Creativity and Mindset

Lovely nuggets of wisdom here by @Angela, I love the references, the list of barriers and trail signs, and the growth vs fixed mindset. One barrier that stood out for me was the “sophisticated taste” one, how if we feel we can’t recreate the music we love to listen to, we give up. And her recommendation, to change your perspective, and to apply a different criteria/don’t get judgemental when you are playing around.

Youtube video

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Interesting stuff @mem. More confirmation that revelation on the whole, but confrirmation is good. :smiley:

I’ve found that even a simple progression can be very satisfying to noodle around with for a considerable time. :smiley:

1 6- 4 5, a 12 bar blues, or even just 1 4.

I’ve no idea what an independent listener would think of my ramblings, but that’s not the point. If it’s entertaining me that’s sufficient. If, as a side effect, it’s educating me, that’s even better.

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I know what you mean, but it seems I have to hear the message more than once before it starts to sink in!

Yes, simple chord progressions are a great way to keep it simple, you can learn loads and have fun with very few chords, totally agree, just got to convince my overactive brain that its worth while.

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Relax & ‘play’ (in both senses of the word) @mem. :slight_smile:

Though I’m pretty sure you don’t really need telling that. :wink:

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When practicing improvisation I try each time to put myself into the frame of mind I remember as a child playing on the floor with toys. I wasn’t trying to achieve anything. There was no right or wrong. Nobody was judging my results. It was just the joy of playing.

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Useful tips there, I do have fun just playing whatever I feel like with the Jam Tracks but I fancy adding a bit of structure and trying to compose something. I know this is recommended in the IFR book, but I haven’t tried it. Anyone had a go at composition?

My composition project is on hold for a bit, as I took advantage of the Missing Pieces promotion and bought the Ear Training for Creativity course. So, deep diving into the tonal numbers for while, and hopefully will be inspired for some composing later.

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Hi Mem. The Missing Pieces Promotion was great. I filled in some gaps, too. The ETfC course was the first course I bought back in Nov 2022. I love that course and I love StN.
Also, with the Feel the Numbers portions of ETfC, I started to check the answers I was singing on piano in real time. Then, somewhat transparently, I transitioned into playing the answers on piano without singing! This was my very first experience at correctly playing what I was hearing. Of course, it was only notes 1-6, and I missed some, but it was just SO COOL!!! It was like whistling a tune without thinking it through. It was a watershed experience for me! This was about a week ago.
Enjoy the video course!!

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I (first) took ETfC back in 2020 when it first came out. Using it as a 10 week course I’ve been right through it several times, but outside that I’ve been using playlists built from a combination of FtN & Stn regularly ( 4-5 sessions a week) at my own pace, only progressing once I felt comfortable (taking David Reed’s “the slow way is the quick way” approach). Just last week I started making the ‘week 10’ (i.e. the full range) FtN a regular part of my sessions. :smiley:

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Nice @DavidW . How long are the combination sessions? Looking over my Practice Journal, I see that I have Sessions as short as 7 min, some 12-15 min, some 20-25 min, and some 40-45 min. It all depends. I try to work on all the extra songs she suggests, too. Those are very helpful.

@mcaputi I arrange for the man part of each playlist (i.e. what I really want to have time for) to be around 25m, with at least one more track beyond that.

That fits well with how I use them, i.e while doing 10km on my exercise bike! :wink:

As an example, this is the text of this morning’s playlist file. I’ve changed some of the standard filenames, but I thnk you’ll see which is which. I make the playlists manually in a text editor, so I’m able to include comments too such as the notes on week and on runtime.

Each playlist includes a mix of levels, from ones I’ve gained confidence in to the current target week. The current sets (I have sets of 5) range from week 7 through to week 10. Below week 10 there are no longer any StN in the current set, only FtN.

###################
## W07
###################
# FtN_1_17 4:55
..\..\0_IFR\FTN1\FtN_1_17 (notes 7, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,).mp3
################
## W09
###################
# FtN_1_20 - 5:29
..\..\0_IFR\FTN1\FtN_1_20 (notes 5, 6, 7, 1, 2, 3).mp3
###################
## W10
###################
# StN1_M5_19 - 6:07
..\..\0_IFR\STN1\StN1_M5_19 - 1,2,34,5,6,71.mp3
#------------------
# FtN_1_22 - 5:57
..\..\0_IFR\FTN1\FtN_1_22 (notes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 1).mp3
###################
## W08
###################
# FtN_1_18 - 3:32
..\..\0_IFR\FTN1\FtN_1_18 (meditative - notes 5, 6, 7, 1,).mp3
###################
## W10
###################
# StN1_M5_20 - 8:06
..\..\0_IFR\STN1\StN1_M5_20 - 1,2,34,5,6,71.mp3
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Yes, @DavidW , this is quite detailed, thanks. And you do this on your exercise bike for 25 minutes? You must be in really great shape to bike AND sing for 25 minutes! Fantastic! Thanks for sharing this level of detail.

I’m finally making my way through the IFR book. For some reason it has taken me a few months to settle down to read it carefully. I printed it out and bound it into 5 sections according to the natural flow of the Exercises. So, I’ve finished reading Section A The Tonal Map, Section B Seven Worlds, and am starting to read ahead in Section C Pure Harmony. It’s gradually starting to sink in. But, I’m still practicing only The Tonal Map. It’s motivating to know what will come up in the future as I progress.

The 10km only used to take 20m before I started to do ear training instead of just listening to podcasts! :wink:

For me the call & response of StN/FtN works well in this situation. A while back I tried tried Melody Paths but that didn’t work out so well as if you try to keep up the flow there are no natural pauses to catch your breath in!

Bravo! That’s real cross-training! :slightly_smiling_face: