As a partner at the Dallas School of Music (DSM) and one of the founders of the online music site Discover Learn Play (DLP) I get lots of questions about practicing, especially when new students begin at DSM, or online at DLP. Parents want to know how long their kids should practice each day and adult learners are anxious to know how much they need to practice to be good enough to “… uh, play?”
My answer is probably not what they expect and usually goes something like this:
To the parent: “If I’m doing my job then your child will enjoy playing music and chances are he’ll make time to explore our material and practice on his own.”
To the adult: “How about we focus on learning these very first few basic concepts and see how it goes at our next lesson?”
Folks sometimes mention that mythical “half-hour-a-day” rule, but I rarely budge. My typical reply is: “Let’s see, it’s our first lesson, we learned how to put the instrument together and made a little noise. We introduced some musical concepts, and there are a few things to review before next week. That shouldn’t take too long.”
Still, parents and adult students who have armed themselves with information like the Mozart Effect or K. Anders Ericcson’s “10,000 hour rule” (attributed most recently to Malcolm Gladwell) sometimes put emphasis on the wrong P word.
In the book Outliers, Gladwell looks at the factors that contribute to high levels of success in a wide array of disciplines. He studies hockey stars, computer programmers, scientists, and musicians, among others, and boils down his findings to the much ballyhooed “10,000 hour rule,” which is: “The key to success in any field is, to a large extent, a matter of practicing a specific task for a total of around 10,000 hours.”
For his musical example, Gladwell cites The Beatles. He learned that the lads had performed live in Hamburg, Germany, more than 1,200 times between 1960 and 1964, and thus easily reached the mystical 10,000 hours of playing time before they returned to Liverpool (and ensuing critical acclaim). But hey, these are The Beatles for gosh sake! I reckon they may have been just as fun and good on their 200th gig as they were by the time they reached The Ed Sullivan Show.
It’s tough to argue with the basic premise of Gladwell’s findings, after-all, it’s not rocket science. The more you work at a task, the better you will become at it. But as one of my esteemed colleagues, Gary Feltner, says, “Some students can get a ton accomplished in one short practice session, while others labor on with little progress to show for their work.” Besides, not every student aspires to play Carnegie Hall. Most just want to reach a level of proficiency and understanding of their chosen instrument and genre. If that’s you, then here are three basic tips to keep you on your path.
- Concentrate on the process, not the end result.
This was one of the main points in Gary Marcus’s book Guitar Zero. After having some success at the game Guitar Hero, he decided to see if his mad skills might translate over to “real” guitar playing. His words of wisdom to other learners? “Enjoy the journey and don’t fixate on the destination.” - If you take lessons, attend them whether you practice during the week or not.
I can’t tell you how many students (mostly adults) completely undermine their progress because they fear they are not prepared for their weekly lesson. A good educator knows what you need and will present ideas for you to review so that you can carry on. Of course, it’s great when students get some practice time on their instrument, but it should not be a determining factor as to whether a lesson is attended or not. - When you do have time to practice, make it count!
A good instructor will provide you with a set of clear goals after each session (a really good instructor will document those goals for you after every lesson). I encourage students to keep their instrument out and “in sight” at home; if it’s visible you’ll be more apt to tinker with it now and again. A few minutes of playing can really go a long way and there’s no need to skip it altogether if you feel like you don’t have a predetermined amount of time available. Every little bit helps!This article is from our September-October 2012 issue. Click to order!
As noted above, Gladwell did not ‘come up’ with the 10,000 rule – he simply expounded on the work of Anders Ericsson. No matter how you slice it, repetitive practice is key. It’s the same idea Hank Haney uses with hackers on the golf course. I took his 100 Swings a Day idea and applied it to music in this post: http://ow.ly/vZCfW. But you are correct – quality trumps quantity every time.