Tip of the Day

Students that come to me to study improvising commonly say that they feel that they’re good players, but when playing a couple times around the form they run out of ideas. The issue is that players commonly have enough vocabulary, but they’re using up all of their ideas too quickly. I teach them how to use phrasing (how the repetition of a lick within a twelve-bar section is important for developing a memorable solo) and to understand that soloing is not all about fireworks, it’s about telling a story. continue reading...

Blues Blast Magazine just released an article on harmonica player Lee Oskar http://www.bluesblastmagazine.com/issue-11-18-may-4-2017/

For students that are interested in playing to non-12 bar blues, here's software that can tell you the chords used in a given song riffstation.com Once you know the chords, you can use Music Theory Study 6 to help show you what to do with this information. Thanks to fellow BluesHarmonica.com student Steve B. for sharing this information.

An interesting perspective on how to approach your practice time (Blocked Practice vs. Interleaved Practice) https://www.musical-u.com/learn/why-youre-not-making-progress-instrument...

An ictus is the emphasis of a beat. Having an emphasis on beat one is extremely helpful while working with a metronome. This ictus helps you to immediately know when you accidentally add or drop a beat while playing (with no ictus, the monotone clicking of the metronome gives you no indication of where you are in a bar/measure). On the app I use (called Tempo), it allows you to set the ictus. Luckily it defaults to beat one (shown as < inside the first circle in the provided pictures). If yours is not set this way, simply click on that circle to enable the ictus. continue reading...

More perspective on focused practice by NOA KAGEYAMA, PH.D. http://www.bulletproofmusician.com/two-things-experts-do-differently-tha... Thanks to fellow BluesHarmonica.com student Marc for sharing!

An interesting study on error correction in music http://www.bulletproofmusician.com/8-things-top-practicers-do-differently/

Thanks Marc for sharing this

Your tip today comes from fellow student Thomas Toussaint. After seeing the latest video interview with Lee Sankey he was inspired to share his approach to understanding chord change relative to position playing.

Video: https://youtu.be/XsuXx1YXYIA

In this video I'm playing examples of how to approach the chord changes in a 12 bar blues progression (either with a 5/4/1 or a 2/5/1 turnaround) thinking in terms of positions. continue reading...

"For those of us who want to become masters at playing the harmonica, practice will probably take the majority of the time you spend working to get better. As you have, or will come to realize, mastering the harmonica is a journey that will take quite a long time. Of course, everyone of you will have your own goals and ideas about the type of music you want to play and how good you want to get. However, the key to all this practice and playing is to have fun. You’re in charge of how much you practice and what you practice and most importantly, your attitude during practice. continue reading...

Today's tip is a simple one, but an important one for learning material. For most people, the first thing they do when digging into learning a lick or solo is to play along with the recording. When playing along with the recording there's a percentage you'll miss... rhythm, notes (notes that you'll miss or replace with incorrect ones), nuances (such as pulls and other articulations that help speak the notes) and dynamics. This can easily be fixed by listening to the lick you're trying to copy once and then playing along with it once. continue reading...