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Mental Practice

5K views 20 replies 14 participants last post by  Thunderer 
#1 ·
DO THESE SCENARIOS SOUND FAMILIAR TO YOU?

1. You have practiced the same thing day after day, hundreds of times, but the same spot is still giving you problems?

2. You are playing a piece from memory. All of a sudden you realize that you cannot remember what the next note is.

3. You have performed an entire page of music and realize that you have not been playing any attention to what you are doing. You immediately start to concentrate and make a mistake.

4. You have been practicing like crazy. Your fingers will hardly move and you have shooting pains up your thumb and arm.

Here's a disturbing fact for you to ponder... Every time you make a mistake, it takes seven times doing it correctly to counteract the effect of the mistake. Mental practice is crucial for truly learning a piece of music. Oftentimes people skip this part of practicing because it is extremely difficult and exhausting work. It is a lot easier to sit in a practice room playing a passage over and over again by rote, just working on muscle memory. Unfortunately, this type of practice not guarantee success, and will most likely end in injury.



LEARNING THE PIECE
Make sure you are completely comfortable with each step before moving onto the next.


1. Look up all the words

2. Look through the piece for alternate fingerings, or possible finger problems.

3. Count out loud while clapping the rhythm.

4. Sing the melody while clapping/conducting the beat.

5. Repeat the previous step, paying special attention to correct articulations, dynamics and musical style.

6. Mentally finger through the piece. Pay special attention to the places where your fingers get mentally "tangled"

7. Finger along the saxophone while singing the melody (with correct articulations, dynamics, and musical style.) Fingers should exactly match the movement in the voice.

8. PLAY!
 
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#4 ·
Now seriously, I'm sure this is well meant, but (at least for me) this is very old stuff and kavala is right in a certain ways. (This is all just my oppinion)

A good player should be able to play "normal difflicult" litrature from the sheet. ( has also something to do with musically imagination)

The I'll use step 1till 7 when I have a piece which ist rhythmicall very difficult for me. For this is an exelent training. But I'll do them more problem orientated.
When I have a problem with complicated fingerings, I'll have other stuff which works great. I don't need to clear the rhythem. If I have problems with the rhythem it has nothing to do with the fingering.
Claping without metronom sometimes can lead to unconcinous cheating.

Personally I doupt that with the 7 times.
Some mistakes I'll do only one time, some mistakes I can practice 15mins without achiving to play them 3times correct in repeat right.
Then I should think where is the problem and how to solve it.

a word to 2: I'm a fan of the best and alternativ fingerings, but actually the sax fingerings are quite simple and lot's of saxplayers work fine with only one fingering.

furthermore, I'm no fan of mental fingering. There a cerain conections between ear and hands (feeling) in the brain. So I need my horn in my fingers. Furthermore, often it's not only a problem of fingeres, it's often a problem with the coordination of finger and blowing. (see your 7)

At last, this is very disziplinated. It's something for the russion or chinese school. Something you should do often when you want to become good but actually lot's of people don't do it. Because it's no fun. I would never advise my pupils to do this with every piece. There are more important things that have to be done daily and with focus (longtones, overblowing, tonematching and intonation)

Oh, btw, where did you copy paste it from. Normally you should give the source when you quote. And is there a deeper sense of posting this here today?
 
#5 ·
DO THESE SCENARIOS SOUND FAMILIAR TO YOU?

2. You are playing a piece from memory. All of a sudden you realize that you cannot remember what the next note is.
I strive to be able to dislocate myself from my instrument. It is like the ultimate accention, to be both the musician and the listener. It is a wonderful feeling, until you realize that it's happening.

I guess the point is not avoiding it, but how to come off of it.
 
#6 ·
i have had the fortune to dream through my marching shows about half way through marching season.these actions that i have done many times consciously becomes unconscious. and sometimes i do a few sets over and over again in my sleep. or do a full run through. other times i mash all the shows i have marched together. it is really an odd experience
 
#7 ·
I wish that more teachers taught their students these types of techniques. Students would learn so much quicker and with less stress and anxiety. Playing is not practicing Johnny....

I admit to liking the conducting and singing one when I get to a tricky rhythm!
 
#9 ·
Yes and now, if you can sing it, it means you have understood the tune but that doesn't automatically mean you are able to play it on your instrument.

Furthermore, not know pieces, I find them hard to sing from the sheet but to play them on the instrument is easier.

