Kenny Werner: “drop your hands”

[Geepers]

I’ve found this simple tip from Kenny Werner (Effortless Mastery) to be very effective. When trying to learn a difficult new phrase our (my) instinct is to just hammer away at it over and over. Kenny says no; as soon as you stumble, drop your hands and breathe. Then go again … and keep repeating this procedure over and over. I find I get to my desired outcome much quicker doing this even though it’s somewhat counter-intuitive (my mind screams “hey, we’re wasting time here!”) In fact I do the procedure for a while even after I’ve finally got it … just helps really cement it. Hope this helps someone else too.

 

[onda'bass]

That was a great read, thank for the reminder.

 

[MVE]

I often need a good nights sleep before my brain solidifies the procedural memory paths to play a difficult phrase cleanly.
If I can’t get something, I just remind myself that it will probably work just fine tomorrow.