When you Can’t Practice – Listen!

Sometimes there are days when practicing or playing on your instrument just isn’t possible. Maybe you are travelling? Or maybe you have so much work to do in your job that you can’t squeeze in time? Maybe you are sick or injured and you can’t play? Or maybe there are too many family and kid events to put in a little time. When you are too busy to practice it’s time to listen! Whether you’re struggling to find time or getting back into a regular practice routine, active listening is one of the best ways to still progress when your schedule doesn’t allow for physical instrument time.

How to Be an Effective Listener

It takes a little planning to be a highly effective listener. An effective listener is someone who actively internalizes what they hear and is able to transpose it into their daily practice and performance. Let’s look at how to be an effective music listener.

You need to have goals for your music. What are you trying to sound like? What genre do you play the most? What styles are you trying to emulate? What techniques within those styles are notable? Who plays these styles and techniques that is a master at the craft? The more specific you can answer those questions the better your listening will be.

Follow Your Styles

Within your chosen genre and style of music you probably have some favorite artists you want to emulate. Since I play saxophone and am partial to the blues/bebop style I’m a huge fan of Cannonball Adderley. I also really like Hank Mobley, Sonny Stitt, and Stanley Turrentine. I also love how Eddie Harris incorporates the blues style with a little funk so I’ve been listening to a good bit of his work. (Sidenote: Eddie Harris is definitely an underrated saxophone player who deserves more time in playlists.) I’ve created jazz playlists that heavily emphasize these players. There are so many tools and apps these days that didn’t exist years ago like Spotify or Pandora that allow you to listen to a wide variety of musicians. It’s really great for the listener!

Create your own personalized playlists based on who you want to sound like and the type of music you like to play. It could be classical, rock and roll, pop, or whatever your main goal is but have that playlist ready to go. You can even make a playlist with the specific songs you are working on. Then add different versions of that same song. Often you can find live performances available where the artist has changed up the song, done different solos, or added a unique twist on the original. Fill up that playlist with those so you can learn the range of the artist and the song.

Enter the Matrix!

In the movie The Matrix the characters are able to instantly download some amazing skill and it becomes instantly knowable by that person. This isn’t really possible (at least not yet) but in music we can think of it that way. When we listen to a player do a technique, maybe it’s Eddie Harris adding a lot of rest and separation then coming in on an upbeat, you can internalize that. Download that technique into your list of things to practice. When you are conscious of what you are trying to learn it accelerates the learning!

If you are learning a classical sonata you could listen for the phrasing, the separation of notes, or dynamics and how the player implements them with the music. This is an extremely valuable accelerator for mastering your music.

Mentally rehearse the songs! In your brain you can run over fingerings or visualize the sheet music in front of you. If your hands are free you can run through those fingerings physically as well. That’s tough to do while driving but on a plane or as a passenger it’s a good way to utilize the time!

Break It Down Again, and Again!

When you effectively listen to music you need to go through the same song on repeat many times over. Each time through you listen to a different part of the music. The first time through you are often getting an overall picture of the song. That first time through you are learning the feel of the music, the tempo, and the roadmap of the music.

The second time through pick something specific to listen to all the way through and listen for that ONE thing. Maybe it’s the chord changes in the piano part. In that case you are trying to hear how the music flows through the chords. It could be the bass line which not only establishes the chords but also can be a driver of the rhythm and tempo. Of course you also will need a time (or ten) to listen to the person you are emulating. Listen to the melody line, the solos, the specific techniques that person used to great effect.

Active Listening

To effectively listen to music as a practice routine you need to be an active listener and not a passive listener. Passive listening would be working on your work from your computer office while music plays in the background on your headphones. That’s a great thing to do and it always will help but to really get the maximum benefit of listening you have to be focused on the music you are listening to. You need your brain to be thinking about the music as a main focus rather than a secondary or tertiary task.

You can be an active listener on the drive to work, while eating on your lunch break, flying on a plane, and many other situations. As a society, we spend a lot of time commuting. It feels like wasted time that could be better utilized. Obviously if traffic is horrendous and cars are darting everywhere then pay close attention to the traffic! On those long boring rides or when you are in bumper to bump traffic for miles you have an excellent opportunity to learn from your listening.

Final Notes

Even when you can’t practice you can be learning. When you come back to practice the songs you are working on, whether it is the Ibert “Concertino da Camera” or Eddie Harris “Cold Duck Time,” you will come back to find that you have internalized the feel, the sound, the rhythms, and many other skills. You have downloaded these skills from your playlist!

So the next time you don’t have time to practice spend some time listening.