Looper Practice

I set up my own practice room a few days ago. Since this spot in my apartment is dedicated to guitar and only guitar, I can leave my essential practice tools set up and ready to be used at any time, including the small pedal in front of the chair in the picture. This is a looper, which records what I play and then plays it back through the amp. I use a bigger version of this looper for some gigs. I'll record the chords while I'm accompanying myself or someone else, and then I'll improvise solos while the chords play back. This is a fun way to use the looper, but it's also an amazing practice tool.

Now that I have this little looper permanently set up at home, I use it a lot. In practice sessions, I use it mainly as a super fast, easy way to record myself and listen to the playback. Have you ever heard a recording of yourself talking and thought, "That doesn't sound like me?" The same goes for playing an instrument. Your own perception of your sound as you play is usually quite different from the way it actually sounds.

I have recently begun using the looper to listen to my improvised solos. (I can't believe I haven't thought of this before.) Improvisation is such a fleeting thing. When I improvise, I rarely remember much about what I played 10 seconds ago, let alone an entire solo. Up until now, I would improvise to Band-in-a-Box tracks and congratulate myself when I played over the changes comfortably. I never thought too much about my style and delivery.

Say hello to my little friend.
Almost as good as a teacher.

With the looper, I can play through the chord changes once. After that, I can add layers to the loop, which enables me to record an improvised solo over the changes I just played. What an eye opener! In some respects, I was pleasantly surprised at what I heard. In general, I tend to play lines that are melodic and singable, which is exactly what I'm going for. Sometimes there are licks that surprise me. I'll hear the playback and think, "Wow! Did I play that?" On the other hand, my relative youth as a guitar player shows through, especially in my timing. When I'm navigating through tricky chord changes or I'm just not quite sure what to play next, I'll start playing ahead of the beat, as if I can't wait to get through some challenging measures. Being made aware of this tendency, I'll take another crack and the solo, and 9 times out of 10, I'll sound more comfortable the second time. It'll be easy to forget to play more deliberately in performance situations, because there are other things that demand your attention, but the more I focus on improvising with a more relaxed feel at home, the more it will become a habit in the real world.

If you own a looper, I highly recommend using it as a practice tool. If you sing or play an acoustic instrument, you can record with a voice memo app on a smartphone or with an inexpensive digital recorder. After the initial shock of really hearing yourself for the first time, you'll be amazed at how quickly you can improve your playing or singing. It's almost as good as having a teacher in the room. In some ways, it may be better, because you can hear for yourself what needs to be fixed.

The Power of Slow

My young guitar and piano students believe everything I tell them…almost. The one thing they never seem to believe is that their playing will improve immensely if they practice slowly. They want to play fast right away.

One of my brightest students is an 8 year old piano player. I lost count of how many times I told her to slow down today, especially when she was sight-reading. I actually got her to slow down once, and – surprise! – she played more accurately. It didn't matter. She just played faster again. I can certainly understand an 8 year old's impatience, so I don't take her resistance personally. I'll just keep reminding her to slow down over and over until I eventually wear her down. In a few years, she'll have progressed enough that I'll have to hand her off to a more advanced piano teacher, and then the new teacher can tell her the same thing.

If there are any young musicians out there reading this (or parents of young musicians), here are some reasons to practice slowly.

• Playing slowly improves accuracy. If you are having trouble playing something quickly, and you continue practicing it that way over and over, you are going to get really good at making the same mistakes. If you slow down, you can pinpoint where you are having problems. Play at a tempo in which it is almost impossible for you to make a mistake, and then gradually speed it up.
• Playing helps you play more relaxed. If you are playing too fast, you build up tension in your fingers, arms, shoulders, and the rest of your body. If you are tense, your body tends to lock up, and you can't play as fast. If you start slowly, within your comfort zone, you will be learn to be more relaxed as you build up speed.
• Playing slowly helps you learn to play expressively. Playing fast is impressive, but if all you can do is play fast, listeners will soon get bored with your playing. You also need to learn how to play with good phrasing, dynamics, and nuance. In playing slowly, you'll learn to develop the power of expression.
• The pros all practice slowly and build up speed. That's one of our big "secrets." If the pros practice slowly, why not you?

I hope that all of my students will be turned on to the power of slow at some point in their development. Until then, I'll keep saying the same things over and over in my lessons…"slow down!"

Practice Room

Back when I was in college, I spent many hours in practice rooms. A typical practice room was basically a jail cell with a wobbly stand, an uncomfortable chair, and a battered piano. The rooms in which I practiced were either a) not soundproofed, enabling you to share your practice session with the rest of the hall, or b) soundproofed so heavily that the sound of my trombone died immediately. (I was a trombonist before I was a guitarist.)

For most of us, particularly those of us who played loud instruments, the practice room was the only place to practice. Sitting in a practice room for a multi-hour session, I would sometimes dream of the future, when I would be able to practice at home.

Be careful what you wish for. I can practice at home now, but there are also many distractions at home, especially the computer. If I practice in front of – or even near – my laptop, I find it difficult to resist the urge to check email, look at Facebook just for a "little while," or visit YouTube to watch "just one" video.

