Practice, Practice, Practice Music study skills and music ... Practice Practice Music stud… ·...

How to practice music and memorizemusic

There's a single key ingredient in elevating your musicianship: the amount oftime you spend playing well. Sounds utterly simplistic, but it's true. And toplay really well—to find your best mastery over a piece—some memorizationis usually required.

So it follows, to play your best, you'll need to explore music memorization,directly experience its many benefits, and regularly use memorization to fosterdeep accomplishments and technical achievements.

I encourage you to give memorization a solid try under good guidance. If youlike the results you may find yourself motivated to use thosememory/memorization techniques on a regular basis ... and continue lookingfor "practice tools" that help you honestly and quickly improve.

The opposing view

Many teachers view memorization and the use of music notation as polaropposites, and those who teach primarily through notation often discouragememorization, as if there's some fundamental conflict, believing that thestudent's reading skills won't develop in an atmosphere that also encouragesmemorization. But there's no argument, the world's great classical soloists areexcellent readers and outstanding in their ability to play by heart. Both skillsare important, and one strength needn't diminish the other. Ideally they work intandem, and the student uses the better tool for the task at hand. As artist MarcChagall might say, work in whatever medium likes you at the moment.

http://singingwood.com/NewFiles/CarnegiePractice.html 2017-10-22, 11?41 AM of 24

Now it stands to reason, if a teacher is not proficient in memorization, inlearning by ear, or at improvisation (skills often eschewed by classicalmusicians) there's a good chance the teacher may be unable to teach those skillsand thus might avoid the topics entirely, or perhaps declare them unimportantor harmful.

So let's get started in understanding the price and rewards of memorization, indetail. They can make an astonishing difference in how fast you learn, inrefining your musical expression, sustaining your interest, bolstering yourconfidence, stengthening your overall connection with music, and deepeningthe joy you get from it.

Music study skills

Various study skills will accelerate your progress with music memorization.This article discusses a number of methods that generally work, and forcontrast, it illustrates approaches that will likely prove of little value.

In adopting study skills that allow you to memorize easily you'll probably needto pinpoint the common pitfalls so you can avoid them, while trying provenmethods, and focusing on approaches that you know work for yourself.

Here's a synopsis of points made below:

Speed is an essential ingredient in establishing deep reliable memorization—it's of particular importance when attempting to embed kinestheticmemory, the type of body memory often called "muscle memory."Speed can be destabilize us; as we all know, a certain amount of speedwill cause us to tighten up and lose control—a likely occurrence whentrying to go fast on a large section of new music.You'll need to select and work on small sections, bits that you can easily


speed up.Once you've memorized sections you have the opportunity of successfullylinking them together, and enjoying effortless command over them.Add an effective review cycle to the mix and you've got a winningformula, which I'll describe in detail as we continue in this article.

What's the mystery?

Doesn't everyone know how to memorize? Well, yes and no. We learn andmemorize our native tongue practically without effort. We remember faces andthe scads of pertinent information that help us navigate and participate in ourdaily lives. This is undeniable.

But many of us have trouble with memorization when it doesn't occureffortlessly or instantly. We managed the required trial and error in learning towalk—so there was certainly a time in our history that we were sufficientlyendowed and resilient in the ways of learning and memory.

Most people are still quite capable of memorizing and enormous amount ofknowledge and physical skill. but most of us have forgotten what it takes tolearn and master new physical skills. ut often people have sorta forgotten how.

Intellectual learning vs. Physical learning

It stands to reason that the average student would have sufficient priorsuccesses with memorization, enough intuition or adequate understanding tooincline them to an efficient and effective approach to music memorization. Butmy decades of experience as a music instructor have shown me quite theopposite, and in fact, students tend to dislike and avoid the very skills andhabits that will quickly afford them the musical experience they seek.


We might not always enjoy all the steps required in reaching our musical goals,but deep rewards may cause us to gladly embrace the necessary chores, and toexcitedly acknowledge and use them as the most direct path to our goal ... evenif that means delaying gratification and deferring attention to the required steps.

