My daughter's piano teacher has started planning her pupils' work for the next academic year and has told me that if my daughter wishes to make any progress on the piano, she will need to do a minimum of I hrs practice a day.

For background, my daughter is 16, has passed piano grade VIII (138) and has just sat 11 GCSEs. She also plays the cello and is taking her ATCL Recital Diploma later this week. She will be taking 5 A levels (4 languages and music). She also suffers from epilepsy which is not fully controlled and is not supposed to get too tired.

She is considering a career in music (on the cello), but is not sure about this yet - mainly because of her health. She is a very hard worker but she (and we, her parents) are worried about her workload next year and feel that an hours piano practice a day on top of 1.5 to 2 hrs cello as well as homework is just too much.

Her piano teacher is adamant that anything less than an hour wil not be productive, so it appears that our daughter has three options - continue with same teacher, give up altogether (not a popular one!) or see if other teachers feel that progress can be made on less practice and if so, change teachers.

Do the teachers here feel that an hours practice is absolutely necessary? We would be really grateful for your advice/views. Thanks.

My gut reaction is that the best practice one does isn't subject to a stopwatch.

I've had really productive practice sessions of 10 minutes....and total wastes of an hour or more at a time.

When I started singing lessons, I was doing a very high-pressure job (European FD for a quoted American company), and didn't have much time or energy to practise on weekday evenings. My singing teacher was aware of this, and accepted that this meant I wouldn't progress as fast as I could have done had I been able to practise every day. And that acceptance that I'd do what I could meant that the pressure was off me, and I did actually progress at a reasonable pace.

I now have this same understanding with my pupils. They are aware that there is a payoff between how fast they progress and how much USEFUL practice they do (note the USEFUL) but that it's up to them how fast they want to go/can go with their current commitments. I'd never prescribe how much practice they do - I just make sure they know what the consequences are of more or less practice.

It sounds like your daughter's teacher isn't the sort to work in partnership with her pupils. At the level your daughter has now reached, this becomes a lot more important, she has to start making her own musical decisions rather than just blindly obeying teacher. And one of those decisions is about how much practice she wants/needs to do. And if her teacher can't come to terms with this, maybe it is time to look for someone new to teach her.

In an ideal world, an hours practice for both cello and piano would be wonderful, but your daughter lives in the real world and not some utopia, so things need to be paced around her.

She sounds a very able person, but her health must come first. Her epilepsy almost certainly leaves her tired and groggy at times, so she needs to build time to recover into her schedules or she will make herself ill.

It is important that everyone involved in her education puts her health first and reduces the amount of stress on your daughter.

This is where you are required to be a proactive parent and make sure everyone understands. (I had to visit the school re my son's Asthma to get working arrangements in place).

At the end of the day, the most important thing is your daughters health, happiness and general welfare. If her piano teacher will not move, find anotherone who is more accommodating.

Best of luck.

JoD

If your daughter is set on a career playing the cello (and not piano) then her piano skills are already well up to standard. Most music colleges require grade 5 level piano. Unless she is thinking of joint first study cello/piano (which is not widely available) then it really isn't necessary to progress further on piano. Maybe keep up playing for pleasure without too much pressure? I believe that progress can still be made without practicing 1hr per day, just on playing pieces that you like and getting them to a good standard. Also, colleges only require about 2 A Levels, so even if she does want to keep her options open, is it really wise be to be taking on so many AS levels unnecessarily?

I know some who passed their diploma on cello and was also a skilled pianist. However, in addition to 4 AS Levels, she failed her piano diploma. But really, it doesn't matter. To be grade 8 on 2 instruments is a big achievement in itself, and few people can claim to be at diploma level on two very different instruments, especially at such a young age.

Your post says that your daughter has just sat 11 GCSE's and will be embarking on a 5 subject 'A'level course. How many hours study has she/will be done/doing for that lot .



After taking G8, I hardly think her music teacher is being unreasonable asking her to do at least one hour practice. Her epilepsy is not an issue here if she is on the correct control medication and dosage. I have seen quite a few epileptics in my time as a doctor and most of them lead very very active lives both physically and mentally, and have their conditions well treated and under control. Please do not use your daughters condition as some barrier to prevent her from stretching her capabilities, she will only become resentful in the end.

At that level it is quite likely that an hours practice happens naturally, some technical work and a little time spent working on maybe 2 pieces easily takes an hour without even trying.

It is very impressive if she has a distinction at grade 8 on less than an hour a day, that works out as spending only 15 - 20 minutes on each piece and on scales with no room for any fun playing or sight reading.

Does she really need to do 5 A levels, that is a lot. How about 3 languages and music?? Just a thought.
Beverley.