There is something magical about a tiny practice room. When you sit down to practice in one of those cubicles, it's just you and the music. There is nothing else. You forget about your cell-like surroundings and focus only on improving your musical skills. My greatest period of musical growth took place when I was spending hours in college practice rooms.

To replicate the practice room atmosphere, (minus the trombone player blasting The Ride of the Valkyries a few doors down), I just set up a room in my apartment as a practice area. Until recently, I practiced near the computer and my phone. No more! I've carved out a small space where it's just me and the music once again. I have my own college practice room with a few upgrades, such as windows and air conditioning. No computers or mobile phones are allowed. I've already noticed a difference in the quality and duration of my concentration.

I like my new practice room, and I'm looking forward to more quality practice sessions in the future.

Luxury Practice Time

One of the nice things about my job at NWUUC (Northwest Unitarian Universalist Congregation) is that I have two months off during the summer. Some of this time will be spent in intense learning situations. I'll be attending the annual UUMN Conference in a couple weeks, and I'll be taking a weeklong workshop in teaching group piano to children the last week of July. By then, I'll be gearing up for another church year at NWUUC, planning for piano classes at Tessitura, and welcoming back some guitar students who were away for the summer.

For now, I've had a few weeks with nothing to do but practice guitar. This has been such a luxury! When I was in college, I practiced trombone for hours. Back then, I took it for granted that I would always have loads of time to practice. I assumed a professional musician would spend his time either practicing, rehearsing, or performing. Silly me.

I practice quite a bit, but I normally have to plan around music engraving, teaching private lessons, and my church music director job, not to mention chasing down gigs, keeping up a website, etc. Sometimes a big music engraving project or an obligation at NWUUC will eat into my practice time, and I'm lucky to be able to run through scales and arpeggios.

At present, I'm off for the summer, my teaching schedule is light due to summer schedules, and I don't have any music engraving projects to finish. I literally have all day to practice, and that's what I've been doing. I love it! When I have a totally free day, I'll play guitar in the morning, workout, play guitar after lunch, eat dinner, and play guitar in the evening. It's not often that I have a chance to practice this much, and I'm taking advantage of it while it lasts.

Most people would think it's crazy to spend most their summer holed up in their private studio, but I'm not most people.

Tick Tick

I teach an adult student who has been playing for about 11 months and has been making steady progress. Her movement from chord to chord is becoming more fluid, she has a couple "go to" strumming patterns that work in 90% of the songs she wants to play, and she has a natural affinity for fingerpicking. To help her move to the next stage of her playing, I've been preaching metronome work.

We had a good laugh today when she said, "The metronome messes me up."

Right now, my student has trouble strumming steady quarter notes along with a metronome set to 80 bmp. However, she can count out loud in time with the metronome, no problem. She can also tap her guitar in time with the metronome. After she counts out loud and taps, she is then able to strum to the metronome. So, that's the exercise…count with the metronome, tap with the metronome, and then strum with the metronome. I've given her one-bar combinations of quarter notes and eighth notes to play, but I've asked her to always start with the quarter note exercise.

This may sound like a remedial exercise, and I know for certain that my student doesn't enjoy this, but it's absolutely essential to develop a sense of rhythm and time. It's the only way you're going to play well with others. Even if you're a soloist, you're going to need to keep a steady beat, otherwise people will find it challenging to listen to you.

Whether you want to be a killer lead player or a rock solid rhythm player, practicing with a metronome is the most efficient way to improve your technique. Once you are able to maintain a steady beat and stay in sync with the metronome, you can make friends with difficult lines or chord changes more easily. First, you start the metronome at a tempo at which it is nearly impossible to make a mistake. It may be an excruciatingly slow tempo, but that's okay. You want to start super slow, so that you are properly training your muscle memory. Get it right in slow motion, and you can then incrementally get it right at speed. Just start at a nice, easy tempo. Practice a problem area until you can play it correctly. Increase the metronome speed by 5 clicks and repeat the process. You will eventually run into a speed at which your technique finally breaks down. Remember the top speed at which you could play with control. The next time you practice that spot, start 10-20 clicks slower than your top speed and build from there. It won't be long before you can sail through that lick or those tricky chord changes.

My student has told me that she has no rhythm. I beg to differ. She has an undeveloped sense of rhythm, but it's in her. All she needs is a metronome and a few minutes a day focusing specifically on tempo.

Memory Work

I've been spending a lot of time memorizing music lately. It's assumed that I'll have my music memorized for my own guitar lessons, and I've been memorizing my own performance repertoire.

There are three main reasons I'm memorizing the music I perform most frequently:

1. To connect more deeply with my audience and with the other musicians.
2. To develop a deeper understanding of the music.
3. To set up less equipment! I'm all for minimizing my gear. It will be a great day when I don't have to set up a stand and a big book for a gig.

Most of my repertoire consists of jazz standards, which means that I have a lot of chords to memorize…a LOT of chords! Some songs come more easily because I've either played them for a long time or because they follow a common format.

Here's my standard routine for memorizing a song. This prepares me to sing, comp, or solo over the chord changes. I follow this routine even with songs I've played a long time. I've found that, while I've memorized some chord changes through sheer repetition over the course time, I can get lost when I have to improvise a solo without a lead sheet, because I've been relying on muscle memory rather than a better understanding of the chord structure.

