Learn Study Song Bars in Reverse order?
I was listening to the Happy Hour Podcast where Carlos del Junco was being interviewed.
Happy Hour Podcast: Carlos del Junco interview
Carlos teaches something I would not have thought of doing when learning a new song. Here is what he suggests trying.
Step 1: Familiarize yourself with each bar of the music. (12 Bar Blues as an example)
Step 2: Learn bar 12 well.
Step 3: Learn bar 11 well. Then play bar 11 and 12, repeat until you got it.
Step 4: Learn bar 10 well. Then play bar 10, 11, and 12, repeat until you got it.
Step 5: Learn bar 9 well. Then play bar 9, 10, 11, and 12, repeat until you got it.
Step 6: Continue learning each bar in reverse order.
I would assume a bar would be replaced with a lick, melody, or line which ever works for you. The purpose of this is to help eliminate distractions due to errors prior to getting to the new bar that you are trying to learn.
I'm only on level 2 of the Achievement program and the first 2 study songs have all the action in the middle and end. It seems to me this method will help get the hard stuff out of the way first and bring a little more enjoyment to the learning process. Plus you then get more repetitions with the hard stuff rather than the easier stuff found at the beginning of the study songs.
I'm interested in your thoughts? I will be giving this a try. Also do you have any tips or tricks you use to help learn a new song?
I've tried this method and it does seem to make sense, but somehow feels awkward too, perhaps because you don't hear the verses in context, and feel the build and crescendo of the song. Definitely worth comparing two methods or perhaps switching it up while tryng to learn a song.