Practising is for many of us a time sink, but we do also find space for it even in busy lives.

At different points in my life I've had different reasons for practising.

When I was a child, it was to please my parents or to avoid getting yelled at by my teacher.

When I was a college student it was to get good grades, or pass auditions for ensembles, or get scholarships.

Now I find that I keep practising because my ability to play the piano is the one thing that I know will improve the more I do it, and I just like knowing that I am always improving myself in this one aspect. And although I'm a bit young to worry about this, I think that if I keep practising, I'll be less likely to lose my faculties when I get very old (barring Alzheimer's or organic diseases like that).

I am surprised by how little ego enters into it now. I had two performances last weekend. I wanted to play well (and I feel that I did), but I didn't care whether I played better than anyone else or how my piece was received. Part of this is knowing that the sort of events they were were such that anything would have been appreciated but part of it is simply not caring. I know where I stand in the continuum of pianists and I'm content to progress along that in my own time.

It didn't mean I didn't get nerves (after a couple of nerve-free performances, how vexing), which I also find surprising.

I practise because it provides a constant in a sometimes unsettled existence! Through school exams, leaving home, moving to university, completing my degree and now exploring life as a new graduate, practising has been the one thing that has always been there waiting to be done. Hope that makes sense!

What keeps me practising? Having something to aim for really helps when things get tough!

I have recently had some down times but I have managed to deal with my own concerns/frustrations re piano progress and settled down to my objective again.
The goal? Until recently G3 - now G5. Not sure about the timescale as realistically I have a long way to go to reach G5.

I have found that if I practice, I get better. Not just "might get better" but guaranteed, certainly "will get better". In other areas of endeavor this doesn't happen, I do my very best but my efforts are un-noticed and/or un-valued. I like the direct correlation in music learning between effort and improvement.

I think this is a good reason. However, this can be disrupted if one works on repertoire that is too difficult or practices incorrectly/inefficiently and gets frustrated when the time they put in doesn't appear to correlate with success (I think both of these factors have been responsible for my latest break from music). Also, external goals like public performances, competitions, or exams are great for motivation, but putting too much stock in these can confuse the true goal sometimes. Even if practice leads to improvement, it doesn't always lead to better outcomes in performances.

Apart from the fact I teach music and have to accompany pupils, I'm not sure what keeps me practising my own material. It's not like I often get to play (solo) in front of an audience - first time in 4 years on Saturday.

Well a few reasons, ~ sometimes to get through the exam and receive a certificate and feed back!
~ another to feel the benefits of achieving!
~ another to feel that my abilities are improving, going to new limits
~ another to perform pieces in front of people, I love it!
~ and even sometimes because it helps me mentally.. emotionally.
~ The piano is my wife!
~ and finally, most importantly, its given my life a direction and a purpose with career hopes

I keep on practising because I will improve more my violin technique /hand coordination/music interpretation. Apart from this I feel so motivated when I have a piece of music which I could not play it and then after few months I return back to it and realise that I can play it easily. When i started violin i.e. 3years ago i dreamt of playing Meditation by Thais but I felt that it was so far, now I can play it. Next in my list is Czardas!!!!

Another reason is that when i'm playing violin i feel in another world, i don't think of anything except music, it's the time were i relax and forget everything (even to eat ! )

When I practice I am in touch with the great composers of the past, as if they were still alive.

First of all, thanks to corenfa for this thread.

Here are some reasons for me to keep practising:
- Learning an instrument is like a journey and it is so much fun to discover new areas
- Like Martin.Walters already mentioned, it helps me emotionally
- It is a great feeling to realise improvement
- Music is my biggest love
- Music is another way to express myself, and a way to tell more than I can tell with words
- There is still so much music waiting to be discovered
- Sometimes Music is sort of a prayer for me
- During my whole life I got told I am too sensible, but when making music it was and is the other way around

Playing makes me feel more like "me" than anything else I do.

I agree with that.