Here's an apt quote from painter Marc Chagall whose "acheivement couleur" isperhaps unrivaled, "The dignity of the artist lies in his duty of keeping awakethe sense of wonder in the world. In this long vigil he often has to vary hismethods of stimulation ..." And Chagal's gemane admonition to those of uspracticing the art of music, "...but in this long vigil he is also himself strivingagainst a continual tendency to sleep."

To practice well and memorize easily, you'll need to remain mindfully ofdomains nearly simulataneously, so you can: 1) refine the sounds andmovements that make your music beautiful 2) use study skills to help youquickly and securely achieve those refinements.

Memorization is a natural linguistic skill

Music memorization is an essential skill, and an important one for musiciansbecause most people can play music far better than they're able to read music.Also because memorization and learning by ear are indeed the natural languageof music.

Western/European music notation is only a few hundred years old, whereaspeople have been singing and playing music for many thousands of years, andhave successfully done so without need of notation. I'm not being dismissiveabout music reading—it's an incredible tool. And I can scarcely imagine mymusic career without music literacy, but for many people it's music reading islimiting. Suffice it to say, if you can't read well, you can't play well. And if youcan read effortlessly, you reading won't allow you to play effortlessly, or near


your best. So don't let reading hold you back.

Of course, you can work to improve your reading, which is a worthy goal, andyou may get considerably better, but reading tends to interfere withmemorization, and memorization will help you play your best. And that willmotivate you to go deeper into music. Read to memorize and find yourpotential. And let that motivate you to work harder and improve your reading.

Surmounting your blocks and doubts

Many people struggle with memorization because they're using an ineffectiveapproach. As a result they think they're just not good at memorization, when it'sfar more likely that they simply haven't found a good path.

Others struggle because they doubt that they'll be able to memorize music, sothey never try out effective study skills, or they've tried approaches that don'twork well, and for that reason they erroneously concluded that the problem liesin their level of ability or talent. But in reality memorization is natural part ofour everyday lives. However, many of us have simply lost touch with how tolearn and memorize large bodies of information, and how to attain mastery overnew and challenging physical skills.

When pursuing memorization people are swayed by emotional blocks, likefrustration and doubt. And they easily feel confined by the amount ofrepetition required. Or they judge themselves erroneously, thinking theywouldn't need so much repetition if only they were better a better musician orstudent.

In other words, sometimes a difficult emotion will derail practice habits andstudy skills that will benefit you most. So you'll need to learn to keep yourselfcalm and adhere to the recommended path, even when the going gets tough.


And to manage studious focus while simultaneously having enough fun to keepyourself motivated Proceeding with respect to the adage, "All things inmoderation, including moderation!" Yes, you can goof around, and binge alittle or fun playing that doesn't really amount to much, as long as you get backto work.

And even when students resign themselves to a restrictive diet of repetition,they often fail to repeat in a way that makes a nutritious difference, so they caneasily conclude that ineffective approaches are adequate, if not better, becausethey feel more fun. And this is an extremely common issue I've seen withstudents over decades of teaching private lessons.

Repetition and memorization

We can't memorize without repeating. We can't repeat without memorizing. Ifyou honestly contemplate these two sentences, I needn't say much more aboutpractice and memorization.

If your repeat things poorly you'll memorize unwanted habit; you'll fail to relaxand get locked into tight or awkward hand positions, and you'll make mistakesin timing and notes. It's hard to undo these matters, especially incorrect timing.Careless practice inevitable leads to needless work untangling the results ofreckless playing. If you work hard at first, you can avoid lots of needless effort.

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first foursharpening the axe." — Abraham Lincoln

To make incisive progress you'll need to pick the proper tool and sharpen it. Tolearn to play effortlessly, you must learn to repeat accurately. To repeataccurately you'll often need to work on small bits so you can refine and relax.Then to make a lasting impression on your memory you'll need to adequately


increase the speed of the repetitions.

Your progress will hinge on a combination of refinement, accuracy, adequatepersistence, and speed.

Speed itself is an essential catalyst to memorization. Speed is most easilyacquired when you practice on small sections. Small sections played fast etch asustainable recollection into your short-term memory (also known as workingmemory.) And if you're reading the music, generally you'll need to look awayfrom the page to etch this small sections into long-term memory. This isbecause the brain sees no reason to memorize what it can see and read. If youkeep reading or peeking you will usually only retain a partial and wobblyrecollection.

