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Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I suppose the short answer here is "no" but I was playing away on the fiddle tonight and started on a tune "Estonian Waltz" which I hadn't played for months. It sounded really sweet, even if I say so myself, and much better than when I was practising fairly regularly for a performance a few months ago. I realise there's probably other things at work here; ie I'm more relaxed about the tune, my overall technique might have improved since I used to play it, and the pratice at the time was probably more useful than I thought.
This has happened to me with many tunes and I wondered if any of you have had a similar experience. Have you any explanation for this phenomenon, psychological , physical, or otherwise?
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I think that phenonema should be called something; I see it often. Any suggestions?
My theory is that your ear changes over time, and when you re-visit the instrument (or a tune) after a break it's fresh and new; your approach changes and the quality improves.
I think it's smart to take a few weeks off once in a while just for that reason.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Putting on my music teacher hat for a moment, I will say that I've seen this in my pupils a lot. NO the ones who never practise really DON'T get better! but quite often somebody comes in for their weekly lesson, confesses that they haven't touched the box all week, expects the worst and proceeds to play really well.
I think what happens is that they forget what it was that they were so worried about in a particular passage. They sort of forget which bit of the tune to panic in, so they accidentally play it okay.
Perhaps, too, because their expectations are lower they are easier on themselves, so they play better.
Anyway, practise doesn't make perfect - practise makes patterns, so take care when you run through that tune for the hundredth time, and then quit when you finally play it right the 101st.
Music lesson over. Class dismissed.
- Kris
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Hmm. This is a good and thoughtful post and it covers a well documented phenomenon. As ever, a thoughtful post by St. Kris, for which eternal thanks.
My small contribution is that the hip bone is connnected to the thigh bone...
As most of you know, the hippocampus, which is a "seahorse" shaped area of mostly grey matter, situated beneath, but kind of in the middle of, the cerebrum, has the function of processing memory. THis is partly achieved by the glutaminergic synapses possessing the function of (post synaptic) long term potentiation. Drip drip kind of neurotransmission.
At the risk of sounding boring by repitition, we all know that of course it is the Superior Temporal Gyrus, that little lump sticking out of yer brain just above yer ear - aww, for gawdsake! don't tell me ye've never noticed! or even worse never had the inclination to think about what's inside me bliddy ear?
I had a grand unifying theory connecting all this - but I'm SO dissapointed in the lot of ye that I'm going to send yes back to kris to be caned
:~}
Wat a pile of sh!te. lads and lasses let's start partying again Hup ya boy ye
Yes, of course. Practise comes in all forms, many of them subconscious.
One good way to get better at a tune, after you think you *know* it, is to track down a great recording of the tune, and listen to it until your husband/wife wants to commit you to an institute for the musically insane.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I wonder if this is related in any way to that other well-documented (if only anecdotal) phenomenon whereby you can slave away at some problem of technique for weeks and not seem to get anywhere, go off on holiday for a fortnight without touching the instrument, and then return to find the technical problem completely solved, and what was formerly down-right impossible to do is now dead easy. I think most of us have had that experience some time or other; I know I have.
I suspect it may be in part due to the subconscious brain beavering at the problem and solving it without you being aware of it, but *only* if the conscious brain leaves it alone. Perhaps the conscious brain working on a problem inhibits the subconscious from working on the problem at the same time.
BTW, a caveat! What I've said in the previous paragraph may be the proverbial dingo's kidneys, since I know next to nothing about psychology or the workings of the brain.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Another possibility, one that I've had happen to me.
Although you don't play the tune, you may still listen to it or think about it. My dad, a retired scientist, has told me about studies demonstrating that when someone who engages in physical activity (playing an instrument, jogging, knitting, etc) thinks or dreams about the activity, their micromuscle movement reflects the action even though they aren't actually carrying out the action. So according to these studies, while you think about playing a piece you've been working on, your muscles would be making all of the motions you would make while playing, only in almost undetectably tiny movements rather than in full-scale movement. In effect you're practicing without practicing just by thinking.
I find this happens to me when I listen to a piece I know; if I pay attention, I'll notice faint movements in my fingers etc.
Is this possibly part of the effect?
Just a 2c theory...
