I’ve been playing for a while and I play in my high schools jazz band – I do a decent job holding up my parts and when I improvise but people point out my lack of confidence and I do have poor confidence and it makes me freak and stress out over my solos and all that – all I want to do is get even better so I can make it into music college and even with the amount of practicing I do I don’t seem to improve much – I get frustrated easy and tend to just want to give up and I don’t wanna fail and just give up any advice for a struggling guitarist? I just don’t want to fail
Guitar confidence & Jazz
- Thread starter Kristina Freebairn
- Start date
Being in high school I can completely understand where you’re coming from. I didn’t get into my jazz band because they didn’t want a guitarist or bassist (the rejection was hard, even though I knew the piece like the back of my hand). But one thing I would recommend for your improvisation is knowing what key the song you’re playing is in. For example, (I’m not sure if you’re familiar on modes) if you’re in the key or C, you can use a c major scale, D Dorian, or go down to A minor pentatonic (aeolian). If you can familiarize yourself with those 3 scales you should be in good shape. Also, try to make licks. A solo is composed of licks stringed together, rather than just random notes thrown together. Try to think of what you want to play while playing. One of the best things in my opinion to start a jazz solo off with is a major 7 arpeggio.
When I played in my high schools jazz band I had a decent understanding of chords but I too was not confident with the solos. My suggestion is to practice arrpegiating(?) the chords that you are playing over. As long as you are hitting the notes in that chord it will sound good. Once you get more familiar and confident with sounds you can start experimenting with other notes or scales.
A great app to download and practice with is iReal Pro. It saved my skin and was a great practice tool when I was in school. You can play along to jazz standards from the real book or make your own backing tracks to play along to!
A great app to download and practice with is iReal Pro. It saved my skin and was a great practice tool when I was in school. You can play along to jazz standards from the real book or make your own backing tracks to play along to!
I experience the same thing. One thing that I have learned from performing is that if you mess up, DO NOT STOP. Brush it off. It happens all the time: I playing something then- oh shit- I played a wrong note or screwed up a run, but I have disciplined myself to keep playing, regardless. If you stop, you’ll only make it worse. The music keeps going, and if you stop after messing up, the you’ll get behind which will make you freak out more than playing a G or something that was supposed to be a G# or A. Honestly, for me, the more I’ve fucked up, the more comfortable I get with playing and the less I care that I made a mistake. Yeah, I made a mistake. So what? Move on because it’s not the end of the world. Chances are, people most likely won’t even notice, and if they do, then oh well. Shit happens, and it’s okay. That mindset is what helped boost my confidence because if you know what you’re playing, then why worry? Even the most confident players make mistakes.
