The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    Strange post but I leave it to thoughts and if anyone has similar results.

    I have a Garmin 645 triathlon type watch. I use it as a regular watch to. Given I run and cycling it keeps track of everything. Has built in stress monitor that reads your heart rate variability. Keeps track of it all day/night.

    Since active exercise and working out causes generally stability in heart rate it does not read it during high activity. Otherwise it does with the science being that if your heart rate varies a bit at each beat it means less stress. In general the less stress on body the more the heart rate varies with each beat.

    So I have keep track of mine for a long time. Realizing it is not a medical device but has good science behind it.

    So my stress levels practicing the guitar are very high. The numbers show my stress level is way up compared to say reading or here on forum. In fact it guitar playing tends to be even higher than when I am the deacon for mass and have to function publicly. This surprised me I would not think playing the guitar as stress but according to watch stress level, no it does stress.

    I wondered if anyone here might have one of these watches? I think an Apple Watch even shows this and other fitness gadgets. Mine just showed 28 on scale of 1-100 as low posting this. Previous 2 hours practicing was averaging 75-100 high.

    I have no clue?

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  3. #2

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    Finally some real science here!!!

    Not even joking 100%...

  4. #3

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    Quote Originally Posted by emanresu
    Finally some real science here!!!

    Not even joking 100%...
    I did read a study of scientists who wanted to know if the songs of Humpback whales lowered their stress responses. They attached sensors to their pectoral fins and it caused stress from an unexpected source: Other whales exhibited signs of jealousy and tried to steal the sensors for themselves.
    Hence the inexplicable and overwhelming popularity of Whale Watches.
    Budda bing.

  5. #4

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    It's been a long time since I worked with ANS observables like heart rate (variability), but here are a few considerations

    - There are many forms of stress, and not all of them are the bad kinds that we think of when we use the term in daily language. It is no surprise to me that practising generates a form of stress; if it didn't you probably wouldn't be practising anything. Check your muscle state when the reading on your watch is high; chances are you'll find tension in places that you maybe didn't notice. I have no idea why acting as a deacon doesn't cause as high a read-out but I suppose you must have been doing that for long enough that you do it on auto-pilot for a large part. My guess would be that guitar warm-up exercises that you also do largely on auto-pilot will also cause less high stress readings.
    - Non-medical devices such as these have probably become better in reading physiological parameters but I still wouldn't expect miracles. There undoubtedly good enough to keep track of how your overall health improves (e.g. average heart during exercise goes down) but the stress detection feature is based on heart rate variability. That means it must calculate the 1st order derivative of heart rate, which is an operation that is going to increase the noise in the signal (or maybe it even needs the 2nd order derivative, which would amplify the noise even more). Basically, random errors in the instantaneous heart rate measure will be considered heart rate variability.
    BTW, if you wear the watch on your fretting arm, are you certain the watch still gets a proprer reading of your heart rate when you're playing?! If it doesn't the read errors will probably increase.

  6. #5

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    I wouldn’t stress about it too much

  7. #6

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    The only time I'll worry about my heart rate is when it stops. Worrying too much about what your stress level is is probably more stressful than what you're doing.

    OTOH, playing guitar make me very very depressed - it's not fun anymore after 50+ years. It's no fun because I no longer have an outlet for it which, in the past, was my reason for practicing and learning anything new. I'm not a 'bedroom' player - I must have an audience to make it worthwhile. I don't understand how those who don't gig can enjoy it but know many do. I posted on the 'Bandstand' section of the forum about, possibly doing a solo gig at an assisted living facility but was pretty much told that the folks wouldn't enjoy it because I don't sing - now I'm second guessing that whole idea - take up gardening maybe?

  8. #7

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    Quote Originally Posted by Skip Ellis
    The only time I'll worry about my heart rate is when it stops. Worrying too much about what your stress level is is probably more stressful than what you're doing.

    OTOH, playing guitar make me very very depressed - it's not fun anymore after 50+ years. It's no fun because I no longer have an outlet for it which, in the past, was my reason for practicing and learning anything new. I'm not a 'bedroom' player - I must have an audience to make it worthwhile. I don't understand how those who don't gig can enjoy it but know many do. I posted on the 'Bandstand' section of the forum about, possibly doing a solo gig at an assisted living facility but was pretty much told that the folks wouldn't enjoy it because I don't sing - now I'm second guessing that whole idea - take up gardening maybe?

    Do the gig man, don't take advice on what might happen from a bunch of people who come here and shoe horn politics and classical music into every thread of a jazz forum.

    Do

    The

    Gig

  9. #8

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    I do notice that my blood pressure and heart rate rise. Part of if is me holding my breath involuntarily, sometimes. My senses are heightened and those darn chords come and go. I also use a lot of different scales in several positions and I forget and lose my place at times.

    I am a bit of a perfectionist, which can be stressful when you are trying to do your best instead of just enjoying playing the music at the level you are at.

    Just my thoughts.

  10. #9

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    Quote Originally Posted by AlsoRan
    I do notice that my blood pressure and heart rate rise. Part of if is me holding my breath involuntarily, sometimes. My senses are heightened and those darn chords come and go. I also use a lot of different scales in several positions and I forget and lose my place at times.
    Funny -- when I was studying classical guitar in college, at lessons, my teacher would hit me with a ruler, "Breathe!!"

