Quest for speed

J.O. writes:

>I've been playing bass for more years than I'd like to count. After a 5
>year absence, I've been practicing every night since a year last January.
>Since reading Essential Bass Technique, by Peter Murray, I've reworked my
>technique from the ground up with good results. I work on excersises as
>well as songs. One of the more difficult ones is an old Yellow Jackets song
>called Sylvania from the Samurai Samba CD. If you haven't heard it, it's
>basically thumping 16th notes using your thumb at around 126 - 132. I have
>slowdown software I use to gradually work songs up to speed. I've worked
>this one up to 90% on a good day with a lot of warm-up. I'll keep this up
>for a couple of weeks and then everything seems to fall apart and I end up
>having to go back to scratch because my right hand just won't do what I want
>it to do anymore. I've been working on the song and have had to restart 3
>or 4 times now. My thinking on this is that I'm changing something that
>reduces my efficiency of motion in my right hand making it fatigue faster
>but I can't figure out what I'm doing right when I'm doing it and what I'm
>doing wrong when it all goes to hell. The song isn't the end all be all but
>it's just something I've always wanted to play. I keep trying because I
>know I can do it. Any suggestions or resources would be appreciated? Also,
>can you recomend any teachers in the Ft. Worth TX area.
>
>Thanks,
>J.O.
>

Dear J,
I'll have to go dig up the song now because I want to hear what you're talking about!
You seem to have a good handle on your own practicing process and you understand that anything fast and consistent demands economy of motion. Your own detective work is telling you that something is causing your right hand to collect tension and tense up as you approach performance tempo.
Be careful that you are not fatiguing your right hand to the point of injury.
Your practice routine of approaching the tempo gradually is good, but you may need to shake things up a bit by trying a different approach. Can you play four bars at performance quality AND at the original performance tempo? You may want to try it that way and then expand it to eight bars, and so on. This may shed new light on exactly what is happening that causes your hand to become fatigued.
If things start out well, i.e. you can play four or eight bars at performance tempo and quality without tension, then perhaps the tension is the product of your internal dialogue.
What do I mean by internal dialogue? The voice in our heads that says, "yeah, I'm getting this, I'm finally playing it! The practicing is paying off!" This thought causes us to lose focus on the relaxed mindset that finally made the exercise work. The tension and fatigue come back. We get frustrated. We have become attached to the results instead of focusing on the process. Focusing on the process, and detaching from the results, is what works. We get tense when we inadvertently focus on the desired result instead of simply staying in the moment and doing what only we need to do.
I see my students' hands collecting tension in all kinds of unconscious ways. Fingers coming way up off the fingerboard is a common one. A tense wrist in the plucking hand is another. I always point these things out to the students in an effort to make them conscious of the tension. I explain that the tension comes as a result of wanting to be able to play what they are practicing. In other words, it comes from desiring the result. The answer is to stop desiring the result, stay in the present, and trust the process of practicing. Results take care of themselves this way.
Let me leave you with this thought: when you have your next practice session, don't think "I need to try harder" when you hit the glitch. Think, "I will try less."
Let me know how it goes.
Happy playing,
Andy


http://www.andrewpfaff.com