Reaching critical mass! Must dump ideas!
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Analogy: rubato like stretching chewing gum. You know, kids stretching chewing gum outside their mouths. How far can you stretch without breaking the gum? Rubato 16th notes: how far can you stretch until they really aren't recognizable as 16th notes any more?
Visual Aids: music has tension and release. How about making a copy of your solo. Use colored highlighting pens to indicate points of tension and release. How about red for the notes of greatest musical tension and green or blue for points of release?
Trombone Placemat: Remember those laminated placemats with things like a map of the U.S. and diagrams of the planets? To get around those bumps on the Manhassett stand (hard to write on), I have an unfolded file folder on the stand to provide a smooth writing surface. It was only a matter of time until I started writing quick notes/illustrations on it. But wait..a lot of the same ideas come up in different lessons. Maybe I should jot down some of my favorites in advance and then have sitting there ready to go. OK, maybe laminating it would be serious overkill.
Renotating: Some licks become strangely easier to play through simple renotation. Take Elegy for Mippy 2. That swing section in the middle would probably be a lot easier to play if it were notated differently. Once I wrote out the second page of the Creston middle movement using flats instead of sharps. Not only was it easier to read, it seemed much easier to play all those high notes.
Time permitting, I'd like to post some of these renotations on the website.
The Trauma of Sharps: Why wait to introduce sharps to beginners? Waiting only makes the experience more traumatic later. I think it might be better to jump right in with sharps at the beginning when everything is new anyway.
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System pressure returning to normal.
