The Secret Practice Technique of the Masters

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

Am I the only one that missed out on this way of practicing imprpvisation or didn't you know either? If you knew about it before, do you practice like this? Let me know down here!

[@aaronmetz8707]

The funny thing is that two years ago I more or less came up with the same process, but I called it "purge the bad" which simply just meant that if I played anything while improvising that I wasn't satisfied with I would immediately stop there and fix it before continuing. This process seemed too simple to be effective at the time but after a couple years I've come to acknowledge that it's the most organic way to work on improvisation. It's extremely intuitive and places the ear and your personal taste at the forefront rather than theory. That's not to say that theory doesn't play a role in terms of informing and modifying your ideas but rather that it takes a supportive role in the process and helps you expand what you hear.

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

Yeah that’s a really nice way to describe this way of practicing!

[@tonyjones2436]

That's great thank you Thomas.

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

Thank you Tony!

[@bluessax5089]

One thing that I really admire about Sonny Rollins is after that bridge period, he recorded an album with one of his ultimate idols, Coleman Hawkins. Two tenors. In most cases, one would think that Sonny Rollins would be playing all types of flashy stuff to try to impress Hawkins. Sonny Rollins did the opposite. I’ve never heard him play more “out”, and I mean super “out”! How many people still like to have Saxophone battles, the only way I know to truly “win”, is to just truly be yourself. If you do anything besides that you still kind of lose.

[@johnmcgrath8886]

Vielen dank, your videos are very enlightening - I'm a guitarist and the concepts transfer over very well.

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

Thanks John, glad it helps!

[@matthias5825]

Your key heights seem to be set up pretty high. Who worked on that saxophone?

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

A guy in Amsterdam, I can't recall his name though, it's been a few years like that now

[@homeandfamilyservices2650]

Why would a sax player or players have "secret" techniques. Do they sit there going... ha, not sharing this...!! Silly

[@travelingman9763]

Kenny Garret is not a fan of transcribing.

[@ThomasHaehnlein]

Do you remember where he said that?