Question:
Students: Post your (SUMMER) Practice Routine/Thoughts/Plans
We all know what summer is all about for musicians. Practice. So, since we are not spending the eight or nine hours around school, what are we practicing now? How much time are we spending? What are we adding, Practicing more of? Maybe adding even adding doubles?
This is it, school's out. Time to post what you do in the summer.

Answer:
I'm doing my normal practice routine of all my instruments (alto, soprano, clarinet, piano, and drums) except I'm bumping up my 30 minutes on each instrument to 60 minutes on alto, soprano and clarinet and 30 minutes on piano and maybe some drums...I'm done with drumming really.
That was a really big run-on sentence.

Answer:
Well, I haven't had a whole lot of time of energy to practice during the school year, but I will be ready for summer. I am hoping to practice for 3-4 hours (not all at the same time). I will put an emphasis on tone and getting ALL of the scales and modes firmly under my fingers; I will also be practicing hard on my doubles (especially flute). That is my main goal. i am also going to be studying with a new teacher, since my old teacher was into teaching classical, and I really am into jazz. My new teacher is a real monster behind the sax and a very well respected musician in the L.A. area.

Answer:
I go to private lessons every Monday with a really cool guy. Then, I practice about two hours a day, 30 minutes on scales and technique, and then about an hour and a half on stuff I want to or I usually get carried away for a few hours by playing along with the Bird with stereo. :)

Answer:
About 6 or 7 hours a day, spread over clarinet, flute, alto and soprano. Spending the most time on clarinet now as it's my weakest instrument by far (~3.5 hours a day). Mostly tone and basic technique studies for now, courtesy of the Klose method book plus my own little exercises. After reading Keith Stein's "The Art of Clarinet Playing" I'm trying to apply some of his basic principles of French clarinet study and how their emphasis is on slow repetition of every interval on the instrument in order to create firm building blocks for fluid, consistent technique. This is good practice for any woodwind really but for the clarinet it seems particularly essential. Boring as all hell but very necessary.
On flute I do mostly tone and articulation studies as these are my main problem areas at the moment. Also just working on getting all my scales down. Back to the basics on the doubles I'm afraid, and humbling to say the least. Kinda tired of being a so-so doubler and time spent is the only cure.
On saxophone I'm transcribing a bit and working on Bozza's Douze Etudes and Bonneau's "Caprice en Forme de Valse". Trying to commit the Glazunov to memory. I studied it this past semester but I'll be using it in a local concerto competition in the winter and it must be memorized. Speaking of which, better order the Ibert soon...
Seriously considering going into woodwind repair as at least a hobby or even part-time job, trying to collect the proper tools and some good books (a few paychecks from now going to grab hold of Thorpe's text and some essentials from Ferree's) and I have some junker horns to get started on. If my tech ever resumes his ability to take me on as a sort-of-apprentice on the weekends, that'll get started up too. But for now, reading up and doing what I can with my student clarinet and flute will have to suffice.
This regimen is at least until July when I start working full time for the month. It'll probably cut down to 4 hours a day and resume 7-8 by August when my job is done. I'm able to afford the practice time this summer because of some recent gigs and saving money over the semester to keep food and rent happening!! Plus now that I have the time and energy I'm working out every other day and biking a little more than I used to. Makes playing four woodwinds every day a lot easier on the wrists and the MIND!! The most difficult part is keeping myself from just blowing random jazz by the time I get around to saxophone :)

Answer:
Hey, Razzy, I can understand why you would want to practice so much, but don't you think that around the 4th hour of regimented practice, you might just be hurting your technique because of fatigue? Even if it is spread out, you have to have a lot of endurance to do 8 hours. I just think that too much of a good thing may be a bad thing. Just an idea, and I am probably wrong.

