Stuck in the same monotonous pattern? Not excited about playing lately? It’s time to start with a clean slate and welcome in the new year feeling motivated.
Here’s 100 ideas to reinvigorate your energy for the music. Read through the list and pick one that gets you excited. Then, just do it.
- Transcribe your first solo
- Learn one tune straight from the record
- Practice at least 30 minutes daily
- Learn a tune in all keys
- Read a biography of a famous jazz musician
- Learn basic piano voicings
- Write your first tune
- Learn a ii V line in all keys
- Learn a simple blues head in all keys
- Visualize every night before you go to bed
- Master all your intervals
- Learn to play in 3
- Play well over “Cherokee“
- Learn to stay focused while you practice
- Transcribe a solo of someone who doesn’t play your instrument
- Commit to 15 minutes of daily ear training
- Practice at least an hour daily
- Find a new favorite musician on your instrument
- Do something athletic everyday
- Read Thinking in Jazz by Paul Berliner
- Replace the stupid videos you watch on youtube with classic jazz recordings
- Learn a chorus of a transcribed solo in all keys
- Seek out new music everyday
- Learn a bebop head like “Confirmation” in all keys
- Play duo with a drummer
- Listen to classical music
- Work out simple melodies like ‘Happy Birthday” on your horn by ear
- Master the key of F# major
- Learn how to hear and sing bass lines
- Transcribe a solo over Rhythm Changes
- Work on your articulation
- Visualize a tune you’re working on every night before you go to bed
- Write a tune over a blues
- Learn your first ballad
- Delve into the music of Monk
- Play with people below your level
- Understand the progression in “Giant Steps“
- Learn how to play over half-diminished chords
- Hear and sing the third of a major chord
- Practice with a metronome on beats 2 and 4
- Sing a blues solo instead of playing it
- Learn basic guitar voicings
- Transcribe a solo over a Blues
- Work on your tone
- Listen to and study a twelve tone composition
- Know what the #11 sounds like on a major chord
- Learn “All The Things You Are” to the point where you’d feel comfortable recording it
- Learn how to draw and see how that changes your outlook on jazz improv
- Listen to the latest pop hits
- Practice the Bach Cello Suites
- Learn a iii Vi ii V turnaround line in all keys
- Be regimented with your time
- Play with just a bass player
- Learn to hear the rhythm section in your head, even when they’re not playing
- Pick something to sightread and work on it
- Learn to play in 5
- Transcribe a Charlie Parker solo
- Find a new favorite musician not on your instrument
- Learn another language and see how that changes your outlook on jazz improv
- Master the Key of Db major
- Listen deeply to Brahms’s symphonies
- Throw your real book in the trash
- Take chances musically and non-musically
- Get your first gig
- Reharmonize a standard
- Share a musical concept with a fellow musician
- Do something not musical everyday
- Inspire a child to start playing an instrument
- Understand how to use melodic minor
- Re-listen to classic recordings you haven’t listened to in a while
- Learn basic jazz drumming
- Practice at least 2 hours daily
- Go see live jazz
- Look up your favorite musician on youtube
- Do something artistic that’s not music
- Use the latest pop hits for ear training exercises
- Visualize a chord progression you’re working on every night before you go to bed
- Learn to find flow through music
- Take a lesson with your favorite living musician
- Delve into the music of Wayne Shorter
- Record a practice session and kindly critique it
- Get a drum practice pad and practice drum rudiments
- Play with non-jazz musicians
- Learn how to use Finale or Sibelius
- Be flexible with your time
- Inspire a child to listen to jazz
- Learn an entire transcribed solo in all keys
- Play with people above your level
- Be able to identify all of Beethoven’s symphonies
- Go see your favorite jazz musician perform
- Learn to play in 7
- Visualize a scale you’re working on every night before you go to bed
- Watch Glenn Gould videos on youtube
- Practice 4 hours a day
- Listen to the Beatles
- Go to a yoga class
- Watch Herbie Hancock’s “Possibilities” video (free on Netflix Instant-play)
- Listen to Bill Evans on “Piano Jazz”
- Practice what you suck at
- Ask Jazzadvice a question you’ve always been curious about