Why does she need to 'progress' on the piano? Her A' levels will take a lot of time and work; her cello is her principal instrument and she's already got grade eight!

Chat to the teacher. Express your concerns re: health, cello and A' levels coming first. If possible then try and make piano stress relief, something enjoyable with out targets for practice and worries about lack of progress. She'll progress plenty by enjoying and playing music of a relatively high standard, but not necessarily for such long periods a day.

I too have wasted many an hour doing practice that has got me nowhere. It's the quality that counts

Obviously celloma's daughter is NOT yet at the stage where her epilepsy is totally under control if you read her post.

I agree with those who concentrate on quality rather than quantity of practice, and I also think that having got to the level she is at, she is already doing very well. If it came down to it and she really needed to improve after school before going to college, there is always the possibility of taking a year out to work really hard, but with 2 good grade 8s when she has only just done her GCSEs it's not like she has to get through a lot of grades/work in the next 2 years to think about studying music.

Her health is too important to risk it - take it from someone who suffers with poor health. Taking things a little easy now and possibly taking a year longer to get where she wants to go is certainly worth preserving her health. A year's grace now could save many years recovery later on.

I agree with sbhoa that at your daughter's standard she will probably use an hour quite easily practising a few scales, pieces and exercises, plus a little playing for fun. At that grade, an hour slips by in a moment.

I would expect any pupil of mine of around that standard to do at least one hour's practice each day, with, perhaps a little leeway for very busy days...perhaps a 'practice holiday' one day a week or something.

I must agree with Jod and Sarah - your daughter's health is most important. Are her piano and cello teachers aware of her condition and how it affects her?

I'm also inclined to think that 5 subjects next year might be too much - is she planning to complete them all? I did 3 A Levels (Music, Maths and French) and along with clarinet, piano and viola that didn't leave much time for anything else.

I hope your daughter does well in her diploma this week! She has already exceeded the instrumental level required to study music at university. If she is aiming at music college, she won't need 5 AS levels, and might do well to specialise on the cello more for the next couple of years, as her piano ability sounds more than adequate!

Thank you for all the replies - very interesting and helpful.

Just a couple of points:

If our daughter only played the piano, then we would have no problem with the 1 hrs practice. It is the combination of the two instruments and the total of 2.5 to 3 hrs practice a night (plus the 2-3 hrs homework) that worries us. However, if some of the replies on this thread are anything to go by, I think we might be going to find it difficult to find a piano teacher who will be willing to take her on if she is unable to to do this amount of practice.

Daughter has made her A level choices to keep her university options open - Latin and Greek(for classics), German and Italian (for modern languages) and Music. Her school consider that she is more than capable of coping with the workload.

Roger - after 4 years on various medications, her epilepsy has not been controlled. She has 2 or 3 seizures a week and each is followed by a 24-36 hrs of a migraine type headache and nausea. The consultant neurologist is stunned by what our daughter achieves but feels that she may be overdoing things - we would not restrict our daughter in any way - and she herself would not let us!

Elliewelly - all her teachers are aware of her health issues - most have been marvellously supportive, but not all. Thank you for the best wishes for the diploma - our daughter says thank you too!

Good luck with your daughter, she sounds like one tough cookie, who certainly has determination in spades.

Listen to her neurologist, and try to plan time for her to relax. You are not restricting her, you are stopping her "burning out". Trust me, as someone who has spent time in hospital with severe migraines, and has rebuilt my life to accommodate health issues, I am constantly being told to cut out stress. I too find it difficult to adjust to it, but I've had to.

I would urge your daughter to slow down a little for her sake. By cutting down, she is no failure. If she really wants this work load, is there any way she can spread the work over three years?

With very kind regards

JoD

So if her neurologist thinks she is overdoing things then why on earth is she contemplating doing 5 'A' levels. Surley even you must know this is going to be more of a strain for her than a paltry 1 hours practice on the piano. Two to three seizures a week (I presume they are all 'grand mal' seizures and not 'petit mal')? That's a fairly high incidence and I would have thought would have been regulated with phenytoin by now, especially as the incidence of seizures normally lessens with advancing age.

You're talking nonsense.

If the girl's as "poorly" as it appears she is from her mother's comments then the 'red herring' about 1 hours piano practice is totally out of context to the bigger and more significant problem of all the other subjects and studies which are a greater contribution to her demise than the extra piano practice.

Concern for the girls health? Your advice should be that she should immediately cease doing any activity which will exacerbates an epileptic episode. One extra hours piano practice pales into insignificance compared to all the other intellectual activities she's currently doing.