I'm scared of my teacher

Thanks for the interesting answers! I actually identify with a lot of them, I just never thought of it at the time.

Somehow, my practise time and energy often comes from a different "brain compartment" - I am often able to feel refreshed after practising even if it has been tiring at work (I work in a brain-intensive sort of job not a muscle-intensive one). Of course if I've just got no emotional energy left then that doesn't work.

I see that a lot of us like the "continuous improvement" aspect of it. I particularly like the idea that I am improving my mind (as mentioned in other threads, I am a swot).

My long-term goal is somewhat vaporous; I just want to be "good enough" that I don't have to work too hard to express what I want to express. It's fine if it takes me till I'm 97, I don't feel that I'm in a hurry.

I feel much the same - practising helps me "unwind" after a tiring day. In the days before I had children (who want to talk to me when I come home) I used to like playing scales or Hanon (something which required no mental effort) to unwind and would move onto "proper" music only after half an hour or so of these.

More generally practising is what keeps me sane, although I find this hard to put into words. I think it is a way of escaping from the real world


I too have no precise long term goal - I just want to carry on improving. However, I'd rather not think too far into the future - I can't imagine having enough physical strength to play the oboe at 97!

I'm quite surprised that there are people who find practising relaxing ... that is the last thing it is to me! If I'm not in the right mindset - alert, wanting to learn etc. then I am not ready to practise. Personally, I find it very intellectually challenging but perhaps thats just because I'm not really a clever clogs!

It think it is to do with what corenfa says about it using a different part of your brain to your day job so it can still be intellectually challenging but in a different way and that's what makes it relaxing (if that makes any sense )

I remember one rather strange conversation with my oboe teacher when we had been talking about the psychological strains of teaching (I teach English as a foreign language) and he asked me what I did to relax in my spare time. I was a bit surprised (as I thought the answer was obvious) and said "play the oboe". He looked at me as though I'd taken leave of my senses I pointed out to him that my relationship with the oboe was obviously different to his as it wasn't my job.

I went to one of the AB's teacher development workshops recently, and heard a phrase which I've been pondering since: 'Practice is problem-solving'.

I'm currently trying to learn an avant-garde recorder piece for a course I'm attending in a fortnight's time (if you watched the BBC Young Musician woodwind final you'll have heard part of it - Linde's Music for a Bird). There are some tricky runs of conventional notes as well as all the special effects stuff, and I was trying to get one of those under my fingers just now, without very much success.

I took a tea break and browsed the Forums, and a couple of things came together: the first being a post of Roseau's where she describes the French method of naming the notes before playing. I tried this with my tricky passage and realised that, by naming the notes (it's a repeating sequence of 5) I had memorised them. The next stage was to play them from memory, but I found I also had to concentrate on the exact finger movements, especially the point at which I had to take off my thumb. After that I went back to the music, and suddenly I had it!

The second realisation was that I had struggled with setting up my new computer which arrived a few days ago, because of the modern trend of giving all the instructions as a series of pictures. I've realised I'm a very verbal learner, and need words. So I think my act of naming the notes turned the musical symbols into words, and that's why I had the success I did.

All I need to do now is keep repeating to myself that practice is problem-solving. I do tend to see it as providing evidence that I'm no good, which is a very strong disincentive.

there was another thread on this.

Practising - relaxing or a chore?

I think it comes down to the fact that different people mean different things by "relaxing".

I find practice relaxing for the same reason Roseau does - it totally engages me in something completely different and unrelated to work and even though it involves full concentration and hard work. At the end of it, I generally feel refreshed and that all the issues of work have been purged from my mind for the evening/ day. So I'd say it is relaxing in the same way that gardenning is often described as relaxing despite the hard work involved in it! But maybe refreshing and restorative are better words. Practising refreshes my mind and restores my calm!

I wouldn't call it stressful (to me the opposite of relaxing) and I certainly wouldn't describe it as a chore which suggests something that I feel I have to do despite not enjoying it at all. If practice routinely turned into either of these then I would stop doing it!

