I have a confession...
My name is Andy Braet....and I have an
I am addicted to scales.
I do them every day without fail. If it so happens that I miss a day, for whatever reason, I feel incomplete somehow.
There is something so amazingly fulfilling about exploring the full technical reaches of ones instrument on a daily basis. Each day it progresses that miniscule bit further that just makes it all worth it.
I have been doing scales every day for over a year now. I have progressed to doing full major and minor scales in 3rds, 4ths, 5ths, 6ths, 7ths, octaves, quarter tones and into the extended register, and nothing makes me feel so accomplished as running the full gamut of my technique in that hour I allot myself each day.
For those of you that don't do scales, I highly encourage you to start. It is honestly one of the best feelings that I've ever had as a musician. There's something so powerful in furthering your technical mastery of ones chosen instrument of expression.
The great saxophonist Jean-Marie Londeix once said "We work every day, methodically, patiently, meticulously, in order for art to become our second nature," and I could not agree more.
Musicality, while always an extremely important gift and resource, is utterly useless without technique.
In some lessons I teach, a student will say they love a certain movement or piece as they can be so "musical" with it. They then proceed to play it sloppily with bad technique, essentially shitting all over the music. Any musicality they "might" have had is simply destroyed by their sloppy technique.
Without technique, musicality is lost.
Now you all know my terrible secret.
Cheers
A
I am addicted to scales.
I do them every day without fail. If it so happens that I miss a day, for whatever reason, I feel incomplete somehow.
There is something so amazingly fulfilling about exploring the full technical reaches of ones instrument on a daily basis. Each day it progresses that miniscule bit further that just makes it all worth it.
I have been doing scales every day for over a year now. I have progressed to doing full major and minor scales in 3rds, 4ths, 5ths, 6ths, 7ths, octaves, quarter tones and into the extended register, and nothing makes me feel so accomplished as running the full gamut of my technique in that hour I allot myself each day.
For those of you that don't do scales, I highly encourage you to start. It is honestly one of the best feelings that I've ever had as a musician. There's something so powerful in furthering your technical mastery of ones chosen instrument of expression.
The great saxophonist Jean-Marie Londeix once said "We work every day, methodically, patiently, meticulously, in order for art to become our second nature," and I could not agree more.
Musicality, while always an extremely important gift and resource, is utterly useless without technique.
In some lessons I teach, a student will say they love a certain movement or piece as they can be so "musical" with it. They then proceed to play it sloppily with bad technique, essentially shitting all over the music. Any musicality they "might" have had is simply destroyed by their sloppy technique.
Without technique, musicality is lost.
Now you all know my terrible secret.
Cheers
A