1. Learn the melody and the words. Sing and play the melody over and over again. Sing it in the car or on a walk. Sing it to your dog. It should be stuck in your head so much that it drives you a little crazy. Even if you don't think you'll ever sing the lead in a performance, sing the melody when you practice. The melody is your guiding light when you're comping or soloing.
2. Then learn the chord structure. Although jazz songs typically have more complicated chords than blues, rock, or folk songs, there is always a form. Find sections that are the same or similar, so that you can understand the overall form of the song. If you've learned the melody, then you are already familiar with the structure of the song. Have I mentioned that you should learn the melody?
3. Outline the chords. So you think you've memorized the chords? Think again! Now try going through the song, outlining each chord. I'm not talking about arpeggiating the chords using whatever chord shape you want. For each chord, play the root, 3rd, 5th, and 7th in time. If the chord lasts 4 beats, then you can play R357 as quarter notes. If the chord is a half note, then you'll have to double that up and play R357 as 8th notes. Once you can play R357, reverse it. Start from the 7th and play downward 753R in time. Bonus points if you can sing the song while you do this. This will not only deepen your knowledge of the chords, but it is a HUGE help in learning to improvise over difficult chord changes.
4. Improvise over the chord changes. You can practice improvising to a track or to Band in a Box. If you really want a challenge, improvise unaccompanied, with a metronome clicking on beats 2 and 4 to keep you honest (or clicking only on beat 4 to really test your sense of time). If you can improvise without accompaniment and keep a tempo, it's going to be a breeze when you play with accompaniment.

If you think this sounds time consuming, you are correct! Yes, it takes a lot of time, but this is some serious quality time with the music. It'll take me a while to go through my repertoire like this, but it'll be worth the effort. I've found this approach to be very satisfying. I'm learning my music more thoroughly, and I'm able to close the songbook a little more often when performing.

I don't want to minimize the ability to read music. Any guitarist who plays in a big band or a pit orchestra will tell you how important it is to be able to sight-read. I will continue to keep up my reading skills, but I'll deepen my understanding of music through memorization.

Oh, and learn the melody.

Lesson #9

I'm continuing to summarize my lessons with Dave Frackenpohl at GSU to absorb the new lesson assignment and help others who may be on the same path.

After a short warm-up, Dave had me play Wes Montgomery's solo from his recording of Gone with the Wind. In our last lesson, I had to play it very slowly to get through it. Dave asked me to keep working on it and build up speed. I managed to increase the tempo from quarter = 80 to quarter = 110. I didn't play it well at this lesson. I probably counted it off too fast. Dave suggested some fingerings to help get through the more challenging licks.

Next, I requested that we work on It's Only a Paper Moon, specifically for unaccompanied improvisation. We worked through it, not just for soloing, but for comping styles. There's more on this below, where I write out my new assignment.

Then we turned to The Brazilian Guitar Book, where I'm working through the "Samba" chapter. We didn't do much with this. I'm learning the patterns pretty well, and he assigned a few more pages.

Toward the end of the lesson, I played Joe Pass' solo in the Ella/Joe Pass recording of I'm Beginning to See the Light. I had to play it very slowly, and so my next assignment is to work it up to speed.

The new assignment:

• Whole Tone Licks: Dave assigned three different whole tone scale fingers a few weeks ago, which I've been practicing daily. Now he's given me a sheet of whole tone licks to incorporate into my improvisation. Learning a scale is like learning the letters of the alphabet. Learning a lick is like forming those letters into a word. Incorporating that lick into your playing is like learning to use that word in a sentence. It takes time, but that lick eventually becomes part of your vocabulary. I'll focus two or three of these licks at a time.
• It's Only a Paper Moon: Part of this assignment is to find a solo that I like and to transcribe it. For unaccompanied soloing, Dave has given me a few options to try. There's his 2/2 plan, where you comp for two measures and then solo for two measures (or vice versa). Comping works particularly well in this song, because there are usually two chords in every measure. With so much harmonic activity, you can just comp and it still sounds like you're doing something. For soloing, he suggested arpeggiating chords. For comping behind a singer, he showed me a couple common Joe Pass arpeggio patterns, and then there's the classic Freddie Green comping that always works so well. Sometimes all you need to do is play quarter notes to lay down a nice groove for the singer.
• The Brazilian Guitar Book: I'm continuing to work through the "Samba" chapter. The last two assignments have been page after page of short samba patterns. Dave has given me a choice between a long comping etude or a chord/melody solo. I'll check them both out today to see which one seems more manageable.
• I'm Beginning to See the Light: I'll continue working on the Joe Pass solo, gradually bringing it up to speed.

As usual, I'm excited to be working on unaccompanied soloing. I'm also enjoying The Brazilian Guitar Book. I've worked through a lot of fun patterns. Now I need to start applying them to my own repertoire. To do this, I'll pull out some Latin songs in my book and sketch out some rhythmic patterns. Eventually, I'll be able to play these Latin grooves at will, but for now I need to write them out so that I can remember them.

Focused Practice

Lately, I've noticed that my most productive practice sessions often occur when my schedule is tight and I'm squeezing in a few minutes.

