I started with tunes on the flute...."Half Nelson" was the last tune I heard on the radio before I started practicing, and I always try to pick out the last melody on radio by ear with the flute for ear training. So I made the notes to the head of Half Nelson once I slowed it down. Then I tried to pick out the solo changes by ear. I'm trying to rebuild my flute chops after not playing it for a number of years.
The next flute tune was "The Good Life" by Sacha Distel. Read it out of the book and played around with the changes. Nice tune. Then I moved on to a nice little Tango, "Orchards In The Moonlight." Nice tune, moving from minor to a major release.
Then I did some minor arpeggios exercises out of an old Ernest Wagner flute book I got as a kid, and my flute half hour or so was over.
On alto, I started with eye excercise. I read out of an old syncopation book,"16 Smart Studies" by David Gornston. Lots of old style cool hep daddy figures and motifs. But I find that it really helps my reading, especially since my regular reading gigs seem to have slowed down. Moved on to a Joe Viola rhythm studies book and did a little sight reading.
Now it's time for tunes on the alto. I do tunes that I'm either trying to commit to memory, melody and chord change wise, or just stay fluent with the melody and changes. I play each tune 20 times a day, alternating melody and changes. I always start with "Giant Steps" for a warm up. I've long ago committed this one to memory, but I use it to get my fingers moving by taking it at a fast tempo, around 360 beats a minute.
So today's tunes were "You're My Everything," c concert, done at a swinging medium, "The Way You Look Tonight," f concert, way up on the ceiling, about 360 again. I'm trying to work on my fast tempos. Next was the old standard "I'll Be Seeing You," Eb concert. Another swinging medium tempo. I finished with the Clare Fischer hip bossa, "Pensitiva." This is a great tune, beautiful.
So that was my woodshed (so far) today.
Julian