I practice for lots of reasons:
- because I want to be a better oboe player
- becuase I want to be properly prepared for my next lesson/ orchestra rehearsal/ exam/ performance
- because it means I can be good enough to play wonderful music with other people!
- because it allows me to engage with music in a way that I can't by just listening to it and that soothes my soul.
- because playing music allows me to express a part of myself that can't be expressed through words.
- But mainly because I enjoy it! Even working on small sections, technical exercises I find quite fulfilling and absorbing. It is something that I do for ME and it is an escape from daily grind and I feel like I am doing something constructive.

Someone once said to me: "There's something strangely liberating doing something that you're rubbish at!"

Quality aside, it being so different to the day job means it's a wonderful distraction and playing in an orchestra where I'm doing well if I hit one right note in a bar relaxes me in a way none of my other hobbies has.

Cello's a funny instrument in that there's a great deal of skill required to hit the right note anyway and so despite doing well grade-wise, there's still such a long way to go before I can use the word 'cellist' instead of 'I have a cello'.

Seeing Leonard Rose and Glenn Gould on youtube play Beethoven's Cello Sonata in A or Piatigorsky play Chopin is also quite a target to aim for!

It's seven months that I cannot bring myself to practice...(before that about 5 months of going down hill), seven months I 'struggle' to pick up the violin once or twice in a FORTNIGHT and only then do it because I have not done so in 2 weeks....even thinking of giving up to be honest so right now I really do not have anything that keeps me practicing

once upon a time I practiced daily for 2 to 3 hours a day, fooling myself I was going to become good on my violin, I think I have realised that I will never ever be good at it and hence why I plummeted. I will never be able to play the pieces I want to play well me thinks and this fills me with great sadness...I don't know what I will end up doing, right now I am trying to 'hang in there' hoping that it's just a 'black hole' I am in and that maybe one day I'll find the way out but I don't know

It's a hard place to be, but sounds terribly familiar. You are not on your own in feeling disillusioned, and pulling yourself out of it is a challenge I know. If you could maybe adjust your goals a bit? Playing the violin is lovely - being a concert violinist or whatever is not the only valid way to do it, luckily! It's a pity you are feeling so low, as I have read lots of your posts and know how much effort you have invested in learning. I do hope you will be able to pick up your violin again soon.

One thing that keeps me practicing is that I really enjoy the focused state of mind I get into when playing. It's strangely refreshing and energizing to be in that 'zone' where an hour has suddenly gone by; the improvement in playing is almost a bonus.

Sometimes I get the same issue with piano, so I play some of the pieces I really enjoy and forget about the dream, but like a domino effect I find myself tackling the larger/harder works again, and progressing further!

Oh, Jojo. That is so sad. I really hope you find your mojo again. I remember reading some of your posts from a year or so back, about how much you practiced and the pieces you were working on and feeling so envious of your progress. It seemed like you were heading for the stars.

I too struggle with the idea that I might never be able to play (well) some of the pieces I like, but there is so much violin music out there, there are other things to play. At the moment classical repertoire has been put to one side and I'm learning a bunch of Bluegrass songs (while teacher is otherwise engaged - so no lessons for me). Many of the songs I've chosen aren't too challenging in terms of fingering, and oddly that has really helped my playing. My left hand has really relaxed and my bow arm is becoming more flexible, and I really enjoying singing along to what I'm playing, so playing is a lot of fun at the moment. The relaxation and flexibility are things I can take to my playing when I get back to the classical stuff again.

I was upset about having to stop lessons for a while, but actually I think this has been a really useful experience for me. Not playing at the edge all the time has really loosened up my playing and massively helped my confidence. So maybe if you look at some material within your current playing level rather than always pushing the edge of the envelope you might get a buzz, and kick start things again. I hope so. Good luck.

(Sorry - off topic a bit).

jojo, don't be silly.

It is normal that there will be times, sometimes quite long periods when you practice assiduously, but although you might add some pieces to your repertoire, your general standard does not improve.