If I have a relatively free day, I'll take my own sweet time on all my practice material. I may practice a particular song or exercise for 20-30 minutes before moving on to something else. By the time I get to the last couple items on my agenda, I'm mentally drained, and I end up going through the motions. Now, I enjoy these marathon sessions when I have the luxury of time, but there's something to be said for shorter sessions as well.

On the other hand, sometimes it seems like I can get just as much done in a short, focused practice session. If I know that I can only squeeze in a few minutes here and there throughout the day, then I'm going to make sure each 10-20 minute practice session counts. If I only have 10 minutes, I may spend those 10 minutes on a single solo transcription. I may even spend that time working on just 8-16 bars, focusing mostly on the most difficult measures.

I've been pleasantly surprised by how much progress I can make when I practice in short bursts like this. I first noticed this when my teaching load began to increase. I like to schedule lessons with 10-15 minutes between students. Waiting for the next student, and with nothing else to do, I would practice a song, exercise, or a scale until the next student arrived. When it was time for my big "official" practice session, I realized that I had already practiced most of what needed work, and that I had improved significantly.

I'm going to begin practicing in short, focuses mini-sessions, even when I have a big block of time. I think a good approach will be to start with 20 minutes of technique, and then take a break to do something else. Then come back to the guitar and focus on a single song or exercise for 10-15 minutes, take a break to do something else, etc. This is all a big experiment, but I think this approach will help me come to each to mini-session fresh and focused.

Lesson #8

Continuing my practice of writing about each lesson with Dave Frackenpohl at GSU to help wrap my head around each new assignment and help other jazz guitarists who may be on the same path.

These past couple weeks have not been ideal for practicing my lesson material. I took a last minute gig a couple weeks ago, I've been doing the usual busywork that accompanies the end of a church year, and I've been preparing for a wedding gig by assembling a book for the bass player, writing up set lists, and a host of other niggling details that go into putting together a successful gig.

In spite of all that, I managed to make some progress on my lesson material. I didn't have time for every part of the assignments, but I worked up more than I thought I could.

We began with the three whole tone scale forms that Dave assigned and then went into the assignment from the new Brazilian Guitar Book. Then we played through I'm Beginning to See the Light. After that, we worked on Gone with the Wind, focusing especially on a Wes Montgomery solo that I just finished transcribing. That pretty much exhausted the material that I had prepared, but we still had plenty to work on.

We spent time talking about improvising without any back-up. It looks like we're going to be spending some lesson time on this for the foreseeable future, and I couldn't be happier! Dave gave me a sheet of ideas and strategies for pure solo improvising called Unaccompanied Jazz Guitar – Making It Manageable. This one page sheet is an absolute gold mine of ideas! We're going to focus on just one or two ideas at a time, which is good, because I think my brain would overload if I tried everything at once.

Here's my new assignment:

• Continue the "Samba" section of The Brazilian Guitar Book, pages 30-36. These are all four-measure examples of samba groove variations.
• Finish the transcription of a Joe Pass solo over I'm Beginning to See the Light. I had started this for this week's lesson but hadn't had time to finish it.
• Increase the tempo of the Wes Montgomery Gone with the Wind solo that I transcribed. I was happy just to memorize it for today. Now I just need to get it closer to tempo.
• Memorize Summertime and Corcovado. I already have Summertime memorized. I kinda sorta know Corcovado by memory just because I've performed it a number of times. We are using these two practice unaccompanied improvising. I'll be using two strategies for this. One is what Dave called the "2+2" plan: 2 bars of comping/2 bars of soloing and vice versa. The other is also a "2+2" plan: 2 bars of comping or solo/2 bars of melody or vice versa. I thought I knew the melody of Fly Me to the Moon pretty well until Dave had me try this approach! It was awfully tricky to jump from comping or soloing and pick up the melody in the middle. Back to the woodshed!

Unaccompanied soloing is one of the major skills I want to possess, so I'm super excited about this new direction!

Lesson #7

Continuing the practice of writing about my jazz guitar lessons with Dave Frackenpohl at GSU to get a handle on my latest assignment and hopefully pass on some wisdom to other developing jazz guitarists.

We started off running through three different chromatic scale fingerings that Dave assigned last time. I played them easily enough, but Dave noticed that my left hand was tense. From now on, I'll be focusing more on relaxing my left hand.

Next, we looked at I'm Beginning to See the Light. This wasn't part of my assignment, but I wrote to Dave yesterday, asking that we begin working on this song. It's a well known standard, and I should be able to improvise on it more easily than I do. We worked through it, and by the time we were finished, I was feeling more more comfortable with the tune.

Then we played through Girl from Ipanema. Dave specifically suggested that I experiment with some Mixolydian #11 licks to fit over the dominant chords in the bridge. This went pretty well. I had stolen a lick from the classic Stan Getz solo, and Dave showed me a few more. With a little more practiced, I'll be well armed the next time I play this tune.