I know this sentence, it contains some truth but because everybody is so niggling here, I think I should mention my opjections
 
#10 ·
It really does take more time to "unlearn" something than to learn it correctly in the first place. I tell my students that practice does not make perfect; correct practice makes perfect. I know one of my worst "clams" was during a jury performance of the Glazounov Saxophone Concerto at University. I knew the piece cold but lost my focus somehow and started to stress a bit about a later section with some challenging fingering. I ended up making an embarassing error on an easy section because I was focusing on the wrong thing! I had spent so much time in preparation and about 2 seconds of "daydreaming" seemed to negate all of my work. It was a very valuable lesson about concentration. I really felt my entire performance was terrible due to that slight lapse in focus. I was only able to get through the performance because of all the practice I had done in preparation. I'm sure the musicality of the performance suffered greatly as I found it difficult to move past my earlier error. One of my profs suggested what you have listed as #7 and it really did help me to become a more relaxed and better prepared soloist.
 
#13 ·
My earlier response was intended to be a 'bit tongue' in cheek of course.

Forgive me. I just can't help myself sometimes.

However, seriously, while I think there are some good points in the OP,
it smacks at being a bit anal to me.

1. Learn the words. Good advice. Knowing the words really helps with the
expression of a tune, especially ballads, however it is not essential.


2. Look through the piece for alternate fingerings, or possible finger problems.
Well I don't think you really know the answer to this until you put fingers
to horn.


3. Count out loud while clapping the rhythm.
I would think attempting to play this on your horn would be more beneficial,
unless you are stuck on a difficult section and cannot easily work out the
rhythmn.


4. Sing the melody while clapping/conducting the beat.
Good to be able to sing the melody, but the difficult pieces are also difficult
to sing.


5. Repeat the previous step, paying special attention to correct articulations, dynamics and musical style.
Once again, these would be better done with the horn. Voice articulation
and instrument articulation are not the same. Singing it may give you some
ideas that you can then attempt to apply to the sax.


6. Mentally finger through the piece. Pay special attention to the places where your fingers get mentally "tangled". The time would be better spent with fingers on the horn.

7. Finger along the saxophone while singing the melody (with correct articulations, dynamics, and musical style.) Fingers should exactly match the movement in the voice.
I think it is a mistake to focus on fingerings and notes.
Have the melody memorized and try and play it by hearing the notes,
not thinking them.


8. PLAY! Finally, we get to the nitty gritty. :D
 
#14 ·
I probably should explain why i have this here.

I GOT INJURED MY FIRST YEAR AT WSU. I would just play the stuff on the page over and over. It hurt. I got tendonitis and it hurt my spine. For me, the mental practice is important but you dont have to do all the steps. I like to finger stuff in my head or do finger drills. I think its important to be able to sing with the horn in hand because you know whats going on and you are not entirely relying on muscle memory.

We are all at different places in our musical lives and for some this is not needed. ANd for those, this article is not for you. But for some of us who have gotten injured or just cant make practice work for us... that what this is for.

Thanks.
 
#15 ·
Also just to be a tad bit snippy, if you read my mental practice thing closely, it does state that it is so much easier to sit there in a room playing a piece by rote only working on muscle memory. Im assuming those of you who are totally against this thread are in that realm.... or not. Just something to think about, maybe i should have posted this in the beginners thread...
 
#16 ·
I do a fair amount of mental practicing. It gives me something to do when I wake up in the middle of the night (also helps me get back to sleep, lol). I don't think this is limited to beginners by any means, and in fact, the better your technique, the more you can get out of playing a tune 'in your head.'

I don't do most of the steps Thunderer spelled out. I mostly apply this to learning a head arrangement. I'll mentally 'sing' the head in my head (no pun intended), paying close attention to keeping it rhythmically accurate. Sometimes I'll tap my finger or foot to the beat while doing this. The mental exercise alone will not help you play the tune on your horn, so you have to do that also, of course. In fact I usually learn the tune on my horn, then use the mental exercise to reinforce and lock in the tune. Then go back and play it some more, etc. I also do this with horn lines and riffs (I play a lot of those because I play in a blues/R&B band).

I never REALLY learn any tune well until I play it a few times with a band. I don't know why this is so, but it is. Playing a tune 3 times with the band is worth playing it 100 times by myself or with a recording.
 
#19 ·
I never REALLY learn any tune well until I play it a few times with a band. I don't know why this is so, but it is. Playing a tune 3 times with the band is worth playing it 100 times by myself or with a recording.
This is so true for me. I'm glad to see someone as knowledgeable and experienced as JL saying it. I just thought it was me - that I was bad at learning tunes. I never really get a tune down all the way through until after I've played it live, in front of people. Fear is a great teacher.
 
#20 ·
Thanks Thunderer for posting this! To any who posted thinking this is a waste of time . . . why post at all? That to me is a bigger waste of time.

If this doesn't seem like something that will help you, then just skip over the thread . . . well at least that is what I do. Thanks for all that added something.

Hacks like me who have been away from music for so long need all the perspective we can get. :D

(I also get some pain in my hands from time to time, I think this could help)
 
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