Do you have any idea what it is like to have health issues that effect your ability to do what you want? Have you any idea of the self-esteem that can be gained or lost by having or not having activities to do and things to be good at despite your health issues? If you have got an idea of it, then you should instantly see that "don't do anything" can be as unhelpful as doing too much, and if you *don't* know what it's like, then YOU are the one talking nonsense.

I have had bad health since I was about 11, and I DO know what it is like both to be unable to do things, and to make decisions to do or not do things being well aware of the affect they will have on both my health and my self-esteem/mental wellbeing. I have also seen people who had similar problems who chose or were forced by health issues to stop all activities, and the long term affect it has had on them. Yes, celloma's daughter has to be careful, but saying "stop everything" is almost as bad as doing too much.

Musical activities can be done now or later - A Levels are much harder to go back to (friend of mine did it and ended up having to pay for a lot of tuition which would have been free had she done it when when was 17-18). I think celloma and her daughter, and her daughter's doctor, have a whole lot more idea of what stresses her, what she can cope with, etc, than you do who have never met her and who declared her epilepsy to be "not an issue", having clearly not read celloma's post properly.

You also assume that for everyone that academic work/A Levels will be more stressful or more taxing than music practice, which is a totally false assumption. It depends so much on the individual - I know it was the case with me, and I know others who would say the same, that A Levels were relatively easy compared to the work I did on my instruments - I found doing sufficient and good violin practice much harder work, even though usually enjoyable, than writing an English essay which I found reasonably easy to do a good job on. The music practice was far more tiring and a good deal more stressful. Celloma's daughter may decide she won't do 5 A Levels in the end, but it's something that needs to be decided by her and people who actually know her and kow what she finds easy/hard/taxing, not on the blanket assumption that "an hour's piano practice is much easier than A Level work".

I will answer your post, but not here as this is not the forum for a diatribe about ill health.

I think the forums cafe may be the best venue!

Celloma, I could be wrong, but if she wants to do something to do with the classical languages such as Latin and Greek at university, then I don't think it is a requirement that she does both. As a student who has just finished AS (4 proper subjects plus general studies), although compared to GCSE 5 sounds like hardly anything, the workload is hard, and it would probably more beneficial to do 4 - not even the top universities want students to do more than 4 and all ask for 3. Anyway, I'm drifting off track. Basically, all the best to your daughter, and if you want to ask me any qustions about ######, then feel free to PM me

Just a small point. I have six dipomas, including two fellowships, and have never done an hours practice a day in my life! Nor have I ever practiced EVERY day.

Ann

As someone who has had to give up certain much-loved activities due to ill-health, I re-iterate what I said earlier. Do what you can to the level you can without becoming ill.

Do the A' levels you can manage, but if things become too much, then be quick to realise and drop one. Or more. Re-assess at the end of the school year, once you've decided what university course you want.

If the cello is the favourite, keep that up. You don't need to do two hours' parctice a day - you may, but it is not a pre-requisite to doing well. She need not take any more exams, surely? Even for music school, she's well-qualified.

Play and progress on the piano in spare time. Use it to relieve stress, or to do something that isn't work. Progress will happen, but without the stress that an exam focus brings.

"Her school consider that she is more than capable of coping with the workload."
She probably is capable of coping with the academic workload. She probably is capable of 2 hours cello practice, and 1 hour piano practice ... but not all at the same time, whilst still saving time for a bit of R&R.

I work full time, do 1 hour piano practice a day, plus voice and Kodaly practice, and am very active in my church. It is a full life, but I do the the music for fun. That is a huge difference.


"Just a small point. I have six dipomas, including two fellowships, and have never done an hours practice a day in my life! Nor have I ever practiced EVERY day."
Ann, you're my hero.

Well, the consultant neurologist has indicated that your daughter may be overdoing things! You should now step back and look at the bigger picture.

With regards to her A levels, if her school says she can cope with it, do they know how much practice she needs to do for her cello and piano? What about any other extra-curricular activities that she does? Have they considered that too? I did five A levels and that alone takes up a lot of time and I did struggle to keep up with all the work, not to mention my music theory and piano, choir, band and orchestra practices and rehearsals, and extra-curricular activities. If she says she can cope with it, then fine - she should know when she gets too tired, I hope!

Looking at things now, she already spends 1.5-2 hours on cello - what is required for piano is clearly less than that. An average of one hours' piano practice post-Grade 8 is a reasonable demand in my view. At that level, practising the piano shouldn't be that taxing. In fact, why not make it 1.5-2 hours as well if she is looking at a piano diploma? I cannot comment on the necessary practice required for diploma level singing as my vocal training has not reached that level.

