If one is led to believe that competency (or mastery) of either (jazz or chess) is going to lead to being able to live comfortably, provide for loved ones, bring up a family, support a spouse...the odds are against you, and has equal parts to do not only with talent (and the secret scales you learned), but also street level business acumen, the ability to build professional networks with others, and dumb luck.

 

As the old joke runs, the difference between a professional jazz musician (or professional chess grandmaster) and a large pizza is the latter can feed a family of four.

 

All that being said, my own anecdotal is learning a fair bit of the jazz vocabulary has been requisite for working as a freelance in my competitive market. I only have a handful of recurring straight jazz gigs - far more are more popular genres. But building the vocab was the foundation of being able to take all the other gigs with zero preparation and hold one's own.

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@timwat wise words 👏🏻

 

Actually by "it's gonna happen" I didn't mean being a professional jazz musician, let alone earning money with it. Luckily I've had a good career in the IT, so music has always been for my own pleasure, and to a certain extent for fame (hypothetically speaking, because it never happened), so to speak 😀 It is probably childish and even superficial, and has to do with certain vanity I am a victim of, but I imagined being a good jazz pianist would add yet another reason people would have a respect for me. The thing is I never even reached the point to understand whether that may be true or not, because, being slightly OCD-driven and a perfectionist I realized I was too mediocre, so I ultimately gave up jazz. I returned to my old love, classical music and of course it's even more difficult to impress someone with classical music nowadays because there are so many great pianists. But unlike jazz, I just have fun when I master a certain classical work and play it for myself. With jazz even I wasn't having fun myself...

 

Reading the above I feel uneasy, to be honest. Sounds like a bit too much personal information for sharing on a public forum... 😕 

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2 hours ago, Adam Burgess said:

Always play with people better than you. You have to keep up … fast.

I may be a masochist, but I thrive on doing things that I shouldn't be capable of.

I love the pressure.

 

If the opportunity to jam with some Pro go for it,  do your thing, and don't step on them when they are playing.    Then when opportunity comes as them for some comments.   Now especially in the Jazz world they have a tendency to be BRUTALLY honest to point their comment will really tick you off, but the next day when you calm down and think about it usually what they said was true and he know what to focus on when shedding.   So play with the Pros when can and wear your asbestos underwear and have skin as thick as a rhino, but it will be worth in the long run. 

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2 hours ago, CyberGene said:

Reading the above I feel uneasy, to be honest. Sounds like a bit too much personal information for sharing on a public forum... 😕 

I very much understand what you're saying, and have fought that temptation (disease?) myself over the many years. I think most (all?) of us who play music in public would cop to a certain amount of vanity, pride, and ego. And it has always been difficult to share the stage with another act or band with a KB player and not have the comparison bug raise its ugly head, "Is he better than me? Am I better than him?" - and turn music into a competition in my own head rather than a celebration of more folks being creative and making people happy. 

 

There really are more than enough gigs to go around, I've always believed. But yes, it's mere humanity that whispers vanity and the desire to be loved, revered, respected, and adored.

 

And over the years here, I've shared my fair share of very personal information here, and it has mostly been met with kindness and encouragement by the members. One of the great things about this community.

 

 

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6 hours ago, CyberGene said:

If I can go back in time and give my young self an advice, it would be to not waste time with jazz...They would blame anything and anybody for why they have 10 people at their concerts, yet would somehow be oblivious to notice that they are just not top-notch...

Hate to break it to you but even the top-notch ones would only garner 10 listeners if not for their fame/publicity :D

The average listeners are a shallow, conforming crowd, always have been, always will be.

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3 hours ago, CyberGene said:

...With jazz even I wasn't having fun myself...


That's the main problem. If we throw away the purist non-sense that "Jazz" must be improvisational, or "Jazz" musicianship must be judged by how fast we can play obscure scales in Hard-Bop; there are TONs of fun to be had in the rich, liberating harmony Jazz offers. Throw some Afro/Latin rhythm on top, and we are in musical paradise.

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5 hours ago, CyberGene said:

@timwat wise words 👏🏻

 

Actually by "it's gonna happen" I didn't mean being a professional jazz musician, let alone earning money with it. Luckily I've had a good career in the IT, so music has always been for my own pleasure, and to a certain extent for fame (hypothetically speaking, because it never happened), so to speak 😀 It is probably childish and even superficial, and has to do with certain vanity I am a victim of, but I imagined being a good jazz pianist would add yet another reason people would have a respect for me. The thing is I never even reached the point to understand whether that may be true or not, because, being slightly OCD-driven and a perfectionist I realized I was too mediocre, so I ultimately gave up jazz. I returned to my old love, classical music and of course it's even more difficult to impress someone with classical music nowadays because there are so many great pianists. But unlike jazz, I just have fun when I master a certain classical work and play it for myself. With jazz even I wasn't having fun myself...

