Very few practice hours this weekend, sadly. I had quite a lot of shopping to do (got a blender, new carpets for the practice room, and small cart to carry my amp, etc.) and I taught friday night and sunday the whole day.

On friday, I had a solid 2 hour session practicing :

• Learning/Looking at three tunes :
  • Tenderly
  • Woody n You
  • My One and Only Love

• Garzone Stuff
  • Major Triads VERY slow
  • With metronome under 60 BPM !

• Refreshing Metheny’s solo on Solar
  • First five choruses @ 80% then 90% speed

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I’ll have more time next week. February is starting and I feel energized to tackle 2010’s second cold month!

I’ve been feeling weird (it’s for the better) because of a huge change in my lifestyle (mostly from a new nutrition concept). Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday.

Tuesday : almost no practice except some jamming. My stomach hurts! Then I had a rehearsal…

Wednesday : I played a great session (quartet) with some of the best local musicians and went teaching at night. My practice was brief, working on Metheny stuff and new concepts from George Garzone.

Thursday : Another weird one… Some practicing and a gig at night

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I believe my body and mind are getting used to the shift I made in my diet now. The weekend is coming and I got to be “top shape” to gig and teach as usual.

For those who wonder what I changed in my diet : 80-90% fruits, vegetables and seeds/nuts/sprouts. That changes a man! Try it if you’ve got a chance.

Record number of visitors yesterday on JazzGuitarLessons.net and this practice blog!

Thank you guys!

Monday. Woke up too late. I’m having trouble sleeping (mostly because of neighbors upstairs.) Nevertheless, I had a great, productive day. I taught an hour on Skype, practice and went to the burritoville jam.

Here’s what I practiced :

• Blowing on I Hear A Rhapsody

• Reviewing Metheny Solo w/o recording (first four choruses)

• Learning 5th chorus of Metheny on Solar
  • then playing choruses 1 through 5 @ 80% then 85% speed

• Left for Burritoville jam
  • Short jam, very few people

Yeah baby!

I started to use a new “journaling” tool today. It works great. (and YES, I keep a log other than this practice-blog!)

What I was practicing today…

Saturday. No Practicing. Nice duo gig at night with Clinton Ryder.

I had the pleasure of receiving a “free lesson” from Clinton on EAR TRAINING matters… yes! Most of the stuff comes directly from the master himself : Gary Peacock.

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Sunday.

Some practicing in my teaching breaks. I had students from 9-5 … and then some more on Skype at night!

I practice improvising on the tune I Love You in the keys of F, Bb, Eb and Ab. Sounds great at up-tempos.

Not much happening today. Teaching on Skype in the morning… then taking care of various things (website, etc.) and went teaching some more at night.

No serious practicing today.

Thursday. Woke up very late (noon!) because of yesterday’s late jam session.

Not loosing a second, I jumped right into practicing :

• Memorized and Improvised on…
  • I Love You
  • Bluesette
• Some more transcribing/learning of Metheny on Solar
  • Once more : what a great solo!
• More playing/jamming by myself, for fun!

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Then I played my weekly gig @ La Petite Ardoise. We sounded GREAT this time (we tend to sound ok to good these days.) There was a good musical connection going on with Pete and Clinton. Thank you!

It’s Wednesday. I had a great practice session before teaching 5 hours at night. Then I went to the weekly Grumpy’s jam.

My practice :

• 30 minutes warmup
  • Free Blowing
  • blowing on Solar @ 144 176 208
• 3 choruses of Metheny on Solar at 90% speed
  • Feels great. I love that solo!
• Bach Invention #5
  • Part 1 fast but not mastered
  • First reading part 2 slowly.
• Slonimsky Book
  • Playing/Singing through the first 4 motifs of page 1. Tough shit.
• Practicing (very fast) blowing on Have You Met Miss Jones

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The jam night was OK; fewer fellow musicians showed up. My playing was not “as good” as I expected it to be. I’ve been practicing a lot but the chemistry was “in and out” and not consistent. We’ll do better next week… (I kept the form, at least I know I’m not a COMPLETE failure!)

It’s tuesday. Woke up early and worked on various things (website et al.) and dived into practice and composition :

• Transcription : I think I’m tired of Harrel’s solo. I’m an octave down and it now sounds “funny” to me. So, I started to learn another solo : Pat Metheny on Solar. Lots of fun!
• Bach Invention#5 Part 1 , fast, still hard to read and play. Probably the hardest invention so far.
• My One and Only Love : memorizing, learning the A section deeply with Chord Melody.
• Composed the entire “Cleared for landing” piece. It’s a new tune for the PEP (Planet Earth Project)

At night, I had to teach an hour. It was a great, productive day practice/composition wise and in general.