Naturally, your accomplishments won't be perfect at first. So you must getyourself on track quickly, before ingraining bad habits or misconceptions. Youwon't improve much by stumbling and efforting your way through pieces, justchipping away, believing that time and effort are the key ingredients, and ifapplied in quantity a good result will eventually appear.

Be clear on your goals, each small step of the way. Get a clear image of thestep you're trying to accomplish, make sure you're working on anaccomplishable piece, and watch to make sure you're rudder points you in theright direction.

Don't bite off more than you can chew. Attempt, evaluate and repeat. Repeatcarefully, in measured doses, so you accomplish your goal and ensure you don'tget overwhelmed or frustration. Be sure to finish what you start. Be satisfiedwith a small solid accomplishment each day. Be kind to yourself, and have fun.It's your responsibility to keep it fun. Even given the suggestions and tips forsuccess, you need figure out and assure that it's mostly fun.


Have a specific goal in mind every minute of your practice. Become awareof when you have a goal in mind, learn shift your attention from goal to goal:playing with steady time, with good tone, with proper hand positions. Learn tospread your attention wide enough that you can observe your actions andsounds, and compare them to your understanding of the goal, and steer yourselftoward that goal, in a way that will be retained enough that you can quicklyrediscover it the follow day and build upon it. (All the while checking casuallyand occasionally to see if previously honed skills are working as intended. Ifthey are already well learned it won't take but a second of attention to noticeand correct. And that's how it all comes together.)

Memorization secrets in a nutshell

Most people can easily learn and memorize music, they can learn the intricateand subtle physical skills of musicianship, and they can best accomplish thesetasks when they adhere to a couple of essential approaches:

1) practice with methods that produce rapid improvement for you

2) review in a manner that ensures a persistent, long-lasting, long-termmemory

Sounds rather simplistic, I know. In upcoming sections I'll explain these pointsin detail, but first let's take a overview of the challenge facing musicians andmusic students.

The musical challenge

Musicians are 'small muscle' athletes. Learning a new instrument or a new songinvolves physical training, just like learning the skills of a sport like skiing,boarding or swimming.


Imagine the practice routine of Olympic divers. There are hundreds ofrepetitions of every aspect of the dive: learning flips and twists, firstindependently, then learning to combine them. And finally, once the dive isperfected, to ensure consistency and reliability, they practice the perfected diveagain and again, hundreds, even thousands of times. The same thing happens inthe ballet studio or martial arts dojo.

You only get to some of what you learn!

This is the part that hardest for most people to accept. You only get to keep aportion of what you learn in a practice session. Doesn't seem fair, I know. Afterall your hard work! If your expectations are more aligned with reality, you'remore likely to feel happy. You can better manage your expectations when yourealize that you will naturally forget some of what you've accomplished inyesterday's practice session, or that you won't immediately remember whatyou've learned in prior sessions. Along with this understanding you'll need toknow the steps of establishing the deepest possible memories, and the steps forrecalling them and further strengthening them.

Short-term memory (working memory) dissipates quickly, and if you fail totake steps to transfer it into long-term memory, it will feel like you're startingover from scratch the next day. Part of the secret is managing yourexpectations, and using approaches that produce quick and solid results ... andeven then, know that it may take some warm up and review to find theknowledge acquired the previous day. When people struggle to recall they maybail out, and ignore or avoid repracticing without reconnecting with andreviving the memory they've already kindled. And this can quickly cause adownward spiral with your accomplishments with the specific piece ortechnique at hand, or it can cause your overall enthusiasm to stall. And if youlove music, you don't want that, nor is there any reason for it if you're equipped


with the right tools and understanding.

Rapid improvement

The opening section of this article states two basic premises. The first premiseis that students need to make 'rapid improvements' when practicing. Withoutrapid improvement students become frustrated, which leads to discouragementor disinterest, even the erroneous conclusion that the task at hand or musicitself is beyond the student's grasp. Even if you possess a strong passion for aninstrument, if you find yourself unable to quickly acquire skills, if you'reunable to assimilate new repertoire, if you're unhappy with the sound youmake, eventually your verve may fade.