This is where the stubborn, persistent streak that is essential for anyone that wants to be a musician comes into play. The most important thing in becoming a musician is PRACTICE. Inborn talent matters, early opportunity matters, but by far the biggest factor is PRACTICE, the quality of it, how much of it you do, and for how long (i.e. how many years) you sustain it.

I have seen it likened to breaking a rock with a sledgehammer. You can hammer away for days, weeks, months, and nothing happens. Then one day, one more strike, and the rock shatters.

You just have to keep working away, and have faith that (so long as you re practicing in the right way) the improvements will come. And that is not a baseless or religious sort of faith, it is a faith based on the example of every great musician on the planet.

Stick at it girl !!!!

I'm in the "I find practising relaxing" camp. I have a fairly high pressure (scientific) job that can get a bit crazy at times. Practising gives me around an hour a day when I can forget everything else. (I find skiing has pretty much the same effect but I can't do that every day!)

I also find practise very rewarding- you can see over (longer) periods of time how you've improved.

Another motivation for practise is the fear that if I let it slip then I will lose all the progress I've made since starting the piano seven years ago- thats a lot of practise that I've already done!

oh dear, that's so sad. I do hope you find a solution soon jojo.
If you were doing 2 or 3 hours a day you are probably already "good" in other peoples' eyes although not in your own. I hope you find a spark of excitement for something soon.

I really hope you find a solution too, Jojo; the fact you are still posting here is a very positive one, because it surely means you haven't lost hope. It's always hard to get through a period of negative thoughts and back-sliding achievement, and it takes courage and deserves admiration. Good luck!

Corenfa, thanks for another interesting thread.

For adult amateurs it raises the whole question of what we mean by practise. In a sense, it's a word we get from the professionals, where life is more defined: you perform for cash, or you get ready to do so/keep in trim (practise). For many people performance is rare, so the question is: into what categories do we divide our playing-time? If we divide it into lessons and "everything-else-equals-practise", then actually a large part of the enjoyment we get has to come from "practising", which means we're not going to want to spend the whole time doing technical exercises aimed at improving our playing. We're also going to need "fun play" time, even if it's not the most productive form of practise (there's lots of criticism of "just playing repertoire").

So my answer is: I aim to get better through practise, but I also aim to enjoy myself. My playing-time is a mixture of fun and serious attempts to get better, and it's hard to draw a definite line between the two activities. Sometimes I do a musically dull exercise concentrating on improving the accuracy of my fingering; sometimes I just play something I enjoy, and sometimes I play something I enjoy, but explore a particular bit of it, trying out different articulation, trying to get a note right that I often get wrong. Some bits are practise, some are fun, and some are hard to define.

Motivation: practise makes me better (but not always, and I can't easily see my progress - beginners lack the apparatus to measure themselves - so I couldn't rely on the urge to improve as my sole motivation). Practise is fun. I enjoy my instrument. If I didn't, there wouldn't be any point (so far it has earned me an empty sweet-wrapper as sole payment; it's not going to keep a roof over my family!). It's also something where I decide what to do (rare thing!). And it's very, very different to my job - the different-bit-of-brain thing. I feel a bit the same after playing as I used to when learning ballroom dance! It's very physical (relies a lot on the physical side of moving hands), and a great relief from non-tactile think-work, which is what I do for a living, but has never been my strong-suit.

Disappearing into a hole is something that most of us can relate to at some point or another. I can say from my experience that sometimes the break is as useful as ploughing away at the practice and just bedding in the mistake. Sometimes a complete break is the way forward, sometimes practice away from the instrument really helps - listening thoroughly to the piece and preparing your brain to play it correctly, preparing your arms, your fingers, for what you are going to ask them to do, not just jumping into the instrument and insisting they do it.

Do you have anyone locally you could join up with, even short term, to do some duet work, string quartets, orchestra, chamber orchestra, etc? Something that is not high stakes, somewhere you get together and have some tea and cakes and while you are there you might as well make some music. Getting back to making music for pleasure not for outcome, and a situation where you can be more hidden when you do make mistakes.