Finally, we played through Gone with the Wind. This tune offers plenty of chances to play ii-V licks, which I've been working on quite a bit. Part of my assignment was to transcribe the first chorus of Wes Montgomery's solo over these chord changes. This was a difficult assignment. I've completed most of the transcription, and I've learned the first half of the solo. This solo is loaded with tasty licks, and I'll steal as many as I can! One thing that strikes me about Wes Montgomery's solo playing is how bluesy everything sounds. Gone with the Wind isn't even close to being a blues tune, yet Wes manages to infuse his solos with blues sounds. It works so well! I'll be studying Wes for a long time to come.

Here's the new assignment:

• The "Samba Intro" from The Brazilian Guitar Book by Nelson Faria. We're going to be alternating between this book and Galbraith's Guitar Comping. I'm really looking forward to expanding my range of Brazilian guitar styles.
• Whole Tone Scales. Yes, another scale to learn. This is jazz, after all! Dave showed me three fingerings for a whole tone scale. I had already figured out two of them on my own, so it's just a matter of learning the third form. Again, we're also using scales to focus on relaxing my left hand.
• I'm Beginning to See the Light. In addition to learning the song in greater depth, I'll be transcribing a Joe Pass solo from an Ella Fitzgerald/Joe Pass duo. I'm very much looking forward to this part of the assignment. When I perform in a voice/guitar duo setting, I will often loop the chords and then solo over the looper. Sometimes I will get brave, skip the looper, and "solo out of thin air," as Dave puts it. It's much more difficult, but I think the solos "out of thin air" sound better than the solos with the looper. Someday, I would like to leave the looper at home and solo out of thin air all the time, a la Joe Pass.
• Gone with the Wind. I'll finish transcribing and learning the Wes Montgomery solo.

Toward the end of the lesson, I commented on an observation that I blogged about a few days ago. Through much of our lessons, we hardly ever take music out and read it. There's a big emphasis on memorizing and listening. As we worked through I'm Beginning to See the Light, I improvised better than I ever have, mainly due to the fact that I wasn't reading music. I was listening very intently. When I'm reading chord changes and improvising, I tend to get too focused on the written chords, worrying about how I'm going to navigate from one chord to the next. When I take my attention away from the page, I play more musically. I still need to know the chord changes, but taking away the written music helps me calm my analytical voice and play more intuitively. I'm assigning myself is to memorize the repertoire for Tea for Two and Godfrey and Guy. This is going to be a major undertaking, but it's going to make me a better musician in so many ways. I'll have a host of standards in my head, I'll play more musically, and I'll be really good at memorizing!

Lesson #6

Continuing the practice of summarizing each lesson with Dave Frackenpohl and outlining each new assignment…

We usually start off playing whatever new scale has been assigned. This time, we skipped over the new scale (mixolydian bebop). I'll continue to practice this scale, along with the others Dave has assigned. We started off this lesson playing Jobim's Wave. I showed Dave an intro that he hadn't seen before. He's going to steal that from me. Dave showed me a way to play the bridge that I hadn't thought of. I'm going to steal that from him.

Then we moved on to The Girl from Ipanema. We first played it in the standard key of F, taking turns playing the melody, improvising, and comping for each other. Part of my assignment was to transcribe a solo from a recording of this tune. I had transcribed the classic Stan Getz solo, which was in the key of D-flat, which meant that I had to learn this tune in both F and D-flat. That was a good exercise!

We then went on to finish up the F Blues exercise in Barry Galbraith's Guitar Comping book. That was a long project. It took me six weeks to work my way through it, but the rewards were great. Thanks to this particular exercise, I have a lot of new chord voicings under my fingers.

Here's the new assignment:

• Three different chromatic scale fingerings. I'm already familiar with one of them. The others aren't too tricky. These are great warm-up and technique exercises.
• The Girl from Ipanema: We will continue to work through this song, focusing heavily on the bridge so that I can try out yet another new scale.
• Mixolydian #11 scale: This is the new scale to try out in Girl from Ipanema's bridge. Dave gave me a sheet of different ways to use the melodic minor scale. One way to think of the myxolydian #11 is a melodic minor scale starting on the 4th scale degree. The easier way to think of it is as a myxolydian scale with a raised 4.
• Gone with the Wind: I'll be doing quite a bit with this song! I'll be learning the Gone with the Wind comping exercise in the Galbraith Jazz Comping book. I'm also supposed to learn the melody, memorize the chords, and be able to improvise over the changes. Finally, Dave wants me to transcribe a Wes Montgomery solo from his recording of the song. Whew!

Since we were working on some Latin songs, Dave recommended The Brazilian Guitar Book by Nelson Faria. This book outlines authentic guitar comps for several Latin styles. I just ordered it and can't wait to work through it and put it to use in my gigs!

Singing and Playing

Most people pick up the guitar so they can accompany themselves while they sing. Playing guitar can be difficult enough. Singing and playing at the same time is another challenge. Here are some tips for those who are learning to play guitar and sing at the same time.

