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Hope this is the right topic / place for this question...

I'm new on the vibes and my sight-reading is very very crappy. I'm looking for suggestions for (a) material to use for practice in sight-reading, and (b) approaches to practicing.

Right now for sight-reading I'm just reading Real Book heads and Bach Inventions (one part at a time). I've also just started with Bartok's Mikrokosmos for very very simple two-handed reading (stuff like unison lines, very simple parallel motion, etc).

What I've been trying to do is to just look at the music and see the instrument with peripheral vision, so I'm not looking up-and-down all the time. That's a challenge.

What do you guys use?
How do you go about it?

Thanks all -

Comments

ntvito Wed, 06/29/2011 - 23:53

I spent a period of time trying to get my sight-reading up to a much higher level, and I used a lot of flute books, they have a good range for vibes. I think Bach sounds very good on vibes too.
I guess it depends on how you like to practice, but a lot of the time I like to start out and end with whatever i'm really trying to work on. I used to do that for sight-reading, and I spent a half-hour to warm-up and a half-hour after I finished all my other practicing.
For me, sight-reading is one of those things that takes a lot of effort to really sit down and do consistently. Half an hour of constant sight-reading is really intense if you aren't stopping every few minutes for a break. I like that intensity though because I know i'm using the time well, you know? good luck with it