If you feel that that you cannot budge on the A levels and cello, then you should scrap everything else or speak to the piano teacher about her situation in detail and that you merely want her to maintain her piano playing at Grade 8 standard with regular lessons and no more than that. Without regular practice, I am afraid her piano playing will deteriorate to a level lower than Grade 8 sooner than you think.


And to AnnC, I think you are just naturally talented compared to the rest of us mere mortals...!

An hour a day is one thing (and at that level is as previously mentioned very easy to eat up) but perhaps not every single day. If there are days when you feel utterly woeful, slogging it out on a piano for 60 plus minutes is not going to be either productive or enjoyable. There are plenty of days when I cannot face looking at the wretched thing and days when I lose 2-3 hours solid on it, playing stuff of all levels, some for sight reading and or quick study, some for development and some for fun and or research for students.

I think the best thing is to go with the flow rather than setting stringent timings on it, my uni singing teacher would advise me never to go a long slog at practice as it would tire, demoralise and possibly damage my voice, she advised bit of practice here and there which I would agree with, especially when I had a bout of glandular fever in the run before one of my recitals and was merrily singing everything down an octave (for some reason the Habenera sounds quite good down there, especially if you adopt a Yorkshire accent when doing so!) The voice is something you have to take good care of so it forces you think about your health, whereas you can forget yourself on other instruments.

Yes most teachers will ask that amount of practice from you post grade 8, but if there are extenuating circumstances such as an ongoing health problem then you have to be sympathetic. Your daughter sounds like the kind of girl who wouldn't slack off diliberately and understands the commitment involved.

As for 5 Alevels- eek, I did 4 (one in a year the rest the next) and found that quite enough along with the musical extras of multiple instruments!

I agree with nicki that universities don't necessarily require both Latin and Greek for entry onto classics courses as many now train students up from scratch in the one they haven't studied.

I'd say your daughter should do three langs (one classical) and music, concentrate on cello whilst keeping piano on a "low burn", perhaps lessons fortnightly or three-weekly, with maybe an hour's practice every two or three days/weekends.

I hope she manages to find a balance that works for her, she sounds very talented. I'll also keep my fingers crossed that they manage to find some medication to control her seizures more effectively.

benjaminja

I have a feeling your particular question is one which Stevehopwood would be able to give some helpful thoughts on. You might be able to track him down at the Alternative fora

My gut reaction (as a non teaching non piano playing parent of non piano players ) is that it all seems rather a lot. You need to identify the purpose of the proposed further piano lessons. If your daughter wants to become even better than the grade VIII distinction standard she already is, I can see how that may take not just time, but energy and concentration which is already going to be thinly spread due to her other commitments. I wonder if in between "pressing on" and "stopping altogether" there is a middle ground of eg having half an hour a fortnight with a friendly but good teacher which is not specifically aimed at cranking up her performance another notch, but at exploring a little more music which is within her current capability, for the sheer enjoyment of it.

Thanks for the vote of confidence! I don't know about that, but I sometimes wonder what I COULD have achieved if I HAD practiced more!

I think if you had practised more, there wouldn't be a diploma at that high a level for you to take!
You're in Bristol? Maybe I can cheer you on at one of your concerts too!

I don't know anything about epilepsy and I'm nowhere near as talented as your daughter but I just wanted to say that I hope you can sort something out that she'll be happy with. I'll be starting my AS levels in September and it is quite rare for students to take 5 AS levels (at least at the college I'll be going to) but if she enjoys those subjects and is reasonably good at them, then the workload might not seem so heavy. Zoda's idea of fortnightly piano lessons sounds good - it would give her time to explore the repertoire in a more relaxed manner and it wouldn't matter so much if she had a bad week.

Good luck!

Somerset really, but I do sing in Bristol. I'll let you know...

If the neurologist thinks your daughter needs to cut down on her workload a bit, she might end up having to choose whether to drop a subject, spend less time on piano or on cello. I think Sarah's idea of taking a year out to hone her instrumental skills if necessary is a good one, however if she is hoping to study languages or classics there will be no need.

I too have long term health issues (hypermobility syndrome causing daily pain and dislocations, suffer quite badly from asthma and had psychiatric problems for 20 years) which mean that I need to pace myself. It's all very well to have a manic week like this one, but next week I will have to rest more. I hope your daughter is able to find a manageable balance next term.

The most important person here is your daughter.

Issues of health, self-esteem and drive all come into play here.

It is hard to adjust to having health problems, but adjust you must. And you or your daughter driving her even harder by ambition is going to do her no good.

I don't know what the answer is, but her neurologist has said cut back. Do you want to put your daughter in hospital because her epilepsy is out of control. Both Roger and FC have medical knowledge and are trying to tell you that everyone needs to adjust to her health problems.