Answer:
Zach, it depends on your goals. Sometimes it IS too much, but I can usually pull off 6 hours without too much trouble, and sometimes 7 or 8 comes easily, it's weird like that. I never practice for more than 50 minutes in a shot. And as long as attention is paid to keep everything relaxed, there's plenty of listening thrown in, playing with friends, doing a bit of noodling, etc then it's not nearly as fatiguing as it would otherwise be. The trick is staying focused and knowing when to take a break. It's one thing to set a goal but it's foolish to be stubborn about it and try to push yourself beyond your physical and mental limits. Stretch but never "force", you know? I think as long as those basic principles are kept in mind, you shouldn't run into too much trouble.
I also spent many weeks working up to this. During the regular semester I typically put in 4 a day, and 6 on weekends. So this isn't necessarily a new or foreign thing to me.
In my sophomore year of high school, I would practice 8 hours of saxophone in the summer. That was pretty silly of me, but looking back I think it was a good idea.
Also have you heard of Dan Higgins? He's LA's top woodwind session player, and went to UNT for saxophone. He practiced saxophone for 8 hours a day his first year there, and on weekends would have competitions with his roommate to see who could practice more, sometimes practicing up to 16 hours before falling on the floor. He also plays a mean clarinet, flute, oboe, and bassoon... you get the idea. Where there's a will there's a way.
Edit: I should add that practicing for me is mostly enjoyable. Even when it gets tedious, I don't let myself get frustrated or angry if I can't do something. I just realize that my body and mind are not ready to fully adopt a new practice yet, and keep on going. I've also been so limited and restrained in what I've been practicing during school (usually in a good way) that, now that I have the time to put in on the basics and to really learn how to play my instruments, I embrace it... so in that way fatigue rarely sets in until the last hour or so. At the end of the night it feels like a satisfying day's work was just done, and I really like having that feeling.

Answer:
For me practice as much as I can possibly get. I know Im going to spend time on this forum, and I have a part time job. I'm trying to get in 3-5 hours a day, depending on what's on my schedule. I include listening and reading books like "How to Practice Jazz" or "Improvising Jazz" (not at the same time) at night before I go to bed.
On sax I am trying to really perfect improv over the basics, and then journey onward an learn as many tunes as possible. I'll be shedding tons of patterns, the Omnibook, and classical books for technique. After reading around this forum for a while, I think I should go deeper into Top Tones and really make an effort to apply Rascher's words.
On clarinet it's just technique, scales, technique, scales, technique... Sometimes I will venture off into some Jazz but at this point its all about building chops. Razzy- I have read "The Art of Clarinet Playing", and noticed the interval technique builders he talks about. It sounds excellent, but I don't think I could handle 10 minutes of it.
Get much better, in a short period of time.

Answer:
Originally Posted by Razzy
Also have you heard of Dan Higgins?
Have I heard of Dan Higgins? If you live in L.A. (or close by, like me) you can't not hear about Dan Higgins. He's ridiulous! (in a good, amazing player kinda way) :D
Actually, Razzy, this school year I have been so deprived of practice time that when summer comes (3 DAYS!!!!!!), I could probably use 8hours of practice. That would be fun! The shed has cobwebs and dust and my name on a chair inside. I can't wait!!!!!!!
Now back to studying for finals....:(

Answer:
This is weird for me, because recently I've been re-thinking my practicing. Maybe it's because I put all those long, hard hours into practicing my first four years in college, but it seems like right now I'm practicing less and getting better, faster. During the school year I take a huge load of classes and in the hours between I'm forced to practice everything I can for a little bit at a time. This summer has been no different, as I've been working full time (mostly with a bit of overtime each week). Although it's stressful and I wish I could spend hours on my horns each day, I think it's made me consciously try to really maximize every second I have on the instrument, so my practice sessions are extremely intense and efficient. I do a lot of extracurricular playing though...I play in a jazz combo each weekend and I'm also in a funk brass band that's been playing festivals, battle of the band competitions and regular gigs around the state. Although my time in the shed is less, I'm getting more 'real time' experience, being able to use what I've learned in context, hearing other players, being around more experienced musicians, etc. It's all about maximising rehearsal time and transfer, transfer, transfer! :D
Oh and Razzy...you're gonna love playing the glazunov with an orchestra, I played that this past year and won a local concerto competition and placed in the finals of one in the Denver metro area. Now I'm working on the ibert, but I'm thinking about changing it since it costs about $450 to even rent orchestra parts and most competitions won't allow it in!

