Just An Exercise #2
I’ve been going back to practicing with records, something that I did for a long time now and for periods of time I actually did everyday.
I realized that if before I used to play with a record in order to learn a tune or practice endurance and consistency in my playing, now I have other goals.
In the last months my focus is been “being in the moment”, not just in music but in life in general. Not really an easy goal to achieve for me, in fact these days every occasion is a good reason to work on my mindfulness.
Specifically in music, imagine composing with your mind free of thoughts, playing and just reacting to what’s going on the bandstand…that’s actually what I would love to be able to reach!
Anyways, going back to playing with records, I’ve been trying to play along an entire track or even an entire album, for ex The Amazing Bud Powell vol.4 or Wayne Shorter Juju, even stuff that is more contemporary and I actually had to sit and transcribe the songs before playing a long ( Joel Ross - Kingmaker) .
My main rule now is that:
If something weird happens instead of starting back from the beginning of the track I actually keep playing and find my way back into it just like every musician should do on a gig.
I am sure that some older or just more mature musicians have already thought about these things a long time ago, but I also think that putting these thoughts into into words might be helpful for the people that find themselves in my same path/situation and might not have found the right thing to do yet.
GC
P.S. playing along with some of these Miles Davis Second Quintet live recordings is very difficult and requires actually a lot of skill, think about Live At the Plugged Nickel…truly recommended.
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