You have a limited period of time to master various skill before frustration ordisinterest set it ... or before you consciously or unconsciously resign yourselfto being a perpetual beginner. So it's in your best interest to discover the stepsthat help you learn quickly, and use them regularly.

I am earnestly advocating timely accomplishment, indeed... so I need to clarify.The 'rapid improvement' I'm espousing is unrelated to impatient rushing.Impatience, recklessness and aimless efforts have no logical or practicalconnection with improvement, and they won't lead you to rapid improvement.Quite the contrary, they lead to disarray and unfulfilled goals.

Total prioritization

You can accomplish 'rapid improvement' by a technique I call 'totalprioritization.' It requires and affords heightened attention for detail and self-observation ... and it actually makes practice more interesting and more fun.Yet ironically, it's the path of the tortoise, not the hare.


I've known students who have studied skills for weeks, months, even years,without achieving their intended goal: straightening their bow stroke,developing flexibility in the bow hold, learning one or more styles of vibrato.They remain stuck because they just give a daily flick toward their goal, neverreally moving if substantially forward, or finding a foothold they can leveragethe following day. Dutifully they devote a small amount of practice to bowing,but they establish only a small amount of momentum, an amount insufficientfor carrying their accomplishment throughout the entire practice session. Thismeans they practice on track for a few moments, but in their remaining effortsthey fall back on familiar old habits, because the wheels always turn toward theruts in the road, and this quickly undermines whatever bowing accomplishmentthey had achieved.

This is typically what happens when we fail to use 'total prioritization.' LaterI'll illustrate how 'total prioritization' leads toward rapid assimilation of skillslike violin bowing.

We've taken a brief look at rapid improvement, the essential first point of thisarticle. Now let's look at our second point: reviewing in a manner that ensures alasting, long-term memory.

Making memorable steps

Even if you practice in a manner that fosters improvement, if your practice andreview style fails to create a strong, lasting memory, you'll reap little gain. Eachday it will feel like you're starting over. It's true in philosophy and politicalscience, and equally true in musical practice: 'Those who fail to remember thepast are condemned to repeat it.' Sound harsh, but it's true!

The mastery of physical skills requires a real "physical education." Aneloquently expressed description can be found in Mastery, an insightful book


by George Leonard. I highly recommend that you read it.

Quality over quantity

If time devoted to practice fails to help you improve, all the time in the worldwon't amount to much. As a music student, your job is to improve, master, andremember what you've accomplished. And, as much as possible, enjoy theprocess while making good use of your time.

To learn a musical instrument you must learn to master many physical skills.Most musical skills are actually a compound skill—a physical skill built uponthe foundation of other previously memorized skills.

Every step of the way you need to master skills so that they operateautomatically. You can't turn a skill into a compound skill until the foundationskill is entirely memorized. Once memorized a skill operates automatically" inan efferent flow. Concentrated mental attention is not required to drive it. Atleast not our normal executive process, where we dictate a string of rapidinstructions.

This precisely what allows us to begin combining the skill with othermemorized skills to make compound skills. With our normal mental attentionfree we can track and refine existing skills and adopt new skills. We build oneskill upon the next, so we must perfect each foundation skill before adding on,or the whole system becomes unstable. This requires careful observation andmuch review.

In summary: Attention is required in reviewing and evaluating each skill todetermine if more refinement is required. A memorized skill operates withwithout our conscious oversight. You can't study or shape a new skill whiletrying to master another. But you can connect skills to existing ones.


Listen to the music that you plan to learn

More than any other single activity, listening helps you learn music easily andquickly. So schedule some listening into your day. Just listen to music a coupleof times a day—a piece that you want to learn, or a piece you've already begunworking on. You needn't drop everything, set aside a special time, or apply anyspecial concentration. In other words, don't make a big deal out of it. Play arecording while attending to some task. Listen when you're in the car. Themusic will sink in effortlessly as you attend to other activities. You just need tohear it.

Listen to each new piece for a few days before you start to practice it. You'reready to start working on it when you can hum or whistle the piece or you canhear it in your head.

If you are good at reading music, especially if you're good at reading rhythms,you may not need to listen. Still it will be quite helpful.

The biggest advantage in listening is that it keeps you from making rhythmicmistakes. And rhythmic mistakes are the hardest to fix. So, simply by listeningyou'll avoid some of the worst pitfalls.

