Sensitive subject so I'm stating up front, I'm taking about two beers, not shitfaced.
I notice a difference between playing with and without alcohol. My hands just work better after two beers. This is at home, no gigging pressure, etc.
Before those two drinks I struggle to play single note stuff at speed, even having done some arm and hand stretching exercises. My fingers feel stiff and awkward.
After two beers it's totally different, my fingers seem to just move as I want them to.
Does anybody have any ideas how I can achieve that without alcohol?
Comments
In a live situation, I can imagine it might help with stage-freight up to a point - but can’t see it helping at all when nerves aren’t a factor.
I'd suggest that the best way to get to that loose feeling without alcohol is to practice, make sure you're totally comfortable with what you're playing, make sure you're physically comfortable (do you need a footstool/different chair/longer or shorter strap)... my final point was going to be to learn some relaxation techniques, but thinking about it that's probably more of a gigging thing than playing at home...
Musicians are usually rubbish at assessing their own playing too, because they conflate how they felt playing with how it sounded.
What alcohol does is relax a musician and make then feel better about their playing- that's doesn't make the playing better, I've often found it does the opposite.
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I used to have about 3.5 pints of pissy Lager from beginning to end of Gig if you want stats. We always went down well and got re-booked. I don't think it affected me to any detrimental level. I suppose people have to gauge these things themselves.
Playing live I tend to really cane the beer, typically 7 or 8 Stellas a gig but I can still play OK these days. When I used to do that when I was young though the playing used to really suffer