  11. #10

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    Quote Originally Posted by AllanAllen
    Do the gig man, don't take advice on what might happen from a bunch of people who come here
    Exactly! And rest assured, as long as you (pretend to) have fun during the gig the people in the facility will probably enjoy it (at least if they're the "alzheimer kind" like my mum ... who always hated Rieux-like performers but now cannot seem to get enough of them).

    Quote Originally Posted by AlsoRan
    I do notice that my blood pressure and heart rate rise. Part of if is me holding my breath involuntarily, sometimes. My senses are heightened and those darn chords come and go. I also use a lot of different scales in several positions and I forget and lose my place at times.
    Exactly what I was hinting at. You're performing, concentrated on what you're doing and on what's going to come. It's probably safe to say this is just about as stressful as racing a (mountain)bike or car. The good kind of stress, but still stress.

  12. #11

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    Agree: It's not playing the guitar per se because what you've mentioned is performance... and must be some related performance anxiety. Maybe your new practice routine needs to deal with this through posture, breath, etc. BUT also agree that this probably has more of a deleterious affect on your playing than on your health... and if you're not hearing or sensing an affect on playing, then "Don't worry, be happy."

  13. #12

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    My stress level rises when I'm booked as a rock band only to see when you get there you're booked as a comedy show band

  14. #13

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    Quote Originally Posted by marcwhy
    Funny -- when I was studying classical guitar in college, at lessons, my teacher would hit me with a ruler, "Breathe!!"
    This is a major advantage that horn players have over guitarists - having to breathe, and to pause to do so, helps shape their phrasing in a way that makes them vocal-like and intrinsically more interesting than, say, endless streams of identical-length (if 1/128 of a beat can be considered "length") "gnat notes".* The audience may be unconsciously sensing the phrasing, and anything departing too far from recognizable speech-like patterns is bound to be tiring and stressful for them. Performers should be positively stressed (excited), but listeners... not so much.

    In my opinion, formed from experience, of course.

    * Zappa, Frank, being frank.

  15. #14

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    Saw video that explained why the drill sergeants constantly scream and shout at recruits. Looks stupid but the explanation makes sense -
    to create constant environment stress so they can actually perform when there is real trouble.
    Hm. When trying to get confident with guitar, it gets kinda similar often.

  16. #15

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    You will get the same stress response when you are having sex. Playing guitar. Having sex. Having sex. Playing guitar. Just two things that give you pleasure that increase your stress level.

    Having sex stressful? But you keep on keeping on.

    You're normal.

  17. #16

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    Quote Originally Posted by citizenk74
    This is a major advantage that horn players have over guitarists - having to breathe, and to pause to do so, helps shape their phrasing in a way that makes them vocal-like and intrinsically more interesting
    Yup, suonare e cantare. The early music masterclasses (by players like Enrico Gatti) I've been able to experience often used period adaptations of vocal pieces (like Anchor que col partire) to work on that cantare aspect. They were usually appreciated by singers too as it taught them things that weren't natural to them.

    My (classical) guitar teacher also encourages her pupils to sing the scores we're working on.

  18. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
    You will get the same stress response when you are having sex. Playing guitar. Having sex. Having sex. Playing guitar. Just two things that give you pleasure that increase your stress level.

    Having sex stressful? But you keep on keeping on.

    You're normal.
    I am completely normal however a celibate at this point by religious vows, so I don't have to worry about that stress.

  19. #18

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    Let me get this straight.

    I spend 90 minutes a day trying to get my heartrate up by exercising and I could do that by playing guitar?

    I could put all that wasted running shoe money into a new ax.

  20. #19

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    Did someone just claim normality, on this forum?

  21. #20

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    Hey this is pretty interesting, I could hook up my blood pressure monitor and try playing different tunes. Is Giant Steps more stressful than Donna Lee?

  22. #21
    To get my heart rate up I have to at least run or cycle fast. Yesterdays 56 mile bike ride in 3:02 had me at HR of 116 for the 182 minutes with my maximum at 145 on a short climb. It is not stressful at least in the way guitar playing is and really a completely different kind of stress. The worst stress I had was about 6 years ago they made do a stress test on the treadmill. I was freaking out they were going to tell me to stop running and cycling. I will spare the details but at some point in the process they told me I could stop I have reached 90% of my max heart rate. They only mentioned I did not seem to be overly tired or gasping for air. They said I was fine to keep doing what I was doing. It was like a surreal dream the whole time. Mental stress off the chart.

  23. #22

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    Quote Originally Posted by marcwhy
    funny -- when i was studying classical guitar in college, at lessons, my teacher would hit me with a ruler, "breathe!!"
    relaaaaax!!!!!!!

  24. #23

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    Quote Originally Posted by deacon Mark
    So my stress levels practicing the guitar are very high.
    OK, now you know that. Or you've known for a long time and now you can't avoid recognizing that.
    It doesn't matter what playing guitar does to anybody else, now you know what it does to you.

    So Mark, what are you going to do about that?
    How can you work toward playing at a full musical and emotional range and not being stressed?
    Who can help with that work?

  25. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by Sam Sherry
    OK, now you know that. Or you've known for a long time and now you can't avoid recognizing that.
    It doesn't matter what playing guitar does to anybody else, now you know what it does to you.

    So Mark, what are you going to do about that?
    How can you work toward playing at a full musical and emotional range and not being stressed?
    Who can help with that work?
    Actually I am not at all worried about it I just bring it up for discussion. Playing the guitar engages my mind and body so it actually make sense. It is not however stress in the sense of cardio and it is not the same as stress like worry.

  26. #25

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    Laying on sofa with no stress will kill you!.. sooner.