• Practice singing separately from the guitar. This will help you learn the melody more thoroughly. The nice thing about singing is that it doesn't require any special equipment. Sing the song everywhere. Some of my most productive song learning sessions take place in the car.
• Practice guitar separately from singing. Be sure you can play the chords smoothly before you try to put it together with the voice.
• It's important to practice the singing and the guitar playing separately, because you have have to divide your attention when you sing and play at the same time. You want to make sure you're comfortable with both the voice part and the guitar part. If you know the song so well that you can sing it automatically, it's going to be a lot easier to play the guitar part, and vice versa.
• Keep it simple. Once you start singing and playing at the same time, simplify the guitar part. (You can make it fancier later.) Try an easy strum, just to get used to playing chords and singing at the same time. Even after you're comfortable with the easy strumming, you might find that simple is good. Sometimes all you need is an easy rhythm and a good melody.
• Hum the melody. Instead of singing the words, try humming the melody as you play. Sometimes the words get in the way of learning a song. If you hum (or sing a generic syllable like "la" or "doo"), it's easier to focus on the melody and the guitar playing. I think this may be because using language requires some extra brain power that takes away from your focus on the melody and the guitar chords. That's my purely unscientific opinion. After you're comfortable humming and playing, then add the words.
• Slow down. If it's a fast song, you don't have to always sing it fast in your private practice sessions. Slow it down so that you can sing and play comfortably and gradually speed it up over the course of several sessions.
• Use a metronome. Even if you're a rock solid rhythm guitar player, it's amazing how funky your time can get when you start singing. Play with a metronome to train yourself to keep steady time.
• Record yourself. This can be a painful lesson. I know this from personal experience! Once you've put the song together, record yourself and do your best to listen objectively. You may sing in tune normally, but you might find that you sometimes sing out of tune when you're accompanying yourself. If you record yourself, you'll learn your tendencies. You'll also find out very quickly whether the arrangement is working. Maybe you've come up with a fancy guitar part that gets in the way of the song while you're singing. If it's a song with a lot of space in the vocal part, maybe you'll need to come up with some guitar fills here and there.

Learning to play guitar and sing at the same time can be challenging at first, but it's so much fun! If you have any other tips for learning to sing and play at the same time, please leave them in the comments section.
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If you live in Atlanta and are interested in private or group guitar lessons, please check my website at www.godfreyguitar.com for more information or email me directly.

Tantrums Begone

An actual quote from my younger
days as a budding musician.

Recently, my brother didn't seem to believe me when I told him that I don't get mad and swear anymore when I practice. This is understandable. My family grew up listening to me yelling, cursing, and throwing things when I practiced trombone. Nothing I played was ever good enough for me. I could play a beautiful phrase but be mad at myself because I didn't articulate the beginning of the second measure as precisely as I wanted.

It only took me about 45 years to learn that this was not the best way to approach a practice session. You can't berate yourself for every little mistake. That kind of thinking bleeds into the rest of your life, and pretty soon, you begin belittling yourself for every little personal flaw.

I'm still a perfectionist when I practice, zeroing in on my mistakes and repeating problem spots over and over until I get them right. These days, I just go about it with a different attitude. I no longer tie my feelings of self worth to whether or not I can play every note perfectly. If I can't play a new lick, it doesn't mean I'm worthless. I just means I can't play that lick yet. Now I can approach that new lick with a calm mind and relaxed body, learning it more quickly than I could if I were berating myself.

This new attitude began to take hold when I started improvising on guitar. When I was a trombone player, I had a terrible time improvising. I wanted everything to be perfect, and that's not what improvising is about. I had only been playing guitar for about a year when I began improvising. Since I was new to the instrument, I already knew I wasn't going to sound great, so I didn't worry so much about what I sounded like. I take this same approach when I make mistakes in my practice sessions. Instead of being angry at every little misstep, I look on it as part of the overall process. My mistakes show me the fastest way to improve. As I work on my weak areas, I become a stronger musician.

Of course I still get frustrated from time to time. I'm more mature about my approach, but I'm not Buddha! However, the days of tirades and book throwing are long gone.

Lesson #5

Continuing with my practice of summarizing my guitar lessons with Dave Frackenpohl and outlining my next assignment…

Today's lesson went well. We warmed up on the major bebop scale, and then we played Nostalgia, which is a bebop tuned based on the chord changes from Out of Nowhere. When it came time to improvise, I did a pretty decent job of throwing in some ii-V licks that I've been learning. I had some trouble improvising over these changes last week, but the new ii-V licks really helped out. I actually sounded like I knew what I was doing this time! Next, we played Bags' Groove, and before improvising my own solo, I played the two Miles Davis choruses that I had transcribed. Next, I played through my F Blues assignment from Galbraith's Guitar Comping. Finally, Dave had me sight-read Fools Rush In, which is a tasty standard that I hadn't played before.

Dave commented that my work with the Miles Davis transcription paid dividends, telling me that I was starting to phrase more like a jazz player…more laid back and in the pocket, even when I'm playing faster phrases. It felt really good to hear that from him. I've been working diligently on my time and feel. I have a long way to go, but it's nice to know that I'm making progress.

Here's my next assignment.