What if you already know how it goes?

It's best to listen anyway. There are lots of different versions of a single pieceof music. Listen to a recording of the version that plan to learn. Even afteryou've learned a song, play with favorite recordings. Listen and compare yoursound to that of the recording.

Practice daily


Daily practice is a cornerstone of steady progress. You'll get much more out ofyour practice if you practice every day. An occasional day won't hurt, but becareful about skipping days.

Many people under estimate the value of daily commitment, so they skip dayswithout too much concern. They usually do so with the good intention ofdoubling-up the following day. But one skip often leads to another. If a studentskip a few days, this can lead to pledges of catching up with one or moremarathon sessions on the weekend. But most 'make up' promises are destined tobe broken, especially when a backlog of deferred practice comes due.

Unfortunately, these make-up sessions seldom materialize. And when they do,often they're counterproductive. Practice should contain some hard work anddiligent repetition, but it should should also be fun.

Long marathon sessions usually cause mental and physical fatigue which caninitiate a downward spiral, leaving you tired, frustrated — and probably withlittle to show for your efforts. Often there's little fun and little accomplishment.A regular reliance on marathon sessions may easily take the fun out of music,and lead to a bad attitude toward practice, practice which might well beenjoyed when spread out appropriately.

There are many other benefits to daily practice.

Daily practice helps to keep you toned and strengthened, limber and relaxed.Music practice places many demands on your body, so it's important to warmup and stretch. If you warm up and prepare yourself before you practicerigorously, your body will benefit from the exercise. If not, you run the risk ofdeveloping bad habits and physical tension.

If you have trouble practicing every day, try alternating days of light and heavy


practice. That's what tri-athletes do.

Shorten your practice rather than skipping it

There will come days when you really don't have time for a full practicesession — there's only so many hours in the day! There will be times whensomething else comes up that you'll choose to do instead. And some daysyou're honestly too tired to practice — or you just don't feel like doing it.

On days like these go easy on yourself, but don't skip your practice entirely.Simply shorten it! Put in five or ten minutes, give yourself a pat on the back,and then call it a day. This may leave you feeling disappointed that you didn'tput in a significant effort. Surprisingly, it really makes a significantcontribution toward your progress.

A few minutes of practice may not measure up to your idea of a rigorouspractice session, but it actually goes a long way toward keeping you on track. Itmaintains and strengthens your "daily commitment," and that counts for a lot.

Remember that the "daily" aspect is more important than the amount of time;especially at first. Slow and steady wins the race — we need to remindourselves of the tortoise the hare.

Pick up your instrument daily, even if you practice for just a few minutes. It'smuch better to shorten your practice than to skip days.

The occasional skipped days

Hey, nobody's perfect. Just tell yourself, "tomorrow will be a better day." Takea brief moment to imagine yourself practice, improving, and enjoying it.


Choose a time for tomorrow's practice.

Warm-up First

Practically everybody wants to skip the warm-up. This is true for beginners,advanced students, young students and adults. The complaint is that the warm-up "keeps you from getting to the fun part." This is a short-sighted view. Agood warm-up will heighten your skills, and will make it easier for you to playwell during the rest of your practice.

Always start your practice with something easy, preferably something familiar.

Play some open string exercises or easy scales. Then play an easy piece or two.In doing so, you'll establish a baseline for the day - a preflight check, a list ofwhat's working and what's not. Then continue your warm-up and try to improveon these points before working on new or challenging material.

If you skip the warm up and fail to establish a baseline at the start of yourpractice, you may proceed with unrealistic goals for the day, launching inunaware that certain skills are working, while others are temporarily dormant.

If you practice more than once a day, you may shorten or skip your warm-up inthe later sessions.

Strive to improve from today's baseline. Have that single goal inmind!

It's rare that you pick up right where you left off the day before. This isespecially true for beginners. It may take five to twenty minutes to get yourselfwarmed up and back in touch with yesterday's best.


With other types of tasks, such as building a stone path, you continue buildingon Wednesday right where you finished on Tuesday. But not with music.

There will come days when your most diligent efforts will fail to elevate you tothe level of yesterday's accomplishments. Or perhaps you'll reach yesterday'slevel, but not until your practice is nearly over.