Sara
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I could practice a new tune a dozen times in a row, and each time would sound worse than the time before. That's when I know I need to play something else, and come back to the new tune tomorrow. The scientific name for this phenomenon is "brain cramp."
Kate
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
It's a very gratifying phenomenon.
Mostly, the longer and more often I practise (s for verb, c for noun in these climes), the more stressed out I get, and wrapped up in the minutae to the point where it becomes a sisyphusian uphill slog to even finish a set, losing more ground than gaining... and inevitably I get fed up and leave off for a few days.
But after, picking up and playing feels like dancing on air... fingers flying with nary a command from yer brain other than "go". For a ham like me it's cloud 9.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I find this happens too - it is a common enough experience, and all the clever things people have said so far are all good stuff. But I suspect that there's also a little bit of self deception taking place with this phenomenon (phenomenon - singular; phenomena - plural).
To some extent it is the case that your overwheening memory of this tune is that it always went wrong, or was at least difficult. When you return to it you may be simply surprised at how well you can play it after all.
Sometimes you revisit a tune after a break and find it still to be difficult, or sound bad, and you do not notice this as remarkable at all, and when this happens it passes by unnoticed - you only notice the times when such a tune comes out surprisingly well. That's possibly a bit like throwing a pair of dice (die - singular; dice - plural) and getting excited about getting a double six - although in fact a double six is no more or less likely than a double three - you just get to Jumanji sooner.
(BTW the easy help to remembering is to use a non-homophone e.g.:
Advise - verb
Advice - noun
The other homophonics such as practise/practice and license/licence follow the rule)
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I'm practising my mandolin so much , albiet 3 or 4 hours a day sometimes, I'm developing a water blister at bottom edge of my index finger where my hand wraps round the neck. Other than stop bloody practising, go ambidextrous, where a condom, etc. etc. anybody got any advise ? I've heard rubbing methalated spirits on helps to harden the skin.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Some of us are practised at playing by ear so can immediately play a tune we have never played before, never mind practised.
Practise is only for technique.
Learning is for tunes.
Playing is for tunes you have learned.
Taking the opposite track, how many times have you heard someone play a tune they maintain they have been practising all week. But you don't believe them?
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Re your first point, Geoff. This is true and I can do the same. However, I was more concerned about playing a tune well. I never had any difficulty with the tune I gave as an example. It just sounded so much better when I revisited it. Probably, it was because I was much more relaxed and not thinking about it too much.
Re the last point, it's often with those tunes that I've been practising most recently that I'm likely to make a complete "b-lls up".
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Pied - IPHI - Iffy?
Hmm.
All the best for your manchester session tonite. I daren't make it, as I am required to stay within reach of a toilet fitted with restraining belts and a straining bar at the moment.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
anybody still here?......the last couple weeks i got obsessed about ONLY 4/4 time. marches, polkas, reels etc,and began a massive review of my repertoire, making lists (only 4/4)forcing recall, playing air banjo (thats realy fast but without a pick, just reviewing the fingering,attaching tunes into long snakes only 4/4 though, mind, doing all this STUFF.....then haha.. guess what.. at my session the only music that came out well was the jigs and waltzes! My 4/4 playing was awful! i felt like crawling under a log...my ego was all bruised too, because my fave player was there...(no no not like romantically, i mean i just admire his playing so much)
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
This phenomenon is fairly ubiquitous among us creative types. Our "left brain" is engaged during practice, drills, scales, the development of technique; it's when we put that aside and go about our occupations, or just relax and play, that we give our "right brain" the chance to do ITS job - which it does best in that period of "gestation". Albert Einstein attributed all of his discoveries to this process. He declared that what he described as the AHA! moment came not in sessions of intense work on the problem at hand, but during the moments of relaxation and play that followed.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I learned about a study, by an Irishman no less, and it found that genius' like Einstein had their "AHA!" moments whilst being intoxicated. It's no joke; I met his daughter, who was assisting him in his research at Stanford University back in the mid-90s.
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
There is a well known phenomenon in educative psycology. When you practice, your learnig curve goes up. After some time, you get at the top of your capacity of learning and the curve begins to go down. It's the shape of an inverted U. If you stop, relax yourself for a while and then go on playing, studyng, or whatever you do, you can mantain the learning curve up (something like sex?).