Perhaps look for repertoire that takes you in an interesting new direction sideways rather than always onwards and upwards. I have recently bought an album of modern music at grade 5-8 (progressive) levels because I'm not really big on modern stuff and I want to be. The Walton viola concerto would be pulling myself in two directions (modern interpretation and advanced technical) so I'm dropping down the grades to work the skills separately.

Also check your instrument, it's not always obvious that progress has in fact been halted by something that is not you. I struggled and struggled with my viola, assuming I had totally forgotten how to play it. I then got my bow rehaired. Yeah, should have done that quite some time ago! Similarly I was squeaking away on my C string, and despite the financial blow of breaking the most expensive string I was reasonably thrilled when it snapped and I found out that it wasn't me after all, the string was in its death throes.

Never say never, sometimes it's not the hammering away at the pieces that moves you forward, it's the overall musical journey. You may find that by just playing something it unlocks the bit of your brain that has been struggling.

I think that, like at least some others have mentioned, I practice for a number of reasons.

I enjoy it - there's rarely something else that I'd prefer to be doing.

It's a habit - I've been practising one instrument or another most days for more than 30 years.

I do quite a lot of playing in orchestras and chamber groups and I know from experience that I'll enjoy it more if I've learned my part thoroughly and at least tried to sort out the technical problems.

I need to practice quite a lot of technical stuff just to maintain my current playing ability. But just maintain isn't enough, I want to get better - which requires not so much 'more' practice as 'better' or 'focussed' practice. Fortunately, I like the technical stuff - what I am currently having to work on is making myself practice musically as well as technically.

Occasionally, I don't really feel like practising. On those days, I practice anyway and mostly I quickly start to overcome the reluctance. On the whole, if it's a crummy practice day two things help. One is to just attempt to solve one tiny little problem at a time, whilst reminding myself that I know that I will see the benefit later, if not now. The other is to work slowly through new or newish pieces, just trying to sort out notes and rhythm and intonation and fingering - very mechanical and I think it works for me because I can usually manage to switch off some of the self-criticism under those circumstances.

Thank you to all of those that have encouraged me (too many to list them all )

I still am not practicing.....only about 20 minutes every 2 or 3 weeks

Inside myself I think I don't want to give up so will try to kick my rear end now and do something about it.

I have signed up for the forum event in 2 months time in London so I have to practice now (erm, I Hope so)

I'll just have to try and ignore how bad I think I am at playing my violin
xxx

hugs and love to all of you

in my view as a humble ex-organist and currently struggling-to-get-recorderist, anyone who can play a violin at all is a star, worthy of admiration! I tried once, and found it quite beyond me.

Some lines from "Poems of Solitary Delights" by Tachibana Akemi sum it up for me.

What a delight it is when borrowing rare writings from a friend, I open out the first sheet.
What a delight it is when, spreading paper, I take my brush and find my hand better than I thought.
What a delight it is when, after a hundred days of racking my brains, that verse that wouldn't come suddenly turns out well.
What a delight it is when, skimming through the pages of a book, I discover a man written of there who is just like me.
What a delight it is when everyone admits it's a very difficult book. and I understand it with no trouble at all.

Here is something that should inspire you, if not to return to serious practife, then to devote yourself to whatever other great passions you may have:

http://www.oprah.com/spirit/Quotes-to-Help...ow-Your-Passion

Just caught up with this.

Have you stopped having lessons? I thought you had a teacher who was a bit of a stickler (but I may be confusing you with someone else.)

My tendency to slippage in practice is attributable to the infrequent, ad hoc nature of my lessons on both instruments; appointments tend to be booked several weeks ahead and I tend to 'relax' because I know the crunch time is about 6 weeks ahead and then -whoops! it's next week. Practice happens, but not in as disciplined a way as is needed. I've got round this by making sure I have an organ lesson at least once a month - and I REALLY don't want to embarrass myself by making no obvious progress in that time. Trouble is, following three staves with a trio sonata is painstaking stuff and I still make errors on a piece I've been working on diligently since February - and there are 2 more movements yet. (There are other things on the go, of course.)

