Session 113 - [#AskRuffini] - Frustration, Jam Sessions, Understanding Jazz and Practice Time

July 9, 2015

113 – [#AskRuffini] – Frustration, Jam Sessions, Understanding Jazz, and Practice Duration

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Welcome to #AskRuffini. I get a ton of emails, messages, tweets, etc asking all sorts of questions ranging from “How can I practice better?” to “What’s your favorite food?” and everything in between. Rather than replying to the messages individually I want these answers to benefit everyone in the Drummer’s Resource Community, so I decided to add them to the podcast.

“The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.” – Robertson Davies (Tweet this)

Have Questions? There are a few ways to submit them:

1. Send a message on the Contact Page or email me: Questions[at]DrummersResource[dot]com
2. Send me a message on Facebook
3. Tweet me and use the hashtag #AskRuffini

The Questions:

“The past few weeks I’ve been in this funk where I don’t want to look at or practice drums or any kind of music. I’ve tried listening to music and watching DVDs for inspiration but I can’t seem to get inspired to want to play. I try pulling out the pad but even that doesn’t help. It may have something to do with the fact that I haven’t had a gig since June 6th and my phone isn’t ringing off the hook. This is new and weird for me and as much as I hate it, I can’t seem to get rid of it. Have you ever gone through this?”
– DeShawndre

“How effective is going to jam sessions at getting gigs? I’ve discovered that for all the hours sitting at a jam session waiting to play a couple of songs, I can be more productive at home practicing?”
– Febbie

“Hey, I recently discovered your podcast and I was listening to your segment on learning different styles and how we need to listen to start understanding the music in order to really feel it. I find I have trouble getting into jazz. I’ll listen to jazz and I won’t understand what’s going on and that just eventually turns me away from the music. I often times find it to have to much going on and hard to comprehend Any advice for just getting into jazz and not exactly diving into a sea of something foreign. Are there any albums that you would recommend that would help someone to begin to have an understanding of jazz?”
-Mario