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Einstein's "AHA!" moments came mainly while playing his instrument of choice - the fiddle. Of course, he could have been intoxicated too. I wonder what he like to drink. Is it too much to hope it might have been Guiness? ;0)
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
There's also an agricultural analogy here. Fields which are overworked by one crop become strained and tense, and eventually their level of performance drops. Leaving them fallow for a period of time allows all sorts of natural and unknown processes, biological, chemical, organic, etc... to occur, and the soil becomes 'relaxed'. Plant again, and up springs the crop with renewed strength and vigour. All work and no play, etc... Amazingly, I have rediscovered tunes after some years, and found myself playing them again instantly with sweetness and even accuracy, which us amazing, since on the piano accordion, one learns a new set of fingering for every single tune, and this is easily forgotten over time. Just reinforces the point that our brains are the most fantastic complex sensitive 'computers'.
Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I suppose the short answer here is "no" but I was playing away on the fiddle tonight and started on a tune "Estonian Waltz" which I hadn't played for months. It sounded really sweet, even if I say so myself, and much better than when I was practising fairly regularly for a performance a few months ago. I realise there's probably other things at work here; ie I'm more relaxed about the tune, my overall technique might have improved since I used to play it, and the pratice at the time was probably more useful than I thought.
This has happened to me with many tunes and I wondered if any of you have had a similar experience. Have you any explanation for this phenomenon, psychological , physical, or otherwise?
John
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Johnny Jay
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
(mr Analogy pipes in) ITM is like wine & whiskey -- it ages well. But practice, like the fermentation process, is essential before the aging begins.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I think that phenonema should be called something; I see it often. Any suggestions?
My theory is that your ear changes over time, and when you re-visit the instrument (or a tune) after a break it's fresh and new; your approach changes and the quality improves.
I think it's smart to take a few weeks off once in a while just for that reason.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by glenn
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
The short answer here is yes all the way I have done this so many times it is not even funny.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Why Bother?
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Putting on my music teacher hat for a moment, I will say that I've seen this in my pupils a lot. NO the ones who never practise really DON'T get better! but quite often somebody comes in for their weekly lesson, confesses that they haven't touched the box all week, expects the worst and proceeds to play really well.
I think what happens is that they forget what it was that they were so worried about in a particular passage. They sort of forget which bit of the tune to panic in, so they accidentally play it okay.
Perhaps, too, because their expectations are lower they are easier on themselves, so they play better.
Anyway, practise doesn't make perfect - practise makes patterns, so take care when you run through that tune for the hundredth time, and then quit when you finally play it right the 101st.
Music lesson over. Class dismissed.
- Kris
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by kris
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Hmm. This is a good and thoughtful post and it covers a well documented phenomenon. As ever, a thoughtful post by St. Kris, for which eternal thanks.
My small contribution is that the hip bone is connnected to the thigh bone...
As most of you know, the hippocampus, which is a "seahorse" shaped area of mostly grey matter, situated beneath, but kind of in the middle of, the cerebrum, has the function of processing memory. THis is partly achieved by the glutaminergic synapses possessing the function of (post synaptic) long term potentiation. Drip drip kind of neurotransmission.
At the risk of sounding boring by repitition, we all know that of course it is the Superior Temporal Gyrus, that little lump sticking out of yer brain just above yer ear - aww, for gawdsake! don't tell me ye've never noticed! or even worse never had the inclination to think about what's inside me bliddy ear?
I had a grand unifying theory connecting all this - but I'm SO dissapointed in the lot of ye that I'm going to send yes back to kris to be caned
:~}
Wat a pile of sh!te. lads and lasses let's start partying again Hup ya boy ye
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Rudall the time
Yes.
Yes, of course. Practise comes in all forms, many of them subconscious.
One good way to get better at a tune, after you think you *know* it, is to track down a great recording of the tune, and listen to it until your husband/wife wants to commit you to an institute for the musically insane.
--E
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Eliot
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
"I think that phenonema should be called something..."
Yep, "something" sounds like a good word for it.
I presume you meant "that phenomenon".
