The Glory-Beaming Banjo

Look, we've all heard that it's a good idea to record yourself playing music so you can gauge your progress. My problem has always been planning to record myself maybe once every few months and then failing to follow through. However, over the last six weeks, I've been a pretty good streak.  I have recorded myself on banjo or fiddle seven times since Feb. 9. Good or bad, I've also been sharing my videos on my Instagram account, which kind of makes it feel like there are stakes involved. I already don't like recording myself, but now there's that feeling like THIS IS A PERFORMANCE FOR MY FOLLOWERS. But let's be real, I get about 30 views and maybe 10 likes when I post these videos, so it's not big stakes. But it's enough to keep me working hard to play well. A big thing for me is I'm not recording multiple takes to get it perfect. If I get through the tune without going off the rails, then that's the one I post. If I need more than three attem...

One of my goals for 2019 is to get back to recording my own playing. Recording yourself is a common suggestion for improving musicianship, but it's something I've gotten away from in the last couple years. The last time I recorded myself was in 2017. I've had this Zoom H2 digital recorder since about 2010, but it has lain unused for the last few years as my phone's voice recorder became my gear of choice. The results were fine, but limited. The Zoom H2 has far better dynamic range, and way more storage capacity. The biggest benefit is I can set it and (try to) forget it. Last week, I dusted off my H2 and recorded a portion of my practice session, running through 10 tunes as a baseline to see where I stand for 2019 and pinpoint areas for improvement. Upon listening to the results, my immediate impression was I tend to play too fast, which I suspect led to my other two problems: muddy phrasing and uneven rhythm. My intonation seemed OK for the most part, except ...