Why You Need to PLAN Your Practice in Advance

4 Minute Read

As a Jazz musician, we’re faced with asking ourselves the same question every single day: “What should I practice?”

There are endless things you could work on at any given time, and it’s pretty easy to fall into bad practice habits or do things that aren’t truly benefitting your growth.

This is why I absolutely recommend planning your practice sessions for one whole week at a time and what you’re going to do every day. This gives you focused goals and will increase morale, satisfaction, confidence and peace of mind knowing you are making progress.

You always want to practice at a level that is at the right level of challenge. If your practice sessions are too easy, your skills won’t grow. If they’re too hard, you won’t be able to meet your goals and get discouraged and quickly burn out.

1. Setting Clear Goals: Are you aiming to master a specific jazz standard, enhance your improvisational prowess, or refine your technical fluency? If you’re aiming to conquer “Autumn Leaves,” break down the song into manageable sections — melody, voicings, improvisation — and allocate focused practice time to each component.

There are 3 main ways you can play any tune:

• Solo piano playing the head or soloing

• “Trio” style playing the head or soloing, as if there’s a band and bassist (Rootless LH voicings)

• 2-handed Comping.

Make it a point of what you’re going to do with your left hand, especially solo piano: 2-feel or Walking Bass line? Root position or Rootless voicings in a swing style?

Combining Root position and Rootless left hand voicings? Plan it out by the chorus: First chorus 2-feel bass line, 2nd chorus Root Position voicings using Charleston rhythm, 3rd chorus using Rootless voicings and Call and Response between the two hands.

For the Right Hand soloing that could be staying motivic, using the Altered scale on every Dominant chord, or using the melody itself as your guide and making slightly different improvisations with it either harmonically or rhythmically.

2. Maximizing Efficiency: Time is a precious commodity best utilized with precision. Begin by identifying your strengths and weaknesses. Are you struggling with voicings, scales, rhythmic patterns? Rhythm? Fluency in playing a tune without stopping?

Tailor your practice sessions accordingly, incorporating targeted and condensed exercises that address these areas.

For example if you’re working on voicings, dedicate a portion of your session to exploring a few different voicngs in all keys and over a tune or two that you’re working on.

By embracing a diverse range of exercises and materials, you not only enhance your technical proficiency but also stave off boredom, keeping your practice sessions engaging and dynamic.

ALWAYS make any excercise or technique you’re trying out as musical as possible. How you practice is how you will sound.

Set time limits for how long you’re going to focus on one thing before moving on to the next.

3. Building Consistency: Consistency is the heartbeat of progress in Jazz piano. Like a marathon runner adhering to a training regimen, consistent, disciplined practice is the bedrock upon which mastery is built.

Establish a practice schedule that aligns with your lifestyle and commitments, carving out dedicated time slots for piano practice each day. Ideally at a time your most awake, alert and free from the distractions of life.

Treat these sessions with the same reverence as a job, prioritizing your musical development. Moreover, embrace the power of incremental progress. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither is fluency and mastery on the piano, especially with Jazz.

Celebrate small victories along the way — mastering a set of challenging chord changes, internalizing a new soloing technique or piece of vocabulary— let those things fuel your momentum. By nurturing a culture of consistency and perseverance, you lay the groundwork for compounding sustained growth and achievement in your Jazz piano journey.

Call to Action: Write down 3 of your biggest weaknesses when it comes to playing Jazz. Make an effort to incorporate ONE different aspect each day into your practice routine.

Just remember: You shouldn’t sound “good” in your practice sessions. It’s a place for you to be trying new things that push you towards success. Mistakes are not a bad thing. It’s not hard it’s just unfamiliar.

Don’t fret if you don’t get something down in one session. It takes time for the brain to absorb and digest new things and build neural pathways of familiarity.

Rest assured, if you’re consistent and keep drilling and reviewing what your main goals are for the week, you WILL get better and more comfortable with them.

If you’re looking for even more specific guidance, download my FREE 8 page Practice Guide and learn the 5-Steps to organize and structure your practice.