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I wonder if this is related in any way to that other well-documented (if only anecdotal) phenomenon whereby you can slave away at some problem of technique for weeks and not seem to get anywhere, go off on holiday for a fortnight without touching the instrument, and then return to find the technical problem completely solved, and what was formerly down-right impossible to do is now dead easy. I think most of us have had that experience some time or other; I know I have.
I suspect it may be in part due to the subconscious brain beavering at the problem and solving it without you being aware of it, but *only* if the conscious brain leaves it alone. Perhaps the conscious brain working on a problem inhibits the subconscious from working on the problem at the same time.
BTW, a caveat! What I've said in the previous paragraph may be the proverbial dingo's kidneys, since I know next to nothing about psychology or the workings of the brain.
Trevor
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Another possibility, one that I've had happen to me.
Although you don't play the tune, you may still listen to it or think about it. My dad, a retired scientist, has told me about studies demonstrating that when someone who engages in physical activity (playing an instrument, jogging, knitting, etc) thinks or dreams about the activity, their micromuscle movement reflects the action even though they aren't actually carrying out the action. So according to these studies, while you think about playing a piece you've been working on, your muscles would be making all of the motions you would make while playing, only in almost undetectably tiny movements rather than in full-scale movement. In effect you're practicing without practicing just by thinking.
I find this happens to me when I listen to a piece I know; if I pay attention, I'll notice faint movements in my fingers etc.
Is this possibly part of the effect?
Just a 2c theory...
Sara
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by sara g
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I could practice a new tune a dozen times in a row, and each time would sound worse than the time before. That's when I know I need to play something else, and come back to the new tune tomorrow. The scientific name for this phenomenon is "brain cramp."
Kate
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by rocking bow
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
p.s. BTW, that wasn't a typo. Around here practice is spelled "practice."
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by rocking bow
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Thanks for all the responses so far. I'll maybe post this tune as it's really nice but not until tomorrow as I'm a bit p-ssed.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Johnny Jay
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
It's a very gratifying phenomenon.
Mostly, the longer and more often I practise (s for verb, c for noun in these climes), the more stressed out I get, and wrapped up in the minutae to the point where it becomes a sisyphusian uphill slog to even finish a set, losing more ground than gaining... and inevitably I get fed up and leave off for a few days.
But after, picking up and playing feels like dancing on air... fingers flying with nary a command from yer brain other than "go". For a ham like me it's cloud 9.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Q
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I find this happens too - it is a common enough experience, and all the clever things people have said so far are all good stuff. But I suspect that there's also a little bit of self deception taking place with this phenomenon (phenomenon - singular; phenomena - plural).
To some extent it is the case that your overwheening memory of this tune is that it always went wrong, or was at least difficult. When you return to it you may be simply surprised at how well you can play it after all.
Sometimes you revisit a tune after a break and find it still to be difficult, or sound bad, and you do not notice this as remarkable at all, and when this happens it passes by unnoticed - you only notice the times when such a tune comes out surprisingly well. That's possibly a bit like throwing a pair of dice (die - singular; dice - plural) and getting excited about getting a double six - although in fact a double six is no more or less likely than a double three - you just get to Jumanji sooner.
(BTW the easy help to remembering is to use a non-homophone e.g.:
Advise - verb
Advice - noun
The other homophonics such as practise/practice and license/licence follow the rule)
Dave
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by showaddydadito
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Dave!
*pounce*
hullo. happy birthday for yesterday.
I dunno that we should be condoning this rampant talk of homophonia. I mean, some of my best friends use homonyms.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Q
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I do all my practising at sessions. That way you can have a few drinks and chat with your mates at the same time. Is it such a crime?
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Just a person
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I'm practising my mandolin so much , albiet 3 or 4 hours a day sometimes, I'm developing a water blister at bottom edge of my index finger where my hand wraps round the neck. Other than stop bloody practising, go ambidextrous, where a condom, etc. etc. anybody got any advise ? I've heard rubbing methalated spirits on helps to harden the skin.
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Justintime
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Some of us are practised at playing by ear so can immediately play a tune we have never played before, never mind practised.
Practise is only for technique.
Learning is for tunes.
Playing is for tunes you have learned.
