455: How to Learn a Piece

How do we learn a piece?

That’s a question thatI recently put out to the Contrabass Conversations community. The responses I got back were fascinating.

While we all have a different approach to learning a piece (as you’ll see in this episode!), there are certain recurring approaches that I discovered:

Listening to recordings
Watching videos on YouTube.
Beginning with a “bird’s eye” perspective
Playing along with recordings.
Working in chunks.
Connecting small chunks to form bigger chunks.
Slow practice.
Identifying key notes in phrases.

454: Daniel Smith on Bali, pre-med, and auditioning

We are chatting with Daniel Smith on today’s podcast! Daniel recently joined the San Francisco Symphony as associate principal bass after spending two seasons in the San Diego Symphony double bass section.

About Daniel Smith:

A native to Southern California, bassist Daniel Smith was recently appointed Associate Principal Bass of the San Francisco Symphony after performing for two seasons with the San Diego Symphony. Mr. Smith graduated from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music in 2013 under the tutelage of Timothy Pitts. After four years of pursuing music, as well as a biochemistry minor, Mr. Smith travelled to Bali, Indonesia, where he spent four months volunteering and teaching music at an orphanage known as Bali Life. Two months following his return home, Mr. Smith was appointed Principal Bass of the Santa Barbara Symphony in February of 2014.

453: Injury Prevention

Musicians truly are “athletes of the small muscles.” And like athletes, we sustain injuries.

Sometimes these injuries are from a specific event. Frequently, however, these injuries are a result of multiple factors that converge to knock a player out of commission for a long time…or for good!

How can we keep from getting injured? And if we do get injured, what can we do to work through it and prevent it from happening again?

That’s what we dig into in today’s episode.

We feature excerpts from the following past podcast guests: