[cleger]

I make sure I'm playing what I hear and not stuff my fingers like to do. I'll spend all afternoon working on two or three keys. In a matter of some days I've gotten through all twelve. No printed music involved.

In the end it's like singing on the horn. Hard to think of something better to practice. It's fantastic for the ears. Interestingly enough, playing it in all keys helps me to play it that much better in any one key. Helps in so many other ways too...

Playing what you hear, not where your fingers want to go is what I struggle with, I may have to suck it up and start practicing in 12 keys. Where for you it's a few days for a tune, a project like that may take me years

 

[cleger]

Thing is, over time you begin to see the universe in a twelve bar blues.

That's a great phrase!! I appreciate your response and it's really got me thinking about this. I am at a point where I've been hacking around with music for several years but I haven't really done any serious work and I feel like I need to decide where it's going. I've always been a bit overwhelmed with the volume of stuff to be done to really learn to play this music, maybe this is a good place to start figuring out some things.