• Mixolydian Bebop Scale. Learn this scale, and also practice starting at the top of the scale and descending. We always practice our scales from bottom to top and then down again, but we need to be comfortable playing the other way. I'm going to apply this to my other scales, too.
• Diminished Scale. I already know one form of diminished scale. Dave showed me a very easy diminished form that I hadn't thought of before…and that's why I'm taking lessons!
• Girl from Ipanema. I kind of know this already, but this is a tune that I should have cemented in my memory. It will be by the next lesson! In addition to memorizing the melody and chords, I also will be transcribing a solo of my choice.
• Wave. Here's another great Jobim song. I know the melody quite well, but I'm iffy on the chords. Again, in another two weeks, the chords will be solid. I'm very happy to be working on this song. I find it difficult to solo over these chord changes, so it'll be good to focus on this one for a couple weeks.
• Galbraith Guitar Comping. I have the final two choruses from the F Blues exercise to learn. I've picked up a lot of useful ideas from this book. It's a tremendous resource.
• ii-V Project. Although Dave didn't give me an assignment, it is my assumption that I am supposed to continue learning ii-V licks from the the sheet he gave me last time. I'm not in a hurry to learn all of these at once. I'll pick one or two more licks and drill them to death so that I can incorporate them into my vocabulary.
• Bag's Groove. I'll be transcribing two more choruses from a Miles Davis solo. For learning good jazz phrasing, you can't do much better than play along with Miles Davis solos!

I'm enjoying my lessons. My favorite part is solo transcription. It's challenging, but it's incredibly rewarding. You get to see how the great players put their solos together, and you have the opportunity to steal some of their licks. In addition to the great ear training, it's beneficial to play along with the recording so that you not only learn the notes, but you get a real sense of style and phrasing.

Cool! A Lesson!

As I was driving home tonight, I said out loud to myself, "Oh cool! I have a lesson tomorrow." Yes, I talk to myself, but we're fine with that.

When I was going to college, there was a strange phenomenon. Some music majors actually dreaded their private lessons. I never understood this. You're majoring in music, yet you don't prepare for your private lessons…the single most important thing that will make you a better player on your instrument. Your teacher is laying out a path for you. There's no guesswork on your part. If you have a good teacher, his or her assignments will be tailored to your strengths, weakness, and overall level of skill. All you have to do is practice your lesson material, show up to your lesson prepared to best of your ability, and then get another assignment.

I didn't really look at it like this in college. I just knew that whatever my teachers were telling me to play, it was making me a better player. Now that I'm "old," at least from a college student's point of view, I really appreciate what my teachers did for me. That's why I perked up tonight when I remembered that my guitar lesson is tomorrow. I've practiced hard and have made good progress on my current assignment. Tomorrow, I'll play my best, get some feedback, and go home with a new assignment, leaving with more knowledge than I had at the beginning of the hour.

Losing Time

My love for practicing guitar has been through the roof. I've always enjoyed practicing, but lately, I've been enthralled by the instrument. Have you ever lost yourself in a good book? Or lost track of time talking on the phone with someone you love? That's the way it's been with my guitar.

I can easily spend an hour working on a new lick or transcribing a solo. If I were a younger man with fewer responsibilities, I could spend the whole day practicing. Alas, I don't have that kind of time anymore! To make sure I cover everything I need to learn, I've been timing segments of my practice session…20 minutes to work on a new lick, 15 minutes on a new song, etc.

Lessons with my new guitar teacher are the reason for my renewed focus. Until now, I've been working on jazz guitar in a piecemeal sort of way. Now, I have a clear path being laid out for me. It's still up to me to walk the path, but it's incredibly motivating when you can suddenly see where you're going.

A Little Each Day

I look forward to every other Thursday, when I take a jazz guitar lesson with Dave Frackenpohl, who teaches out of Georgia State University. Dave assigns plenty to keep me busy, and even though I've only had a few lessons, they're already paying off. So far, I've been able to take a couple ideas from each lesson and apply them immediately to "real world" playing. I used to think I knew a lot of chord voicings (and I did), but I pick up some useful new voicings with each assignment. I've also picked up some nice licks through transcribing solos.

I'm not as prepared as usual for tomorrow's lesson, but I'm prepared enough. I've had two weeks to practice. The first week, I had a pretty good amount of time to practice my lesson material. This week, I've been busy preparing to lead a music service, and I've been learning a lot of new songs for a gig on Saturday.

I tell my students that it's better to practice a little every day than try to cram all of your practicing into one or two days. This week, I've been taking my own advice. I would love to have spent a couple hours a day practicing my lesson material, but my performance preparation took precedence. I still managed to carve out at least 30 minutes a day for my lesson music, spending 5-10 minutes on each part of the assignment. As a result, I've made slow but steady progress, and I feel prepared for tomorrow.

It seems that part of the reason you can still make good progress by practicing consistently, even for short periods, is that daily practice helps you feel familiar with the music in general. While I couldn't spend as much time practicing for my lesson as I would have liked, I often found my lesson music playing in my head this week. Aside from personal experience, I don't have any evidence to back this up, but I think that, even while I was away from the guitar, my brain was processing my lesson material.

It's About Time

Keeping steady time is an important skill for any musician. It's a simple concept, but it's not as easy as you might think. Just ask anyone who plays with a metronome for the first time. You may think you are keeping a steady beat, but when you begin practicing with a metronome, you'll swear that the metronome is slowing down. It surely couldn't be that you are speeding up!

When I was a trombone player, I tried to stay on top of the beat. The trombone is a big instrument and requires a lot of air, making its response time a little slower than a smaller instrument like a trumpet. When I began playing guitar, I carried this "slightly ahead of the beat" mindset with me, which was a mistake. The guitar is much more responsive than a trombone, and by playing on top of the beat, I tended to rush.