I concluded last week that my piano lessons need to be at least as frequent as the organ, simply for the challenge of the deadline; unfortunately because of our separate commitments my teacher and I couldn't fit anything in before early October.

It's a bit like losing weight; there's nothing like a bit of success to get you all fired up to continue.

Good luck.

Starting with a new teacher in a few weeks time is making me practice like there's no tomorrow - I'm determined to start off positively.

Hope things are a bit more hopeful at your end, jojo

classes start soon, don't want to seem
a hopeless old pensioner!

Following this thread for quite a while. But since it was quite obvious to me, why I practice, and what keeps me practicing, I didn't feel the need to answer. But then jojo wrote, and there came another thought. So first of all:

The reason why I practice and what keeps me practicing is because I need to. Same way I need to breath, to eat. I am not complete without my daily practice. And its hard for me to not be able to practice on Sundays for the same reason.

But then again, I have not found my limits yet. And that brings me to jojo.



I was once in a very similar situation. I have what is called a multiple intellectual giftedness (dx'ed). For a long time, as beautiful as that might sound, this stood rather in the way of achieving anything. When I finally started sorting out what I actually got there, I found myself to be interested mostly in Fine Arts. So I started developing first my drawing and painting skills, before I finally ended up with music.

When it comes to art, I discovered limitations for myself as well. Not the one you might think of but still serious enough that I just knew I will never be satisfied with what I do, no matter how much time I'll invest. That is different with music. The way is much more defined, clearer. I cannot get astray so much. That makes it easier and more determined. When I discovered this, I completely abandoned art and focused on music.

I have a saying: what matters to you, you will do. And what matters most, you will do first. If it isn't important enough, or if there is something still more important, you will never do it.

So, as a matter of fact, I picked up drawing again. Or will be - on September 26! The reason behind it is that I love drawing. I like the activity, I like to still progress, I still like to try things out. But now without all the expectations I had, when I started it. It is just what it is and it is just for me, and maybe I will have an opportunity to exhibit in the future, but that is not the final goal. The final goal is, to have fun. It's a complete new definition WHY I do it.

And there is one thing more; even with limitations people got famous. Not that I expect you to. But those people with limitations that got famous were great in one thing: figuring out their limitations and making the best out of what they got, or even using their limitations to their advantage. So it doesn't always need to be the big thing. The thing that matters is that it makes fun - just like art is for me. Finding out my own limiations when it comes to art means, concentrating on those things I always wanted to do. One thing, I want to do I never find the time because of more important things (drawing fast facial sketches within seconds while fixing the complete personality and looks with just a few pencil strokes). But the other thing, I will do in September is finally an art nude class. What that would mean in relation to music for you, you have to figure out yourself. But when you do, I believe you'll find that you have no trouble at all finding the time for your daily practice.

I get grumpy when I don't!

Oh, you get grumpy when you don't as well!

Which fits in nicely with an oft asked question in the forum - "How do you find time to......."?

Hi Inigo,
I have all of a sudden got the violin 'bug' in me again just yesterday!
I feel like I really want to get stuck into it again
I just need lessons again (not having had lessons in 10 months!!)

That's wonderful news! Really happy for you, and I hope you find your way to enjoying your playing again. Do you think you will go back to your previous teacher - I remember that you were very impressed with him - or are you going to start with someone new?

That's brilliant, Jojo. Go for it!

Great news Jojo

Gently does it at first.... say she who took up the horn just over a week ago and was told to do 2 x 15 minutes practice a day and has been very very very bad indeed and done much more than that. Naughty.

So that's another reason to keep practicing, starting to learn a new instrument. Hmm...

Heard someone playing the viola yesterday at orchestra. Very nice sound....hmmmmm