Musicians...solo practice regimen tips (any instrument)

This might be the most important topic about being a musician...especially for people just starting out. Much has been written about this topic. Break the time down this way or that way. What's been the thing that has worked for you to really move forward?

For me....the single biggest thing that's moved me along is this bit of advice....Every time I start practicing by myself, I try to spend at least the first 5 minutes playing something I've never played or heard before. It doesn't matter what instrument you play. You can use it to warm up too. But I try to do that every time I start out and I often find that I can start with a few notes, force myself to figure out a different way to play them, add in more as I go and before long, I have something kind of cool and new. It forces me to think and be creative every time. Sometimes I never even get around to what I was planning on practicing. I just sit there for 2-3 hours letting my mind wander.

So what do you guy got? What's your go-to thing? We better use this forum to show we deserve it! (Thanks again, Skip)

 

Well my practice regimen has mostly consisted of learning songs recently, I haven't really practiced to improve like I used to but I found ways to improve with the basics of guitar...

• Playing with/to other music
• Do hand exercises which makes the fretting hands have better dexterity and the strumming hand have more control of rhythm and picking
• Learning how chords are formed so you can play them in various positions
• Learning common chord progressions/scales

 

The single most usefull thing any musican can do is train their ears! This is something I did early on in my playing and the thing that helped me the most to take it to the next level. Being able to put on any song on and play along with it using only my ears has takin me further then anything else. Yes learning theory and how things work is also importent, but if you want to shine in a band format your ears will take you further then anything else. You use your ears to listen to music why would you not use them to play music?

 

Trying to remember that hook or groove I wrote the last time I played...

 

I learned the most from learning other people's songs, like Metallica, then Mastodon, now Animals as Leaders.

Once you have some chords and scales down, get a looper and play with yourself. Laying down different chord progressions and soloing to them is a great way to build improv skills. I got two jamman express xt's and they're pretty neat!

 

The looping is fun and helpful but another piece of advice along those lines is playing with people who are better than you. Even if you only know 4 chords and the only other musician you know knows 8 chords. Play with that person.

 

Kay, what I'd always do was start with scales-lots and lots of scales and maybe some review of stuff that I had learned the previous week (I'm both thinking back to when I used to take lessons and then would practice on my own time and also what I tell my flute students to do now), and then.... there would be a new "lesson" each week so there would always be new material. And I'd always try to challenge myself. Even if something at first glance looks like something like...oh my gosh, I can barely READ this music... I'd supposed to PLAY this?!.... I'd still just give it a run anyways. And then break it up piece by piece and really I would have it before too long. So the two main parts of that, is not to become scared by music that looks intimidating...but also to practice the techniques (and scales) in bits and pieces to be able to achieve it.

And then honestly, can't beat repetition. And then a little bit more repetition. And then a bit more. (which can equate to, practicing long enough!!)

 

Especially when you're starting out, the most important thing in my book is to have FUN before anything else. Keep your motivation up high by actually enjoying your practice sessions, or else you might get discouraged and quite sooner or later. Try rocking out to the songs you like, writing your own song even if you only know a few chords(barre chords are wonderful, power chords are even more useful depending on the situation). Keep LOVING what you do, that's my advice and that's what I've always done myself.

But as for excelling further once you've got the basics down, I say listen to as many different types of music and compose in as many different styles as you possibly can. If you wrote a metal song one day, just for the fun of it write a jazz version of it. Or maybe techno version, whatever works. Think outside the concept of genres, and be someone who could write a blues song using just a coke bottle, and have the audacity to call it heavy metal. The rest is the icing on the cake.

 

I used to spend a few minutes pretending there were others there to communicate with them.

I used to spend time on counting and tempo. I found there was no difficult passage I could not nail if I just figured out a way to count it that made it seem easier. I often had to drop the tempo significantly, but once I had it, I could get it up to speed.

No matter how far I got, I always spent time on fundementals. Posture, hand position in different positions, shifting from one position to every other position especially on different strings, bow hand postition for french and german bows, scales, arpeggios, progressions, tuning by ear, tuning by harmonics, and at least once a month I would pull out my very first workbook.

I used to (and should definitely do again) turn the metronome volume on and off while tapping my leg to be sure I was keeping the beat accurately. As a bass player, that's my most important job. Communicate with the drummer(s) and togeher, keep the damn' beat. So I practiced that.

I always played something I truely loved after my warmup, and again before I put everything away for the night.

I kept my bass where I could see him. As a result, I think I played more than I otherwise would have.

 

i can play the guitar all day everyday , but it dont get any better.. I only change up when I set it down for a couple days to a week or so. Then I have to learn a new tune, so I dont just go back to old ways of shit right away.

 

If you're only beginning an instrument, just playing it, anything, will help. Get used to which notes make which sounds. There's so many possibilities with music, some think you have to take the music theory route and understand all of the scales and composition, some of the worlds greatest artists still don't even know how to do that, some have mastered it completely. It's all about what makes sense to you.

I myself learn by ear, so like the OP, I love to just figure stuff out, I've learned entire songs without looking at one tab or the sheet music.

Writing music is like learning a language, you don't just practice pre-recorded scenarios and then become fluent. You try your own ideas that will inevitably fail and improve. Trail/error so to speak, I've seen musicians who've played for 10 years who still haven't written a complete original song, and some who are playing there own stuff in only a few! This isn't to judge, but know what you want and go for it!

 

Don't just play your scales when you're learning them, play with them. Mundanity kills the essence.

And listen to music, lots of it, with an open mind. There's a reason some people like shit you don't like, it helps to find out what that reason is..

 

I always start with scales. Only when my fingers are falling in the right places, I move on to work on pieces.

But I'm not a musician. I just like to play music.

 

I just do whatever the hell i feel like. I know if id drill technique and theory id get better but i dont have the discipline. If i dont treat my guitar like a toy i dont ever play. I just play for sheer enjoyment and since i started looking at it from that perspective ive played pretty much every day as opposed to a couple times a month drilling boring crap

 

Honestly if it takes you longer than an hour or so to write the basis of a song, its not worth writing in prob 99.9% of musicians.. what I do is after taking a shot or two of rum to clear my lungs and throat I do some heroin or w.e im using for that "inspiring sound" because u need to let ure feelings/emotions out in ur music. I just had a beautiful 17 year old girl who im madly intoxicated by standing here showing me how "Nice" her body is getting.. so now that im high im going to sit down, take that emotion, and see where it goes!!! With the help of one thing, a tape recorder, because only 1ce will the song comeout how I feel, and by recording myself I can keep everything I did and write it down after the fact without an interruption.. my advice is if u don't do drugs don't start now, but everyone has something to put them in the mood to play, do it, than record what comes out ull find no better way for writing/practicing a song, weather u wrote it or not, but u can really hear urself too and tell what u need to improve on. A tape recorder and guitar is all I need to write an album.. that and a bundle of heroin with the side of an eighth of marijuana lol

 

Try recording yourself when learning new music.
It helped me a lot. Lets me know if my notes are on key.
The beautiful instrument I play are the bagpipes

 

Well THAT'S a sure way to take all that fun, and turn it around on yourself.....

 

I practice 6 to 10 hours everyday. I warm up with scales, then turn them into "songs",then I will do kinetics for muscle memory..then, I throw on some backtracks and improvise for a while. Practice songs I know, songs im learning...then I pretty much trip and screw around with tapping chords and harmonics..

 

Oh, then I work on the ongoing projects..and I record almost everything. Its an invaluble learning tool.