With some effort, I've gotten my time under control…for the most part. When playing rhythm guitar, I can keep it nice and steady, but I tend to push the tempo when I'm improvising. My guitar teacher, Dave Frackenpohl, gave me a useful exercise.

My trusty old Dr. Beat.
The metronome never lies.

If you want to work on your own sense of time, first try practicing with a metronome ticking away on every beat. If the tempo is 120, then set the metronome at 120. You'll soon discover where you tend to rush.

Once you're used to playing with the metronome on every beat, set it to half the speed (in our case, set it at 60). Now think of every click of the metronome as beats 2 and 4, with beats 1 and 3 being silent. Without that steady click on every beat, you have to rely more on your own sense of time.

Finally, and this is the exercise Dave gave me, set the metronome to one quarter speed (in our example, we'll set it at 30). Now think of every click as beat 4, with beats 1 through 3 being silent. This suddenly becomes a much more challenging exercise!

Because I'm most likely to push the tempo while improvising, Dave has me improvising solo lines while setting the metronome to click just on beat 4. This gives me the double benefit of working on time and improvisational ideas at the same time. It only took me a couple days of this for my inner sense of time to settle down. I'm not saying that my time is suddenly perfect, but it has become more solid over the past couple weeks, and it'll only get better as I continue to work on it.

Chord Hammer-On Exercise

Here's a chord exercise that's great for beginners. (It's a pretty good exercise for advanced players, too.) If you are just beginning to learn how to play guitar chords, you probably build your chords by putting down one finger at a time. Eventually, you want to be able to have your fingers form a chord shape all at the same time. Once you can do this, you'll be able to move from one chord to the next more smoothly.

This exercise involves "hammer-ons." To play a hammer-on, don't pluck or strum with your picking hand. Instead, use your chord hand to come down on the string quickly enough to make it sound a note. Here's the exercise.

Step 1

• Play any chord. Start with one that's easy for you. Try an E or an A minor chord.
• Sustain the chord to make sure each string is ringing.
• As you're sustaining the chord, let off the pressure of your left hand so that the strings that you are fingering stop ringing. Keep touching the strings. You want your fingertips to maintain contact.
• Now, without strumming, pump your left hand fingers while maintaining the chord shape. Squeeze quickly, hold a little, and then let up, still maintaining contact with the strings. If you are able to squeeze quickly enough, you may be able to get those strings to ring softly.

Step 2

• Form the chord again.
• You're going to use the same pumping action in your left hand, except this time, raise your fingers so they're just barely above the strings. Without strumming, see if you can pump your left hand fingers quickly enough to get a chord to sound. This is the hammer-on. Your left hand "hammers on" to the strings to make them ring.

Step 3

• After you're comfortable raising your fingers slightly and playing the chord hammer-on, try raising them a little bit more…just a fraction of an inch, then a little higher, and then a little higher. See how high you can raise your fingers while still maintaining the chord shape.

Quick Tip: Think of hammering on quickly rather than squeezing hard. If you focus on squeezing hard, you'll build up unnecessary tension in your left hand. That's the last thing you want. Try to keep your hand as relaxed as possible by moving quickly and loosely.

Practicing chords like this will help train your fingers to move as a unit instead of one by one. Once you can play one chord like this, try another one, and then see if you can move back and forth between the chords just playing hammer-ons. It's challenging at first, but you'll get better with practice. Soon you'll be switching from one chord to the next with ease!
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If you live in Atlanta and are interested in private or group guitar lessons, please check my website at www.godfreyguitar.com for more information or email me directly.

Perception

Every so often, you play a gig where everything seems to flow. The notes fly effortlessly from your fingers, and all your improvised solos are inspired. You look at the clock and can't believe the evening is over, because it feels like you just started.

Tonight was not one of those nights. I played solo guitar for a realty company's 40th anniversary party in downtown Atlanta. Despite playing guitar all day, my fingers felt cold and stiff. It felt like I fumbled my way through most of my solo arrangements, and I couldn't quite find the flow in my improvisation. It was an off night, and I was disappointed in my performance.

Imagine my surprise at the end of the night when my client praised me effusively, asked for business cards, told me that the partygoers were complimenting my music, and added a generous tip.

There's usually a big difference between how you perceive yourself and how others perceive you. I tend to judge myself harshly. In the hours I spend practicing, I work relentlessly to become a better player through perfecting new solo arrangements, learning licks, or improving my speed and accuracy. While I've come a long way in a short time, there is always something new to learn. A short search on YouTube will reveal a host of amazing guitar players to inspire me. Sometimes my diligent practice results in a magical gig where everything clicks. Sometimes I fall short, and I disappoint myself.

In public, I don't let my disappointment show. The only way most clients can tell you've made a mistake is if you make a face. Tonight, my client didn't know or care about my self doubts and musical ambitions. She just cared that the partygoers were happy, that the music sounded nice, and that I acted like a pro.

Even on a bad night, I still enjoy the fact that I'm being paid to play the guitar for a few hours. It's not a bad way to earn a few bucks.