The brilliance of Wynton Marsalis http://wyntonmarsalis.org, goes way beyond his noble musicality. Wynton is a dedicated educator providing young musicians with clever advice on the task of music practice. His viewpoint: be honest while encouraging.

Over 100 illustrations for this wonderful book!!!!!

Wynton’s words enrich these illustrations in our 2010 book:

“The large monster of practicing always comes to trample on our dreams of becoming great without sacrifice. Almost no one likes to practice. That’s just the truth! We all want to be heroes, but we just don’t want to fight the dragons. And this is understandable. Dragons have bad breath!”

“No matter how talented you are, there will always be things you don’t know. Your teacher can be like the captain of a ship and keep you from straying off course.”

“I’m always fascinated by groups. It’s like a congregation in a church. You know how you might hear 300 people saying the same prayer, and they start a little out of sync and then somewhere along the way they find a group rhythm, and by the end they are together. Well, this is the essence of what group activities are about. The attempt to ‘get it together’ makes group playing and working successful.”

“Now, if you can’t concentrate, don’t just go through all the motions pretending to practice. Stop, and come back to it a little later when your mind is clear. Concentration allows you to clear your mind of other thoughts and channel all of your energies in one direction: your music.”

“Mistakes during practice,
mistakes during lessons,
mistakes during performance…
you will always have plenty of time to learn from your mistakes.
If you’re not listening,
you will miss your “call”
and your “response”
will go unheard.
This is the reason
group practice and
participation in bands
and orchestras is
important to music: to
help in developing and
understanding your
musical identity within
the group and building
your listening skills.”