How To Know When to Move to the Next Tune
One of the most common decisions I make as a teacher is when a student should move on to new repertoire. When one of my JamWithLauren subscribers asked me how he’ll know when he’s ready to set one tune aside and start working on another, I thought it might be helpful to outline some general guidelines and share them.
What were your original goals for learning the tune?
Perhaps the tune is a common one in your weekly jam or at your favorite fiddle camp. Can you play it up to tempo? If you’re cruising along at performance/jam/dance speeds, then you might be ready to learn a new tune. If you’re still under tempo, try my tips for increasing your speed with this post:
Are you able to play all aspects of the style?
Do you have variations or are you playing it exactly the same way every time?
If it’s appropriate to solo, can you do that?
Can you play back up while others are soloing?
Perhaps it was the key that you were working on: how’s your intonation in this key now that you’ve learned the tune? (Side note: I love working with Darol Anger’s Drones for intonation and improvising).
Were you working on tone?
Which leads to bow control and phrasing... Maybe you heard your favorite artist play this particular tune: are you able to emulate your hero?
And the most important questions: Are you still motivated to practice the tune and your goals with the tune, or is your inspiration dwindling and it’s time to find another tune that can address the same issues so you’re freshly inspired? If you’re no longer eager to reach for your instrument so you can work on your goals, then something needs to shift. And it might be as simple as moving on from one tune to the next.
Because….
Inevitably you’ll be at a session and someone will say, ‘Remember that old tune we loved so much…..’ and you’ll pull it out from the cobwebs of your memory, along with a few smiles and a couple of rusty string crossings.
I remember learning Jerusalem Ridge early on in my ‘crossover’ to fiddling days. A few years later when I was jamming the tune with Darol, I was pretty disgusted with my playing. He kindly pointed out that I had traveled back in time and was playing what ‘my best’ was three years ago, but now I knew more and could hear the discrepancies in my playing. I needed to go back and apply my current skill set to tunes I learned years ago.
The good news here is that the learning is never done or over. If you ‘set aside’ a tune after working towards your goals and pick up a new one to continue those same goals or a new set of tricks, you’ll circle back around and improve other angles of your playing the next time around.
It’s important to return to ‘old’ repertoire and add in your new skills. My students are always going back to basic tunes they know inside and out to address new techniques. This way you’re not playing each tune as a snapshot in time, like I did, with Jerusalem Ridge.
What to do: Collect your tunes!
A nice way to manage your repertoire is making lists - you could group tunes by key or style, or both. Or by time signature - reels, jigs, waltzes, marches, polkas, polskas, strathspeys, rags, etc. You might even be inclined to come up with a giant database or spreadsheet that helps you cross-reference tunes. You could also make playlists of these categories.
Once you’ve organized your repertoire, you can map out a plan for revisiting tunes. Maybe have a practice calendar and write the tune you’re going to review on your date of choice. I like doing this because it helps keep the rotation of tunes fresh and when I don’t do this, I tend to teach the same tunes and they feel stale and I’m uninspired.
If you’re trying to structure your practice time, these two posts could be helpful:
Take a picture of your practice plan and email it to me! I love hearing from you. [email protected]
Finally, I’ll leave you with this thought: let the never-ending learning cycle of music be a joy and inspiration to you. Delight in the journey and your instrument being your constant companion.
