TrumpetChat

yamahadude · Posted: Wed Sep 28, 2005 8:53 pm Post subject: How long do you practice?

How long do you practice? I practice about 2 hours a day.

OLDLOU · Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2005 6:17 am Post subject: Duration of practice.

If you are practicing for two hours daily it would indicate to me that you have developed a good bit of endurance. In the case of most of us who are amateurs at our music, this amount of playing is both impossible due to other commitments and lack of lip musculature. I have to ask, is this continuous playing or, do you take several short breaks while selecting new charts to play from? I was taught to practice any music that I select until I can play it PERFECTLY five time through without the chart. This taught me to be more concious of perfection and less concious of duration. I tend to temper that with the knowledge that duration of practice builds lip muscle and extended breath capacity and control.
Personally, I practice about the same amount of time that you do, but, all cannot afford that much time. I am retired and pensioned off. I think that I do drive my wife a bit daft with my repititious tootling. She has been known to call my friends to drop by for coffee just to get me to shut up.

bandman · Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2005 9:24 pm Post subject:

Most people who say they practice 2 hours a day actually practice about 20-30 minutes and play for 90-100 minutes. Now there are great benefits to playing for a long time. You build endurance, and usually start to form wonderful musical ideas.

The definition of practice when it comes to music is "to do repeated exercises for proficiency". In my case I practice very little, but work on music for expression and endurance. More acuratley put "I practice my music". I work on the music that I will need to play in weddings and concerts. It becomes habit and therefore I make very few mistakes when playing, but I doubt if over all it is making me a better player.

Practice makes you better (more proficient over all) and playing makes you more proficient on one piece of music.

So there you have my opinion on practice. Most people say they do, but they don't...... so next time you are "practicing" stop and ask yourself, are you practicing or are you playing!
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"To be a teacher you need to be as good a performer as you can be: you'll have more to impart to your students musically." - John Haynie

clevemcs · Middle C Joined: 05 Oct 2005 Posts: 25 Location: Montana

Hi Lou,
I tried to do a warm up early in the moring. 15-20 min with Chromatics and Lip Slurs and Pedal Tones.
In the afternoon I like to work on technique for about 30-45 min.
In the evenings I enjoy playing with variours CD's in various styles of music. Sometimes I will play for an hour.

j c · Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2005 12:47 pm Post subject:

10 min lip buzzing...
10 min break.
10 min mouthpiece buzzing.
10 min break.
10 min gentle long notes starting on g 2nd line working down to bottom f#
10 min break
Charles Collin advanced lip flex.
10 min break.
Scales
10 min break
Arban's Major and minor arpeggios. + whatever else I need to look at from the method.................
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Bach 37

OLDLOU

clevemcs · Middle C Joined: 05 Oct 2005 Posts: 25 Location: Montana

Yes Lou I have done that on several occasions. I used to play with two older circus musicians at a nursing home and we did that often. I sure miss playing with those guys. They are up in the heavenly band now. They were the ones that taught me to improvise and transpose at sight when I was much younger. By the way I talked to a reitred band director yesterday about forming a New Horizons Band. He was most interested. Will keep you posted.

HarryMarks · Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2005 3:40 pm Post subject:

I have a 2 hour practice session. It is broken up into several 15 to 20 minute segments. By doing this I am able to focus on many specific areas in each session.

The is keeps me from slacking off on any areas and to work on each component of playing each day.

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Harry Marks