Jazz Harmonica Practice: The Pros & Cons of Backing Tracks

For musicians, regardless of their instrument – be it guitar, piano, or our instrument - jazz harmonica – the way we practice impacts our development. Backing tracks have become a great tool in the practice room, offering a convenient way to play along and work on various skills. While undeniably useful, it's important to consider both the advantages and potential drawbacks of relying on them. This post explores the good and bad aspects of practicing with backing tracks, drawing from my observations of students and musicians over the past 25 years.

Pros of backing tracks

• Extended practice: Being able to practice the same thing for hours allows for both quality and quantity in your practice sessions.

• Learning fundamentals: Utilizing backing tracks can be highly beneficial when learning a fundamental 12-bar blues, rehearsing a jazz standard, or acquiring the ability to improvise over chord progressions.

• Improvisation practice: Backing tracks with clearly defined chord progressions provide an excellent platform for practicing improvisation. You can focus on developing melodic ideas, phrasing, and harmonic understanding within a supportive musical environment, allowing for focused experimentation without the pressure of leading the entire musical direction.

• Safe space for experimentation: Backing tracks offer a safe space for musical risks and mistakes. Without the pressure of a live band or audience, you can freely experiment with new ideas, try out unconventional licks, and learn from missteps without judgment. This freedom fosters creativity and helps you push your musical boundaries, ultimately leading to more confident and innovative playing.

• Pitch control: When playing harmonica, you have to play in tune, and this is easier to develop when having a reference pitch or track.

• Easy key changes: Apps like iReal Pro and Band-in-a-Box can put your favorite tune in any key in a matter of seconds.

• Composition and practice Ideas: You can input any chords and form, and the track will play it. This allows you to really pinpoint your weaknesses and study them deeply.

• Ear training: A great exercise is to put on a tune and try to learn the chord changes by ear by listening to it. Don't look at the screen. You can instantly find any genre, groove, and style. Go on YouTube and just absorb all the beautiful tracks that are there – a true goldmine!

• Understanding musical structure: Backing tracks make it possible to listen to and learn forms, sections, and repeats. Practicing melodies with backing tracks is very helpful for beginners. This way, you will hear directly if you enter too early or late or get lost in the melody. The backing track is there to support you and put you on the right track.

• Portability: You can bring your tracks with you wherever you go. You can access tons of backing tracks on your smartphone. Play them through a Bluetooth speaker, and you can jam along wherever you are: in the car, on vacation, on the balcony, or in the basement.

Cons of backing tracks

• Over-reliance: The backing track will always “save” you. If you get lost, you can just glance at the screen or find your way back in by listening. Listening is, of course, best, but if you are in a live situation and the band suddenly gets lost, who will guide you then?

• Lack of foundational knowledge: Furthermore, if you don’t know the chord progression and form because you mainly jammed along to the backing track, everyone will be lost. If you are able to play the song without any backing track, then you know the chords, the form – everything. This is much more valuable in the long run.

• Difference from live performance: Playing to a track is not the same as playing with people. It is a big difference. It is better to play to a track than to always play alone, but playing with people feels really different than playing to a computer track. Music is a lot about creativity, dynamics, and human interaction.

• Limited rhythmic input: When improvising to a backing track, you will not get any direct rhythmic impulses. When playing live, you will get a ton of rhythmic cues from the musicians in the band. So, if you only practice with backing tracks, you might have developed great melodies and pitch control, but your rhythmic sense might not be as developed.

• Dependence on external tempo: Getting too used to the perfect beat of a backing track can stop a musician from developing their own internal clock. You might start to depend on it and find it hard to keep a steady tempo or feel natural when playing solo. This can also make it tough to play well with others, where listening and reacting to tiny tempo changes is really important.

• Listening to the same thing over and over: Backing tracks might limit your creativity, as it is never changing and sounds exactly the same every time. You can change style and tempo but it will still play the same thing. In the long run this might block creativity. Listening and playing to the same backing track all the time can hinder creative thinking and you will not get the new impulses and challenges you need to develop as a musician.

I don’t want to sound too critical about backing tracks, because when used thoughtfully, I believe the advantages generally outweigh the disadvantages. I still practice with backing tracks, and I feel it gives me energy, but I try not to rely on them.

As an ending, particularly for those interested in the nuances of solo jazz harmonica, I share two videos where I practice jazz standards totally solo. No backing track, no metronome, just me playing harmonica in front of a camera.

Thanks for reading!
Filip