Answer:
I'm really liking the idea of putting in half an hour on longtones in the morning. I did it one day before school during the testing period, and I really felt great afterwards.
I'm working with a student orchestra, playing the bassoon parts on bari sax. Lots of those are ridiculously hard, so I think putting in an hour or so every day with those parts will help me out. The director has also mentioned a bari sax concerto or some such.
If I can manage it, I might also put in an hour a day on the clarinet. My sister is starting beginning band over the summer, so I'll just buy a mouthpiece and steal her horn.

Answer:
I changed my summer schedule. Alto 3-4 hours a day. Piano for 30-60 minutes. some long tones on soprano and clarinet and a bit of work out of a clarinet book.
For the past month I've been doing that. My soprano and clarinet skills aren't falling behind (clarinet is actually moving forward slowly because I just started). Piano is still improving.
Alto...wow. I used to think I liked my tone. It's improved SO much in the last month it almost seems impossible. All by just doing a crap loud of long tones, scales, etc. All the fundamentals that really count on that kind of stuff.

Answer:
Current practice schedule:
Go to Martha's Vineyard , Play several hours a day outside across the ocean. Deep breathing , filling the horn with massive amounts of air. Blowing every pattern I can dream up.Tritones, 4 note groupings,whole tone patterns. Practicing all my tunes especially the next 20- 25 standards that I will be playing on my next performance. Learning the melody and chords solid from memory .
Go swimming, repeat next day for 2 weeks.

Answer:
I have absolutely no organized practice regimen at all.
The one static thing I have been working on is playing the exercises that work you through all the keys in the Universal Saxophone Method book.
Everything else that I have worked on has been improvised, not over chords, or a set of changes, or a tune, its just been playing whatever I felt like and trying to make musical sense of it. I've really been working on the connection between what I hear in my head and what comes out of the horn. Its nice, being able to do whatever I please, however I want. Its like taking a car ride without a map, and without a destination, learning different things along the way. I have also been staying away from playing licks of any kind.
Most would probably consider this probably detrimental to my playing, but I really think I've improved my ear, and have had moments where I've said something musical, instead of what just fits over the chord changes.
What do you guys think?

Answer:
Well, tried to do 8 hours one day. Didn't work as well for me. Just can't focus that long. Been really busy, but this week looks pretty dead, so I have 4 hours planned out for sax, and 1 hour each on flute and clarinet. When school starts again, I will practice sax where it needs the most practice, but my main focus will be on the doubles. I will be playing about 3 hours a day a t school, plus an hour or so at home is enough for that. I will be practcicing the doubles each for as long as I can every day.

Answer:
I just picked up clarinet and cornet, and ive been practicing hard on the sax. Generally 3-5 hours on sax and an hour on the others, i'm not playing piano over the summer though, i cant put up with our piano that hasnt been tuned in 20-30 years and is 30 cents flat at best -shudders- thinking about maybe buying an electronic piano...In terms of what i am practicing i am working hard on getting the top altissimo d e f above regular range to sound good, and im working on perfecting the glauzonov, carnival of venice, variations on gavotte by corelli, and i am gonna pick up the 24th caprice by paganini, and maybe the Ibert. Mostly though i am working on a better tone..oh and im gonna pick up that jazz theory book, so i can learn how its done, cuz i love jazz. but i gotta get the clarinet going real good so i can maybe play that in concert band (alto sax in concert band is way too easy) and then ill play sax in the 6 piece jazz band me and some friends are trying to get together. basically i got a full sched. this summer and am lovin playing this much. It's a BLAST!!!