 

Reading the above I feel uneasy, to be honest. Sounds like a bit too much personal information for sharing on a public forum... 😕 

 

 

I, like you, have had a tech career and music has always been a secondary activity.   But with regard to Jazz, I gravitated to it both listening and playing Jazz fusion and then taking an interest *mostly listening* and some playing of more straight ahead Jazz.     I never developed any interest in Bebop because it didn't move me emotionally (being based on technical chops), and was always into more of post-bop Miles, Bill, Ahmad, Keith, Chick.    I never really thought of the Jazz I was into as more difficult, but more sophisticated.   I wasn't into the challenge, I was into the lush chords, harmony and melody that gave me chills.    Given this, I think there is no reason to swear off Jazz, I might suggest taking the good and leaving the bad.    

 

There must be some positive aspects that you could continue to embrace and keep alive?  Were there aspects of Jazz that didn't require the dedication you felt was required to do justice, but still gave you musical satisfaction?

J a z z  P i a n o 8 8

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@timwat - I met an ex-professional chess player a couple of weeks ago as part of my day job.  He definitely made it sound like a grind.  He was saying he now plays only for fun - mainly on line - and enjoys it much more.  Reinforces your point I think.

 

I would venture that EVERY keys player I’ve shared a stage with has been better than me.  Having checked out many forum members here on YouTube, I can also say I’m at the bottom end of the bell curve in this cohort. No false modesty here, just my dispassionate assessment.  In fact I’ve just recruited a vocalist who I suspect is a better pianist than I am.

 

One of the great benefits of getting older is I no longer worry about this sort of thing, and haven’t for years.  No one actually cares who is “the best” in these scenarios, so I also choose not to waste emotional energy on it.

 

This is not to disclaim the existence of pride or ego in my makeup, of course.  I’m human like everyone else!

 

In a way, this loops back to the topic.  Working on trying to improve oneself with whatever talent level was granted by the universe rather than getting out the measuring stick is very useful for personal productivity and mental health.  Or so I’ve found.

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I think of chess players every so often, because my freshman year at UC Berkeley we had a chess GM on our dorm floor. He made enough money playing to pay for textbooks throughout the year (but not for tuition).

 

I was an EE major, cocky and sure I was smarter than the average bear. So five of us decided to challenge Vince to a game, and to make it "fair" he couldn't start with his queen or either rook.

 

So away we go, us moving by committee, then Vince would go, etc.

 

After 20 minutes, he's telling us what move is best just to keep the game going. Twas a humbling experience, to be sure. But he always told me it's not about intelligence, or even superior memory. It's just being so familiar with so many games that you learn to see possibilities and options several moves into the future. I never learned that with chess, only with women. And most of the time that's ended with a drink in my face or a restraining order. Grandmaster I'm not.

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12 hours ago, CyberGene said:

They would blame anything and anybody for why they have 10 people at their concerts

You could be the next Stan Getz and only have 10 people at your concert. In fact that could easily be part of why, ironically. IMO fewer and fewer people are really capable of understanding/"getting" jazz at that level or anywhere near it and the link between quality and popularity in music generally has not been a consistent one for a very long time.

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6 hours ago, AROIOS said:


That's the main problem. If we throw away the purist non-sense that "Jazz" must be improvisational

uh - what?

 

Improvisation is the very heart of jazz to put it mildly. That's hardly "purist nonsense." Jazz without improvisation is like a cheeseburger without the burger. At best.

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2 hours ago, bill5 said:

You could be the next Stan Getz and only have 10 people at your concert. In fact that could easily be part of why, ironically. IMO fewer and fewer people are really capable of understanding/"getting" jazz at that level or anywhere near it and the link between quality and popularity in music generally has not been a consistent one for a very long time.

I've felt that way about the average listener's taste for at least 25 years now.

As I get older, I'm even starting to suspect that "older folks understood jazz better" is just an illusion. Jazz was what's fed to them, so they enjoyed it.

Chances are: give them Justin Beaver in their formative years, and they'll eat it like hot cake too.

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2 hours ago, bill5 said:

uh - what?

 

Improvisation is the very heart of jazz to put it mildly. That's hardly "purist nonsense." Jazz without improvisation is like a cheeseburger without the burger. At best.

Haha, precisely because of purist stances like this, I never claimed to like "Jazz", despite how much I LOVE "Jazzy" music.

