Backwards Progress

GeorgeB · Posted: Tue Jun 06, 2017 2:41 am Post subject:

I am a firm believer in adhering to a daily practice routine, though I wasn't always that way. I am a comeback player, age 80, and have been playing now for 14 months. With the exception of endurance, I am playing better now than I did when I played weekend gigs between 1953 and 1965 and rarely practiced.
I am fortunate that I can devote mornings to practice and afternoons to playing songs I love. But there are days when things don't go so well and the sound is horrible and I really have to work on ironing those things out, but it is always worth the effort, so stick with the practice, and play tunes, too, when you can.
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GeorgeB
1960s King Super 20 Silversonic
2016 Manchester Brass Custom
1938-39 Olds Recording
1942 Buescher 400 Bb trumpet
1952 Selmer Paris 21 B
1999 Conn Vintage One B flat trumpet
2020 Getzen 490 Bb
1962 Conn Victor 5A cornet

Billy B · Posted: Tue Jun 06, 2017 7:36 am Post subject:

GeorgeB · Posted: Tue Jun 06, 2017 7:54 am Post subject:

Good point, Bill.
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GeorgeB
1960s King Super 20 Silversonic
2016 Manchester Brass Custom
1938-39 Olds Recording
1942 Buescher 400 Bb trumpet
1952 Selmer Paris 21 B
1999 Conn Vintage One B flat trumpet
2020 Getzen 490 Bb
1962 Conn Victor 5A cornet

Robert P · Heavyweight Member Joined: 28 Feb 2013 Posts: 2596

Bflatman · Heavyweight Member Joined: 01 Nov 2016 Posts: 720

It reads to me like you are not focussed and this is at the .
heart of the problem.

You get up excited at the prospect of playing, then you begin a practice session and call it a warm up.

Its not surprising to me that you are frustrated, a warmup in my view should last 5 minutes to warm up your chops, you are stopping 10 minutes through your warmup, this seems to me to be a practice session.

If you structure practice like a warmup its no wonder to me it is frustrating, you are spending practice time warming up and not learning or improving or truly practicing anything.

If you do that you will feel it is a pointless exercise and a waste of time and that leads to frustration.

This is the value of a good teacher they know what to practice how to practice when to practice and how to warmup. I second the advice to get a teacher.

You look forward to playing, so play.

Try this
Warm up for 5 minutes.
Practice tones scales and whatever your preferred practice is.
Practice one thing you are bad at to improve it.
Play some music that includes the thing you just practiced.
Play some music you enjoy playing
Finish on some soft gentle playing as a warm down.

This method will warm your chops up, give you repetitive practice, make you improve in some area, embed the practiced technique, and give you a reward in enjoying playing some satisfying music.

Bert Falcone · Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 7:26 am Post subject:

It is good every now and then to take the horn off your face for 1 day. Also-practice in shorter amounts of time but practice more often through the day.
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German made Destino *3* gold plated
1932 NY Bach Strad
1936 Keefer Brua
1940 NY Bach ML
1945 French Besson Meha
1978 Benge 1X
1950 Martin C
2008 Selmer Concept Flugel