By doing so you are not letting your daughter down, you are giving her love and support to deal with her physical needs.

Talk to the school, see if she her proposed plan of A/S and A2 over three years. Why not do 3 A/s subjects this year, the remaining two the next along with on A2, and finish the other A2s the next year or just leave them as AS levels as appropriate.

Get the music practice to a managable level.

Your daughter needs some rest. Not just when she is recovering from the seisures but between them. It is hard to learn to relax when you are very driven person, but you have to.

I'm not medical, but I have been there done that and worn the T shirt, and believe you me the 10 days I spent in Huddersfield Royal Infirmary suffering from Hemi-paresis of the Right Hand side, not knowing whether I would make a full recovery were very frightening. I've spent enough time in neuro wards, learning how to walk again to know how awful it can be. And that was due to hemi-plagic migraines brought on by stress.

Now do you want your daughter to go through that?

Ooh Elliewelly what's your hypermobility syndrome? I have one too

Many thanks for all your replies - they have been very interesting and helpful to read and have given us much to think about. Thank you too to those of you who were prepared to share their own health issues and what you have learned from them.

What we already knew and has been reinforced here is that it is essential that our daughter finds a healthy balance in her life between her various commitments and interests and relaxation. This was the main reason I started the thread as we needed the information about teachers attitudes to practice so that she and we could decide how best to proceed.

Our daughter really loves her academic work and like Sarah-flute finds it less stressful than some of her more intensive music practice. The school are fully aware of her musical commitments (she holds both music and academic scholarships) but still feel that her AS choices will not be a problem. Daughter has already said that if things become difficult she will drop a subject and the school are happy with this. We had already queried the need for both classics subjects, but have been advised that the school's classics department is known by the university admissions tutors to be one of the largest and best in the country and that anyone hoping to read classics from there will need to offer both subjects.

We have not been able to find anything that exacerbates her epilepsy and even the neurologist says that there is no certainty that she is overloaded as her seizures continue at the same rate even when she is on holiday etc. All we can do is continue to see if we can identify anything (including reducing her workload) and keep trying the different medications in the hope of finding one that works.

Daughter does not wish to cut down on the cello practice as this is her first love so unless we can find a very special piano teacher out there who is prepared to compromise on what is usually expected at this standard because of the circumstances, then I fear she may end up having to give up the piano.

The size/reputation of the department should have no bearing on anything. University admissions procedures are now, in theory, much fairer than this.

Anyone applying to read classics where both languages are required will of course need to have studied both languages, but she would not be expected to offer both if applying for one of the courses that does not specify both as a prerequisite for entry.

Sounds to me like the classics department at the school know your daughter will get them a couple more As so don't want to risk not having her on board...

Possibly Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. Lots of pain, very clumsy, daily dislocations/ subluxations, stretchy skin, poor healing, probs with jaw, back, neck, wrists, ankles and feet. 3 jaw operations and 3 cortisone injections so far. You wouldn't know anything was wrong unless I did my tricks though.

I pity you. Fibromyalgia is bad enough. Again people say I look well even when I'm in a lot of pain!

Well, its difficult, but certainly her health has to take COMPLETE priority.

Firstly I should say she is doing one A level too many in view of her strong (and very talented ) music activities.

I dont think she should be doing more than two hours total music practice a day whilst doing all those A levels. I would say 75-90 mins on her main instrument and 30 - 45 mins on her secondary.

I went though all this my self way back in 1963-4 when I was doing Maths ,Physics, and Chemistry + General paper at A level, as well as ALCM piano and Grade 8 (ABRSM) Organ.
But my intention was never to do music as a career, so I doubt if I did more than an hour a day on the piano and the organ only an hour twice a week (I only had limited access to the organ) . DEspit having no health problems I coudnt have coped with any more. But I got the ALCM and would have got a distinction on Grade 8 organ if I hadnt (unusually for me) fouled up some Aural tests.

But what great pleasure I have had, and still get, out of music just as a hobby, without the pressure of too much public performance.

Well said!

There's no point pushing yourself beyond your comfortable threshold, especially if you are sick!

Me too

I'm clumsy and dislocate easily too - not too much pain, but that might be because I'm used to it!! Three back operations and am banned from a lot of sports (and I can't hald a F horn correctly!). I have a few tricks, and even then it took docs several years to spot the diagnosis

Do you know about their fora? Here it is. I don't post too often, I don't think I'm in as much pain as some & feel a bit of a fraud! They're very supportive though.

You probably won't see this 'til tomorrow, when I'll be MARRIED!