04/11/2024
These are exactly my thoughts.
WHAT IS PRACTICING?
by Erv Shaw
Practicing is the daily playing you do to stretch your instrumental abilities. Without thirty minutes of practice a day, a thirty minute lesson is of little value. In fact, good music instruction basically teaches the student how to practice more effectively.
No matter which instrument you are trying to master, there are some basic considerations you may want to keep in mind. Good, effective practicing has the following qualities:
1. It is PURPOSEFUL, its basic purpose being to overcome your technical and musical problems, not to entertain yourself by playing what you already find easy. By all means, spend as much time as possible enjoying what you have mastered, but don't regard this activity as practicing.
2. It is THOROUGH. Often students will say, "I don't know why I can't play this; I just played it perfectly at home. Playing something perfectly once does not mean that we have mastered it. Mastery requires playing the piece or passage correctly with consistency and this comes only with repetition. My rule of thumb is that I must be able to play something perfectly three times in succession before I can assume that I know it.
3. It is SPECIFIC. We learn a piece of music like we fix a car. Locate the specific problem and keep trying different solutions until one works. In other words, don't keep playing a piece through from the beginning to the end if one measure keeps tripping you up. Practice the difficult measure -or pair of notes- until you can play them, perfectly and repeatedly, with total relaxation.
4. It is SLOW, or slow enough that it is virtually impossible for you to make a mistake. Practice difficult passages slowly at first to avoid/correct inaccuracies. If you cannot play a fast passage flawlessly, SLOW it down and practice it with a metronome. Playing something fast before you are ready to will get you into the habit of playing it wrong, and every time you play it wrong, the habit will be strengthened. If you play slowly enough so that you never play wrong notes or rhythms, each repetition will strengthen the habit of doing it right and pave the way for you to do with total ease and confidence what had seemed impossible. Find a tempo at which you can play every note correctly (pitch, duration, tone quality), no matter how slow. If you can play the passage without mistakes five times in a row, you can speed up (about 2-4 clicks on the metronome). Gradually increase the tempo until you reach the tempo required.
5. It is RHYTHMICAL. Playing music well is far more than just playing the right notes. Rhythm is almost always more important than mere notes. In order to be able to play with others, you have to play rhythms accurately. This will ensure that you are keeping the pace with other musicians and fitting in the musical context properly, so be concerned with rhythmic accuracy (always playing with a steady beat, however slow). Make sure that you understand rhythmic notation fully. As any good sight-reader knows, command of rhythms has a strange way of facilitating the playing of right notes. To play music well, we must first count it. In fact, you’re not ready to play the notes until you can sing or clap the rhythms. Use the metronome to avoid or correct any inaccuracies, and subdivide beats if necessary.
6. It is ACCURATE. Make sure you can play every note with the correct fi*****ng. Do not ignore sharps or flats (or double sharps and double flats).
7. It is TONEFUL. Always strive for an even and pleasing tone quality in all the registers of your instrument. Do not compromise your sound due to technically challenging passages. Moreover, ensure that you are in tune at all times. Playing in tune with yourself is the first step toward becoming a good ensemble musician.
8. It is THOUGHTFUL. If you find that you are not concentrating, shift to
a different part of your lesson assignment for a while, or take a break.
9. It is REPETITIOUS. Musical skills do not develop simply because we understand how something is done. Mental and motor skills must be developed through repetition, often through playing the same phrase or chord or pair of notes over and over end over. Thus, real practicing is not easy to listen to.
10. It is DAILY. One of the great pianists used to say, "If I miss one day of practice, no one notices it; if I miss two, I notice it; if I miss three, my audiences notice it". Without regular practice your mistakes and struggles will be heard by your peers and by the audience alike. The habit of daily practice is essential. If you miss a day or two, much of what you accomplished during the preceding practice sessions slips away. Write down the number of minutes you practice each day, remembering that the number of days practiced is always more important than the number of minutes.
11. It is SATISFYING. Progress is inevitable with good instruction and good practicing. You will be excited to find that you can play more easily, more smoothly, faster and more expressively after a few weeks of good practice, and little-by-little you will find practicing your instrument to be one of every day's most enjoyable activities. For myself, there are few things in life that I enjoy as much as an hour or two of uninterrupted practice. As James Galway is reported to have said when asked about what he looked forward to most during an upcoming vacation from concertizing and recording, "I'm looking forward to being able to practice as much as I want."
If you try to make your practicing truly effective, you don't need to practice for hours and hours. Charlie Parker practiced 10 - 16 hours each day when he was a teenager, and John Coltrane practiced even during the intermissions of his last performances, but for the skilled amateur musician taking a half-hour lesson each week, 30 to 45 minutes each day is enough; with an hour lesson, 1 1/2 hours is enough. If it's possible to divide the time into intense 15-minute sessions, that is probably best. Few of us are able to keep our concentration at the 100% level far more than 20 minutes.
Parents can help children a lot by establishing within the family schedule a definite time (or times) when the TV and other distractions are suppressed, by providing a definite place, by insisting that the next lesson not be canceled simply because practicing was neglected, and by giving special rewards or privileges for conscientious practice. Parents must also require the student to bring the instrument home from school each afternoon. The playing done at school is of great value, but it is seldom practice, which can only be done alone. Ultimately the parents should stress that the privilege of private music lessons will be taken away if the child does not practice regularly and conscientiously.
