Checklist & Tools:

Aids to Intelligent Practice

By Jeffrey Agrell

To excel, every player must practice intelligently. Among the most essential skills needed to achieve this are 1) the ability to hear what needs improvement 2) knowing what to do about it. To this end, we have developed the idea of a Checklist & Tools for quick reference.

Checklist

My brother-in-law is a Cessna pilot. Before every flight he carefully goes through a checklist of items that must be in order to ensure a safe flight. The idea of a checklist is very useful to us as musicians as well, except that we make use of this particular checklist after our ‘flight’ a.k.a. performance. And our checklist is a lot shorter than my brother-in-law’s.

The more specifically one can identify and isolate problem areas, the quicker they can be solved. Just having a vague notion after you play through a piece for the first time that there were ‘some things not quite right’ is not much help. We need to know precisely what elements should to listen for and the order of their importance. Yes, everything is important, but some things are more important than others.

1. Got Rhythm? Rhythm is the most important parameter. This includes correct note values and maintaining a steady beat or pulse. And playing each at the right time - getting the right note is useless if it arrives early or late. Steady as it goes: when you are playing at an audition you can bet that every single one of your listeners is tapping a finger on his/her leg to see if you can keep a steady pulse. If you can’t, the next thing you will hear is a loud “Thank you!” meaning adios. Everybody misses a note now and then, but rhythmic shortcomings are much more serious. Get rhythm first and foremost!

2. Pitch accuracy. Getting the right note, plain and simple. This also includes achieving the note cleanly, without any sloppiness in approaching or leaving the note. Strive to make clams an endangered species. This area also includes intonation.

3. Expression. This includes dynamics, articulation, and other expressive markings. If you are nailing the note at the right time, add the trimmings to really make music.

Incidentally, this checklist also doubles as a recipe for efficient sightreading. If you are in a situation (jury, competition, audition, gig, recording, etc) where you must sightread something with little or no rehearsal, you can use the list to help solve most of your problems with a 20-second drill. 1. Scan for tricky rhythms and tap them out. Don’t worry about the tempo – figure passages out at whatever tempo works. Only spend time with the difficult rhythms – let the rest go. 2. Scan for any unusual key signatures, accidentals, intervals. Note where they are; mentally sing (or very softly whistle) the intervals of the sticky bits. Identify any scale patterns or parts of scales that will make your fingerings or hearing the passage easier, more automatic. Let the other stuff go. 3. Expressive markings. Scan for basic dynamics and any special or unusual markings. Your twenty seconds are up, but your chances of nailing it will have increased exponentially if you are practiced in this drill.

Tools

The checklist will help us isolate what needs attention. So what can we then do to make improvements?

1. Pulse & Rhythm. Metronome. Metronome. Metronome. Use it – always. And actually listen to it. I have witnessed on occasion the feat of some folks turning on the metronome and then playing with an independence of the beat that percussionists work years to achieve. What to do if you are sans metronome in practice or on stage: it is all well and good to assign the rhythm-keeping function to your left foot, but that pedal extremity is not only notoriously unreliable, it is a annoying distraction to others (audience or players) in any ensemble situation. Classical music venues insist that we keep body motions to a minimum when we perform – more’s the pity – but there is an alternative: hold the horn free, and feel the beat through your whole body, and let the horn sway subtly with the pulse. You don’t have to look like you’re paddling a canoe with the bell, but you can do some sympathetic movement with the beat and phrasing with the bell held free.

2. Tempo. A corollary of the above. Any less familiar passage in which you hesitate or miss notes profits by immediately slowing the tempo. Use that metronome to regulate a gradual increase in speed as you accumulate successful repetitions. Tempo is the least important element of learning a passage, and achieving the final tempo should be the last element mastered. Ever visit a horn factory and see how the horns are made? Brass instruments look very raw and unfinished right up until the end, when they are shined up and lacquered. Tempo is like the lacquer – apply it last. Get everything else in place and gradually learn it at faster tempos until you reach the final designated tempo. Don’t force – you’ll know if you are pushing the tempo too fast too far if you either start chipping notes or feel any tension in your fingers (or anywhere else).

3. Looping. Many – repeat: many - accurate repetitions of any passage are necessary to set new material in muscle memory. Pro golfers practice by hitting 500 balls a day, ditto pro tennis players. A wide receiver will catch 200 passes a day (and has to buy a dinner for the guy the operates the pass machine if he drops one). Hand on heart: how many times do you usually repeat a passage and expect that it is learned, okay I’m done, on to the next one? More than three?

4. Memorizing. Memorizing a passage forces you to learn it at a higher level. It of course takes much longer to learn a passage or a piece by heart, but you thereby naturally accumulate more correct repetitions. The resulting mastery of the passage is much deeper than common superficial ‘visual’ re-creation in performance. Rely on your eyes, and the passage may go astray with even a modicum of distraction, mental or otherwise. Grind it into your DNA by learning it by heart, and you will have it there to call on, now or even years from now.

5. Make Changes. Change any element of the music you need to in order to be able to play it perfectly. Besides tempo, you can change one or more of the following:

•Dynamics. Sometimes it’s easier to play something loudly. Start that way, and gradually work toward the softer indicated dynamic. Or vice-versa.
•Interval size. For example, if you have to slur an octave and it’s not working at first, start with smaller intervals, and gradually increase the size.
•Transposition. If a passage is in the upper register, learn it first an octave lower, and then progressively repeat it a half step or a step higher until you reach the required level. The musical value is the same, and you can also progressively build endurance this way, with gaining extra skill in transposition for lagniappe.
•Articulation. Try different degrees of staccato and legato.

6. Recording/coaching. The first task is awareness that you missed something. It’s all too easy to play through a piece and not remember much of what you missed. Recording yourself allows you to catch everything. A coach or teacher can do the same thing. Otherwise, be sure to practice shorter passages in order not to miss or forget any scratches that need attention.

Have a nice flight!