Taking the opposite track, how many times have you heard someone play a tune they maintain they have been practising all week. But you don't believe them?
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by geoffwright
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Re your first point, Geoff. This is true and I can do the same. However, I was more concerned about playing a tune well. I never had any difficulty with the tune I gave as an example. It just sounded so much better when I revisited it. Probably, it was because I was much more relaxed and not thinking about it too much.
Re the last point, it's often with those tunes that I've been practising most recently that I'm likely to make a complete "b-lls up".
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Johnny Jay
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
This has happened to me many times may I suggest "Inter Practice Hiatus Improvement" IPHI
# Posted on May 20th 2004 by Pied Piper
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
The fundamental point about practising is to practice until you get it right, and then continue practising until you can't get it wrong.
Trevor
# Posted on May 21st 2004 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Pied - IPHI - Iffy?
Hmm.
All the best for your manchester session tonite. I daren't make it, as I am required to stay within reach of a toilet fitted with restraining belts and a straining bar at the moment.
Dave
# Posted on May 21st 2004 by showaddydadito
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
That’s a shame Dave, keep optimistic, I'm shore we'll meet again soon.
TTFN
PP
# Posted on May 21st 2004 by Pied Piper
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
bite my phenomenomenomenum.
# Posted on May 21st 2004 by glenn
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
anybody still here?......the last couple weeks i got obsessed about ONLY 4/4 time. marches, polkas, reels etc,and began a massive review of my repertoire, making lists (only 4/4)forcing recall, playing air banjo (thats realy fast but without a pick, just reviewing the fingering,attaching tunes into long snakes only 4/4 though, mind, doing all this STUFF.....then haha.. guess what.. at my session the only music that came out well was the jigs and waltzes! My 4/4 playing was awful! i felt like crawling under a log...my ego was all bruised too, because my fave player was there...(no no not like romantically, i mean i just admire his playing so much)
# Posted on May 22nd 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
*double pounce on Q & Dave*
Um I didn't really read this thread, I just felt a Tigger moment come over me.
# Posted on May 22nd 2004 by emily_bmore
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
This phenomenon is fairly ubiquitous among us creative types. Our "left brain" is engaged during practice, drills, scales, the development of technique; it's when we put that aside and go about our occupations, or just relax and play, that we give our "right brain" the chance to do ITS job - which it does best in that period of "gestation". Albert Einstein attributed all of his discoveries to this process. He declared that what he described as the AHA! moment came not in sessions of intense work on the problem at hand, but during the moments of relaxation and play that followed.
# Posted on May 23rd 2004 by Graewulf
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
I learned about a study, by an Irishman no less, and it found that genius' like Einstein had their "AHA!" moments whilst being intoxicated. It's no joke; I met his daughter, who was assisting him in his research at Stanford University back in the mid-90s.
# Posted on May 23rd 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
There is a well known phenomenon in educative psycology. When you practice, your learnig curve goes up. After some time, you get at the top of your capacity of learning and the curve begins to go down. It's the shape of an inverted U. If you stop, relax yourself for a while and then go on playing, studyng, or whatever you do, you can mantain the learning curve up (something like sex?).
# Posted on May 23rd 2004 by fer
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
Einstein's "AHA!" moments came mainly while playing his instrument of choice - the fiddle. Of course, he could have been intoxicated too. I wonder what he like to drink. Is it too much to hope it might have been Guiness? ;0)
# Posted on June 12th 2004 by Graewulf
Re: Is it possible to play a tune better if you don't practise?
There's also an agricultural analogy here. Fields which are overworked by one crop become strained and tense, and eventually their level of performance drops. Leaving them fallow for a period of time allows all sorts of natural and unknown processes, biological, chemical, organic, etc... to occur, and the soil becomes 'relaxed'. Plant again, and up springs the crop with renewed strength and vigour. All work and no play, etc... Amazingly, I have rediscovered tunes after some years, and found myself playing them again instantly with sweetness and even accuracy, which us amazing, since on the piano accordion, one learns a new set of fingering for every single tune, and this is easily forgotten over time. Just reinforces the point that our brains are the most fantastic complex sensitive 'computers'.
# Posted on June 25th 2004 by petemay