And it's OK. Don't let it get to you. Your achievements won't always follow astraight line, and your improvements won't always come at a steady rate.

So simply strive to improve from your starting point — from your baseline.

Warm Up On Technique

As you practice a piece of music, you must spread your attention spread overseveral tasks: reading notes, interpreting the timing, trying to play at a steadypace, maintaining posture and relaxation, creating good tone, playing in tune,accenting ... the list goes on.

With so many musical details vying for your attention, you're likely to losetrack of your technique (the details of how you control your instrument,including posture, hand positions, relaxation ....)

So, it's essential that you practice technique during your warm-up period,otherwise you may fail to improve or maintain technique at all.

But if you practice technique first, there's a good chance some of theaccomplishments will carry through to the rest of your practice. When thisoccurs, your practice yields dividends on an exponential level.


Divide and Accomplish

Divide and conquer an old idea. I put a positive spin on it, calling it Divide andAccomplish. Break tasks and obstacles into small, manageable pieces. This isideal for learning music and physical skills.

There's plenty of brain research that shows that most people can onlyremember about seven items of new information at a time — plus or minustwo. To learn large groups of information efficiently, you must study thematerial in small sections.For most people, that means just four to eight notes.Though this may seem like a ridiculously small amount, even four to eightnotes can be too much. You have to see for yourself. If you can't accomplishyour goal, try reducing the size of the section.

Work on any size piece you want, any amount that allows you to make decidedprogress, and that you do so quickly. If you fail to quickly learn the sectionyou've chosen, divide the section in two parts, and practice those parts in loops.

Continue dividing until you reach a size where you can progress quickly.Indeed you may need to work on just two, three or four notes. And this can bethe most intelligent and effective way to proceed.

When adopting this style of practice, you're face to face with delayedgratification. Playing from the start to the end feels like a lot more fun, but youmay accomplish little by doing so. The big fun comes from learning a piecewell, and reaping the many rewards that accompany that level of success.

From understanding to accurate repetition ... to physicalknowledge.

The study and mastery of a musical instrument is largely about observation,


repetition, and a careful four-step process where we develop and transfer skillsfrom one level of knowledge to another.

Once we've thoroughly learned a physical movement, we no longer rely onunderstanding or deliberate actions to produce the desired result. This iscritical. People are unable quickly and reliably perform actions while they arestill under conscious control, so we need to transfer the skill out of consciousattention, not to improve our ability, but because we need our consciousattention for other tasks—primarily for observation. To practice effectively weneed to shift our observation from point to point, without interrupting our skillexecution.

Step 1: Understanding

Understanding is essential when attempting to learn physical skills. Nothingcan be accomplished without it. It's our map to our destination. However all theunderstanding in the world won't produce a physical skill -- it's merely to toolwith which we set our sights and evaluate our progress. Then the trial and errorbegins.

Step 2: Refinement

Through trial and error we influence and forge memories, but we can onlyforge good memories when we understand and can discern between a desirableand undesirable outcome. It takes lots of trial and error before your body cando what your mind clearly understands. You can't sail freely when constantlyreferring to your map. Sometimes even a misunderstanding needs refinement,but this may be impossible to know until we begin trial and error.

Once a movement is correctly refined, sufficient repetition is required in orderto establish the movement deeply in your memory. It takes still more repetition


and review before you'll have a reliable type of reflex-level, long-term memory.

This result is often called kinesthetic memory, motor memory, or musclememory, which is a cascade of ordered reflexes, rather than a string of bodilyinstructions and mental intentions. You must reach this level of control in orderto play by heart in recitals, performances or rehearsals.

Step 3: Working memory (short term memory) andrelinquishing executive process

When we've thoroughly learned a physical movement, we no longer rely on theslow deliberate sequence of conscious instructions delivered through executiveprocess. We bypass executive process completely and replace it with a cascadeof ordered reflexes that trigger effortlessly and reliably in succession. The mereimagination of the melody carries the song effortlessly through the fingers. Itlooks magic, and feels magical, and it's a testament to the amazing mind/bodyability to memorize physical movement.

