[Harp-L] Re: Harp Practice

[Bill Houle <saxandharper@xxxxxxxxx>]

Paul Routledge asked:
"Now what I want to know is how does everybody STRUCTURE their practice 
on HARMONICA so as to progress as they become more advanced in their 
playing."
 
There's a tried and true structure that I've read a lot of pros use for instuments you have to blow. There are some adaptations I use for harp, but first the structure
 
1.  Long tones
2. Scales
3. Practice songs/licks you know or are learning
4. Learn something new
5. Just fool around and have some fun doodling
 
1. Long tones - I try making sure I can play and hold a note in the bottom, middle and top registers and have them sound as close as they can in intensity from quiet to loud. I also make sure  to hold bent notes for a long tme against a tuner
2. I'm so far off getting overblows to sound good I just focus on 1st, 2nd and 3rd positions making sure I can play chord arrpegios and the readily available notes in scales for the usual chords (I,IV,V and when I get adventurous the ii and VI). I read somewhere what you practice here is what you play, so I fool around a lot with different patterns here and keep trying every different mathematical combination of notes and intervals I can think of. Straight up and down, up two, down one, start on a root and jump up or down in steps of increasing distanc, etc. Or sometimes I will practice a lick in 1st, 2nd and 3rd position. Or move a lick through the I, IV and V chord. A good time to play with as many different rhythmic patterns as you can think of.  Some of the combinations of patterns and rhthyms sound bad, but some will be new to me and sound good!
3. kind of obvious
4. Critical here to try to learn at least one new lick from some source on a regular basis. (Do this every day and you have 365 new ideas to  play with!) Or sometimes I use this time over a week or so to learn a whole solo
5. Everybody's favorite part. Don't go there until steps 1-4 are complete.
 
I'm always surprised how the discipline of focusing on steps 1 and 2 helps me come up with new stuff. Notably when I'm playing with other people, but the Aerbersold books are great play along exercises I use to test drive new ideas as they come to me. Just the time I spent describing the 2nd step may be an indication about it's value to me. 
 
And I do think the listening part is important. And I mean very disciplined focused listening. Can I sing what I hear exactly? Can I tell where chord changes are really happening? Can I simultaneously really hear every instrument being played (this is hard!)? Can I hear how a slight change in the drums or base sets off the soloist in a new direction? I listen to blues based jazz the most. Those Hammond B3, tenor combos mentioned in another post are a mother lode if you are into blues. But whatever your style there are probably other places to branch into. 
 
I consider this type of listenting to be practice. Sometimes I'll listen to the same phrase dozens of times in a row to hear very note and nuance exactly. I once listened to Sonny Stitt doing Scrapple from the Apple over and over almost non-stop on a trans-Atlantic flight. It takes a lot of focus and energy. And the more I do it it does seem the better my playing gets.
 
Anway it works for me. And I'm a big fan of the idea  there are different learning styles for different folks at different places of development. So hopefully you get a lot of suggestions and try a few to see what will work for you. Good luck.
 
Bill
 

		
---------------------------------
 Start your day with Yahoo! - make it your home page