How to Practise Better Options

[Suepea]

Thanks for the useful thoughts about fitting everything into practice time. I'm just having a bit of a panic about the Benslow course I think! I'm terrified I won't be able to keep up. My teacher looked through the music and said "well there's nothing you can't do there"! Oh to share her confidence!! We are doing a Bach double concerto and the two allegro movments are likely to be a real struggle for me to play up to speed. We're also doing 2 other works and the main issue for me is just the bulk of music to learn. I'm used to working on 2 pieces and doing them in a lot of detail. It usually takes me about 6 weeks to get a piece sounding like I want it to and for teacher to be happy. But now I've got pages and pages of music to work on and I need a different approach!

I've cut down my technical work quite a lot and dropped the Bach I was working on as I know I can pick that up once the course is finished. My ensemble music is easier and I don't need so much time on that. Also I know the other members well and they won't mind the odd wrong note!

Corenfa, I like your bit about self belief. I too have faith in my teacher and every time she's said "do this and it will get better but you might have to be patient", she's been right. But you must have to be really testing this approach with your new challenge. Good luck with that! I gave my teacher a list of pieces I wanted to play eventually a while ago and I thought she'd laugh. She surprised me by saying I'd play them all eventually if I was patient and determined enough. It's good to have a teacher who believes in me and I have to remind myself of this regularly.

Lubylu, stop worrying about the Benslow course - I've just looked it up on the Benslow website and see that you have Jen Lynch and Janet Hicks as tutors. The atmosphere will be friendly and encouraging. I don't know David Bass, the other tutor, but I'm sure he will be the same. Jen will play with the cello section and she is one of the most incredible people I have met - and very forgiving if you make mistakes. Play first beats of bars if you're stuck! If I wasn't playing in the Egham concert that weekend I'd be tempted to join you.

[lubylu]

Thanks sbhoa and suepea for your encouragement and reassurance! My teacher knows the tutors on my course and has been equally reassuring about them. She is adamant I will enjoy it and she's usually right so I guess I should believe her!

Funnily enough, I think I'm more worried about the other participants and what they'll think. I'm worried they'll be wondering what on earth I think I'm doing there!!

I have a lesson on Friday so I'm going to ask my teacher if we can work out how best to approach learning the music in the (short) time I have before the course...

[Roseau]

katica, I agree that self belief/confidence is vital to productive practice and making progress. I find my self belief varies quite a lot, often it's affected by things unrelated to music completely. If I'm feeling generally negative about myself then this definitely manifests in my approach to the cello.

I just wanted to add that I initially mentioned self-belief on the oboe thread that Katica posted a link to in the context not of believing that you are "good" (whatever that may mean) but the belief that eventually the practice you do will pay off. So it doesn't matter if you're having a lousy day and you're playing sounds awful, you practise anyway because you believe that one day you will improve.

I wonder how others who play in orchestras or ensembles cope with practising the music for that and getting a balance with working on individual repertoire as well?

Like others I tend to class bits of orchestral pieces into "can play with no practice", "could play with practice", "impossible even with practice" and only practise the bars that fall into the "could play with practice" group. I take the ones I have deemed "impossible" into my lesson just to make sure I'm not underestimating my ability (sometimes my teacher comes up with a way around the difficulty) and I also take in very exposed solos just to give myself confidence that I am playing them properly. I rarely work on pieces before the first rehearsal because I find that playing with the other instruments changes what is difficult. A very hard part in what turns out to be a full orchestral tutti, for example, may not really be worth working on if everyone else is already playing the same thing without a problem. Something which seemed simple may be harder because where I thought I was going to breath turns out to be the wrong place in the context of the piece as a whole.

I'm sure you'll be fine on your course - I have always found the tutors on the courses I have been on to be very encouraging and the same has been true of the players even those (or perhaps I should say especially those) who have been much better than me.

[corenfa]

I've just got an acoustic piano (but am also keeping the digital) and it has opened up a whole new can of worms set of mindful practising things to think about.

I'm getting a lot of practise in trying to listen for how the correct hand position produces the right sound. The differences are miniscule. This is something we go over in lesson every week, but I've so far not really been able to practise at home. I'd tried to video my hands but I can't get the right angle and even when I try to watch my teacher in lesson, if I'm not at precisely the right spot I cannot see the difference. Blooming obvious but I can see now why she said that without the differences in tone colour, it's harder to learn these things. I didn't realise it made such a difference.

I have also hit the truly dull, boring, tedious, dreary, repetitive bit of practise. As a result of the above, I realise that my left hand is very much weaker than my right hand. This is nothing new for most pianists but the only remedy is to do a lot of left hand practise (again, nothing I didn't know before, just never put my mind to actually doing it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)). I have been given some exercises but they are so tedious that I can only do ten minutes before my brain turns to porridge, so I am trying to play through the left hand parts of all of the Bach 2-part Inventions that I have learnt before. Of course, these must all be played thoughtfully and not just bashing through, because if I don't play them with the right finger movements it is a futile exercise.

This had better show results in a couple of months (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[katica]

Is it OK to resurrect an old thread?

There was another one on practising and adult learners but I can't find that one either...

My practice has been horribly up and down for more than six months, with lots of travel and general work interruptions. I finally seem to be getting back into the swing of things, even though I still can't manage to practise 2-3 days per week. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/fingersCrossed.gif) that I can actually manage not to have to travel this month.

One thing I am getting better at is focusing in on particular problems, even just on one or two bars - fighting my inclination to play pieces or studies "from top to bottom". I do need to do that too from time to time, to combat another bad habit which is frequent stopping.

How's the acoustic piano working out, corenfa?

[corenfa]

Is it OK to resurrect an old thread?

I'm glad you did!! I have a lot to report about practising but am too mentally blitzed with new job to do so... I will do when I've recovered a bit.

There was another one on practising and adult learners but I can't find that one either...

My practice has been horribly up and down for more than six months, with lots of travel and general work interruptions. I finally seem to be getting back into the swing of things, even though I still can't manage to practise 2-3 days per week. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/fingersCrossed.gif) that I can actually manage not to have to travel this month.

One thing I am getting better at is focusing in on particular problems, even just on one or two bars - fighting my inclination to play pieces or studies "from top to bottom". I do need to do that too from time to time, to combat another bad habit which is frequent stopping.

I've kind of gone the other way.. I focused so much on particular problems that I feel like all my musicality has gone out the window. But at least my hands now have bulges in strange places.

How's the acoustic piano working out, corenfa?

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[katica]

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Great that you're enjoying it.

Our community cultural centre, where I have my lessons and play in the wind band, has just got its first acoustic (upright) piano. I'm not a pianist - though I do have a digital piano which has been on loan to a proper pianist for about six months - but even I can really appreciate the difference. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)