Step 4: Muscle memory and long term memory

Once you can play something by heart, when you've got it in short termmemory, make sure to transfer that knowledge into long term memory. It's themoments you spend playing by heart—without reading at all—that createdurable long term memory.

Reading music will surely interfere with memorization, and it easilyundermines memorization by preventing or stalling the transfer of knowledgeto long term memory. I have no quarrel with written music, nor it's use inmemorization ... if people use it wisely. Use it to launch yourself into motionby reading small sections of music, usually just four to eight notes. Then addspeed to the section as you continue practicing it in a loop.


Whether reading or learning by ear, you need to practice fast enough to out runexecutive process. Executive process is a slow, deliberate type of mental effortwhere intention and observation are roughly intertwined. When you exceed thespeed executive process allows, you make the leap to playing by heart.

To free yourself from executive process, systematically increase your speed.Then look away from the music. Go back and forth as much as you need:switch from reading, to memory, from reading to memory. When fullycomfortable increase your speed even slightly more and continue repeating—uneffortful speed naturally deepens memory.

Give it a minute — Don't obsess

Once you've chosen a practice section, practice it briefly in a loop, just for aminute or two. If there's no progress after about 20 seconds, work on half asmuch. Then go to the next section or even to another piece of music. There areadvantages to working on a sections pieces at once:

-- it keeps practice interesting

-- it keeps confusion and frustration at bay

-- it allows your memory to absorb the experience subconsciously. This wayyou'll get the most out your of practice time — much like studying andsleeping on it.

Review frequently

Review is your best practice tool. If you've tackled a few new sections, and youcan play them by heart, review each section occasionally during your practice.


Alternate between learning and reviewing.

Start your practice with something familiar. Then try something new. Continuealternating between familiar and new. In other words, rest one part of yourbrain while a different part works.

Get it right

You'll learn whatever you practice. There's the old saying, "Practice makesperfect." Actually practice makes permanent. So practice carefully. Don'tpractice music casually. Anything repeated becomes partially memorized. Don'tmemorized just anything! Be specific. In Jane Wagner's play, the Search forSigns of Intelligent Life in the Universe, Trudy the bag lady takes a looks at herstation in life, haven fallen from a high powered New York city career, nowliving on the street and having conversations with extraterrestrials. She states,"I always knew I wanted to be somebody. Now I realize I should have beenmore specific!" (Sounds like something Henny Youngman would say!)

Keep it right

Your memory thrives on patterns. It especially notices recurring perceptionsand repeated actions. If you repeat actions casually, without precision in timeand motion, your memory will probably discard you good efforts, or it maylink them with a number of errant and imperfect bad habits.

Exact repetition allows you to memorize quickly and efficiently. Your brainliterally stores new repeated memories by creating new physical structures inyou brain. once your memory is hard-wired in this manner, it is lightly quick atserving up perfected or unperfected movements, depending on what you'vepracticed.


As you repeat make the movements the same every time you play a passage.Once you've established a relaxed and well formed hand position, work on asmall passage. Refine your movements with attention to relaxation andeconomy of motion. Don't just aim for right notes. Extra motion will slow youdown and tire you out.

Complete your practice with review

Before you end your practice session, briefly review all the material you'vepracticed once again. In just a few tries see if you can revive eachaccomplishment to the best level that you achieved during this practice. Thenjust spend another minute with it. I know I've already said this, but I justwanted to review!

Summary

This article outlined and explained a number of practice ideals, but of coursewe never practice in a perfectly ideal manner. Nevertheless, you'll benefit whenyou include any of these methods into your daily practice. As you adopt goodpractice habits, you'll get more out of your practice. Occasionally try out one ofthe tips that you forgot or avoided.

There are many other practice techniques as well. Some are rather detailed andbest explained by example in lessons.

Watch your own progress. Remember the value of various learning techniques.Try them out. Soon enough you'll discover your own practice secrets. Make alist so you don't forget them.

Recommended Reading: Books on music practice and learning music


Recommended reading for musicians and music students

How to learn music without frustration

Private Music LessonsWorkshops • Performances

Singingwood Home Page


Practice, Practice, Practice Music study skills and music ... Practice Practice Music stud… ·...

Documents

Transcript of Practice, Practice, Practice Music study skills and music ... Practice Practice Music stud… ·...