TOPIC: Bad habits for players

Well the other night Learned a lesson on how to hold the banjo stright up rather than holding it at an angle. It made me wonder if there is a list of bad habits we could all profit from if we shared what we know. Not keeping your hand anchorded is also another bad habit. What about it any one want to fess up?

Good Post DJ -

I am anxious to see what others feel are bad habits. As an instructor, I will hold my comments until I see some of the others.

My bad habit is reading/making posts instead of practicing.

The worst mistake is not using your practice time to correct your mistakes! If a few measures are giving you trouble in any given song, isolate them, play with the metronome slower than normal and work on getting it right and eventually up the speed to the best of your ability.

Come on Pinky - its called multi-tasking.

Well I learned another bad habit to break tonight. My fingers need to be spread out with one fret for each finger when playing a scale. I found myself picking out the melody with one or two fingers which I found to be cumberssome. Our instructor found me and the rest of us out while trying to play scales with the Dueling Banjo. Well if I stay at it I guess I will develope a keeper of a list of bad habits to share with other beginners. But alas. I was abel to pick my first short melody on a string instrument ever. So Small an accomplishment but for a beginner it was a great leap. Now if I can get the other hand to agree to work with the other. Smile.