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6 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

There must be some positive aspects that you could continue to embrace and keep alive?  Were there aspects of Jazz that didn't require the dedication you felt was required to do justice, but still gave you musical satisfaction?

There is, it’s the harmony, I still occasionally enjoy reharmonizing pop and kids sings with lush jazz chords and progressions and that gives me pleasure. But it’s not really jazz though, there’s no improvisation. But yeah, maybe I shouldn’t care too much. 

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Just now, AROIOS said:

Haha, precisely because of purist stances like this, I never claimed to like "Jazz", despite how much I LOVE "Jazzy" music.


It also reminds me of two music fans on Facebook arguing over whether "I Keep Forgettin'" is "Yacht Rock". 😆

To me, this kind of obsession with labels is about the most boring exchange we can have about music.

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While this thread is posted in the Keyboard Corner, the title is "One music-related tip that you think helps the learning process." 

In my mind, that leaves things open to all other instruments, including the human voice. 

And directly above my post, Docbop posted a meme with Pat Methany holding a guitar and one of his quotes. 

 

Perfect since I am a guitarist. When I was starting on guitar, a friend of mine who was proficient on both piano and guitar (bearing in mind we were in our middle teens), told me that the biggest difference between keyboards and stringed instruments is that keyboards have only one of each note and because of the logical layout, you must learn a different fingering for every scale where with string instruments the intervals between the strings of a properly tuned instrument remain the same and learning a scale on any 3 strings it's simple to change keys simply by moving that same pattern to a different location on the neck. This is true of the violin family, guitars, banjoes etc. 

 

I heeded his teaching and it made learning how to play in any key very easy on the guitar. Chords are the same, all different on the piano, all the same up and down the neck of a guitar. 

 

As a second "One music-related tip" any keyboard with a pitch control (and all stringed instruments) are capable of playing notes that are not on the European tempered scale but that are correct for other types of music, like blues, jazz and many other forms of popular music. I'm from Fresno CA and there was a large population there from Armenia and other Middle Eastern countries. They brought their music with them, beautiful, haunting melodies. The Middle Eastern music was also influential in Africa and worked it's way into American culture from that avenue as well, what we know as the Blues now evolved from African musics. Hence the string bending and slide playing and Billie Holiday dropping to a "flat" note at the ending of songs (hint, it's not flat, it is the note). 

 

Y'all can do those things too with a pitch wheel. Just a different way of getting there. Listen carefully to Son House or Muddy Waters, it is often subtle but you'll hear it. 

It took a chunk of my life to get here and I am still not sure where "here" is.
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9 hours ago, AROIOS said:

Haha, precisely because of purist stances like this, I never claimed to like "Jazz", despite how much I LOVE "Jazzy" music.

Except that it's not purist at all. I think you're confusing jazz with "jazzy music." 

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Stay curious.

 

As a kid I heard a lot of lectures about working hard and putting in the time.  And so I managed to find things that felt like hard work but were actually just ways to avoid the real work: find a simple crank, and just keep turning it as long and hard as I could.  Often the "crank" was lots of repetition to gradually increasing metronome settings.

 

Slow practice is really useful!   But the technique for playing a passage at 120 bpm may be fundamentally different from what works at 60 bpm.  Repetition is important too, but there are diminishing returns.

Over time I've acquired a bigger bag of practice tricks.  But above all I'm trying to pay attention and experiment and look for creative solutions.  When I find myself getting tired and frustrated and shutting down my brain, I know it's time to take a break.  When I'm ready, I'll come back with a fresh perspective and maybe I'll find the breakthrough I need.

 

(Then again, a disclaimer: I'm a middle-of-the-road amateur musician with no (music) teaching experience, so don't weigh my opinion any higher than that of any other random person on the internet....)

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To make good progress I need to be completely engaged in what I’m practicing. I’ve learned the hard way that I need to take what I’m practicing to the point of really knowing it — where it can be played second nature with no conscious thought — for it to show itself during performance. Too often I haven’t taken what I’m working on over the finish line. I’ve learned the hard way that taking it only 80 or 90 percent of the way is, for the most part, a waste of time. 
 

I enjoy practicing. If the enjoyment isn’t there then the engagement decreases and I know it’s time to move on to something else. 
 

Recently, I’m in the habit of writing my own etudes to help learn and engrain specific music into my playing. I practice the etudes in all keys. As an example, the most recent is an etude for five-note quartal voicings based on Equinox by John Coltrane. For it to remain fun the etudes need to be musical, challenging, attainable, and enjoyable. 

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