Answer:
Lately I've been spending 3+ hours on tenor and an hour on clarinet and sometimes soprano, then some flute and alto if I still have time. I play a lot of jazz flute, but as I'm no longer studying classical flute very seriously, I don't practice it all that often. I can pick it up anytime and sound better than I do on sax, so it's not a high priority right now. Flute was my first instrument, and when I was studying it real seriously, I practiced that two or three hours a day (which, during the school year, was usually at the cost of sax). If my university gets a good flute professor next year, though, I'll definitely get into it again, but lately, I've been concentrating my efforts almost exclusively on jazz, as well as getting over the extraordinarily high learning curve on clarinet.

Answer:
I think we need to emphasize the importance of QUALITY of practice rather than QUANTITY of practice. If you say "OK, i'm going to practice my horn for 6 hours today so I can get really good" but you don't really have any kind of specific goals or bench marks it's very likely to turn into a big waste of time. Here's the schedule I've made for myself (and I try to stick to it as regularly as possible, I find it helps me concentrate when I have a set way of doing things).
Alto-
Long Tones/Overtones/Tuning CD
Scales
Etudes
Repertoire
Sight reading/jazz transcriptions
::Break::
Listen to & Transcribe solos
Tenor --
Long Tones/Overtones/TCD
Patterns/intervals
1-5 Tunes - memorize changes (3rds & 7ths exercise)
Transcriptions/sight reading
::Break::
Clarinet/Flute-
Long Tones/Tone Building
Fundamentals - intervals, scales, patterns, articulation exercises, etc
Other things to rotate in/out:
Mouthpiece exercises, breathing fundamentals, rascher/rousseau/sinta books, sight singing, piano voicings, soprano and bari work in the same manner as listed above
I never make a timed schedule for this stuff, I just try to get through everything as thoroughly and efficiently as possible. If I feel like one specific area needs more attention on a particular day, I'll spend more time on that and less on another. My practice sessions depend alot upon my mood and concentration level for the day and the pace and order may vary significantly. Sometimes I don't feel like doing much more than just blowing over some changes so I'll do that first, and usually after a few choruses I'm starting to think about all the **** I need to get better at and it motivates me to get back to my schedule :D

Answer:
Originally Posted by toepferMVI Here's the schedule I've made for myself (and I try to stick to it as regularly as possible, I find it helps me concentrate when I have a set way of doing things).
Just out of curiosity, how long does this take you?
My goal for this summer (last 6-7 weeks) was to get some fundamentals under better control. With that in mind, my daily practice regimen has been looking something like this:
Flute:
Long tones - 25%
Scales - 50%
Reading tunes - 25%
(Total: somewhere between 30-60 minutes, or until I can't hold the embochure or my shoulders are screaming)
Bari sax:
Scales (a short warmup with major scales, and then whatever 2-3 scales I think I should work on) - 30%
Patterns/arpeggios/other facility exercises - 40%
Improv with playalongs, working up tunes/charts - 30%
(Total: 2-3 hours, or until my lip is too sore or my hands/wrists are stiff, or whatever)
If I over-do it one day, I might keep things going by switching to alto, clarinet, or bass clarinet for a day, and if I've got a gig coming up on some other sax, I'll work on that for a day or two prior to the gig. I really haven't been doing long tones and I know I should probably be shot for that, but on the bari I seem to get a lot of that under control by blowing the scales/arpeggios, and on the other saxes... well, let's just say I need work.
Anyhow... this is a schedule I've been able to stick to, more or less, unless I have to work that day (I teach, and the days I work are long ones), or I've got a rehearsal/gig to save my chops for. It seems like it should evolve a bit, but I'm not really good at practicing ANYTHING for ten minutes at a time. Still, my teachers say they hear improvement, so I guess it's doing SOME good.
Y'all been sticking to your schedules? How have things been working out?
-Leanne