How I structure my jazz practise · Learning Jazz Violin

1d • Tips

How I structure my jazz practise

I break my practise up like this.

Warm ups and technique practise.This is where I use my exercises, as vehicles for focusing on intonation or bowing etc, but using actually jazz related language.

2. Learning.Taking down a lick or a solo that I like and want to study. I like to transpose anything I’m working on into at least a few keys each time, but all 12 is best.

3. Improv practise.Use the material you just learned and improvise around it over tunes you know. Dropping it in, changing it in the moment, making it your own.

4. Learning new tunes.I like to learn the melody by ear from singers versions and then try to work out the harmony by ear too, checking against a chord chart later.

I try to give equal amounts of time to each of these if I have lots of time.

However generally I might only focus on one or two of these aspects for a week if I only have small pockets of time.

This is for me of course. I’ve been playing jazz for a long time and have specific things that I want to improve on.

Everyone needs to focus on different aspects of jazz at different times in their learning journey.

If you want help with your own practise routine, send me a message on here.

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