hi. just wonder what is the average years for adult to complete abrsm violin from beginner?How many hours needs to practice daily?

Hallo,
I think it is one of those, "How long is a piece of string", type questions. It depends where you are starting from in musical experience, how long you can practice each day, how keen you are to do the exams and how good the tea is?

At my rate I am looking to do Grade 8 then I am 90 and have a huge amount of musical fun along the way.

Children beginning at age 7 or 8 wold expect to do a grade a year.
But an adult already reading music and being prepared to put in plenty of practice , and with lessons form a good teacher might manage it it 5-6 years. Its up to you eally how much time you put in.

There is a school of thought, with good supporting evidence, that it takes 10,000 hours of "directed practice" to reach a professional standard in anything.

If we take DipABRSM as representing a professional standard then it comes down to how long it will take to do the 10,000 hours.

Working at it full time (40 hours a week) that is 5 years. You would have to be enormously gifted and/or hard working to get from beginner to first Diploma any faster than that.

At a more realistic 20 hours a week (about 3 hours a day) it is 10 years.

Bear in mind that "directed practice" is a precise technical term. It is NOT the same as "Time spent with your instrument". It is possible to spend many hours - quite possibly enjoyable hours, that do not count towards that total.

So allowing for years when you lose interest, wasted time, missed practice sessions etc.

It could easily take 20 years or more.

I don't see how this can be. My experience is that it depends very much on how much the person wants to study and also their own natural talent. Some people are so crazy about their subject that they soak up everything like a sponge and need almost no time to get to a high standard.

With such people, doing a grade every six months is easy. A friend of my son got from grade 5 to 8 in clarinet in two years.
Also, if they read music and already play an instrument, they'll probably get to grade 5 within a few years anyway.

Steve (Wishing I was one of those people!!)

Mad Tom, your answers are always spot on. Learning an instrument = A discovery in learning to have patience

The idea is based on the fact that people who are keen on something practise more.



Several studies have shown that most people who achieve a high standard in music do a lot of practise, and it has proved very difficult to identify a group of especially gifted people who learn quickly. Obviously, there are the people like Mozart who learn so fast that they just could not have amassed the amount of practice needed, but these studies are actualy talking about the general population.



The evidence suggests that high achievers practice more, and that their practise is more "directed". In fact there is more that one study which sugests that musicians who have achieve a high standard have actually practised so much that their measured rate of improvement is actually abnormally *slow* (i.e. practise hours per grade).



Within limits, there is no evidence that adults learn music more slowly than children if you relate things back to hours of proper practise. I posted one of the articles on here years ago.



Similarly with language, although Steven Pinker et al. insist that adults can't learn languages, the simple fact is that if you take someone of the streets of Britain and throw them into a prison in Bangkok where they hear nothing but Thai for 5 years, then they will emerge (if they emerge at all) speaking the language fluently. The experiment has been done time and time again and it always works. I personally feel that the "Pinker" school of language acquisition is very heavily biased by US culture - the Americans are even worse than the Brits at speaking other languages.



To come back to the original question - I was once told that it takes 20 years of daily practise to become a good pianist. I think that's about right!!

I agree, i do a lot of practice (usually), and seem to be getting on fairly quick, as far as i can make out from what i have heard. i started from scratch --- not even knowing what a crochet was! I think it is important to add that i do practice in a structured way ( except when messing about), so you need to practice in the correct way as well! I started playing grade 2 at about 3 months. It is like you say, the amount of work/practice done is because i love playing the violin. But, some people simple do not have the time------ however, i even stay up to 1.30 in the morning if i have to. So, if you only manage 20mins/day, then i quite believe it could take 1-1.5 years per grade-----but if you are fine with that----thats o.k.

The figure often quoted for Grade 8 is 2000 hours. With due regard to stevensfo's comment that is not set in stone. Some people will be quicker, some slower, though I also concur with StuMac - those who appear to advance effortlessly in very little time actually put in a lot of work.

Dare I ask why the OP needs to know anyway? It's not a race, and there are no prizes for reaching a particular grade within a short period of time.

There's plenty of great music out there without the need to do exams, but if the need strikes, take as long as necessary. If one feels the need, what's better - taking X years and passing with 100, or taking Y years and passing with 140?

There are a few things with which I've been involved in the past that I would never have started had I known just how long it would take, but the journey to the final destination (including a few beautiful diversions as well as a couple of dead ends) has been a fantastic one, with the rough bits of path making the arrival taste all the sweeter

Are you saying the figure to reach grade 8 from 0 is 2000 hours or grade 7 - 8 is 2000 hours? (You can tell I havent a clue!)

Just for a laugh... (based on 2000 hours for grade 0-8)

By my calculations 2000 hours divide 8 grades = 250 hours per grade.
At grade 2ish currently so 250 x 6 remaining grades = 1500 hours left to go.
1500 divide 10 hours practice per week = 150 weeks of practice.
150 divide 52 weeks per year.....

....... only 2.8 years to go until I will be collecting my grade 8 certificate.

Never in a million years will that happen! He he

If someone really did that much _quality_ practice then I don't see why not.

I've just had a quick play with the calculator and starting from a position of being fairly competent at playing various recorders (ie: a bit of musical awareness and ability to read the wrong clef for it) I reckon it took me less than 100 hours per grade to reach grade 7 viola (from about aged 9 to about 16/17)

The OP should bear in mind that we're all different and also our circumstances change from time to time.

I started at Gr5 and passed Gr8 in two years - without skipping any grades in between on classical guitar - same as Violin it's got strings!!

At the time I was really driven to achieve my goal and I managed it with the tremendous help of my tutors.

Unfortunately, just after my Gr8 my circumstances changed (some will know why) and for a while I just couldn't bring myself to play. So for me the "rush to proceed" was definitely the right thing to do, because if I'd delayed I don't think I would have ever reached my goal.

I didn't have a specific time frame in mind, but I was determined to try and move from grade to grade as quickly as possible. Because I had to do the Theory paper as well I ended up taking an exam just about one every six months.

In addition work has recently got really busy, and at this stage I don't think I could put in the same amount of practice as I was able to do previously.

I have the Dip niggling in the back of my mind and the only reason I haven't mentioned it to my tutor is that knowing what I had to do to get to Gr8, I'm not sure I have the fortitude to go for it. If anyone has any thoughts/suggestions I'd be grateful.

Anyway, back on topic, whilst it is true that dilligent practice is a must, only you can determine whether or not you have the time and motivation to reach your goal.

By the way I'm not saying that Gr8 is the be all and end all - just that it was my objective at that particular time. Loads of people will remind you that it's not a race and that ultimately the more dilligent you are with your journey the better player you will be - and I wouldn't contradict that.

Best of Luck,
Kind Regards,

Nigel

According to John Sloboda of Keele University (Chapter 4 of "The Road To Excellence, edited by K. Anders Ericsson) the total hours from beginner to Grade 8 is approaching 3,500. Those "quick learners" may appear to learn effortlessly with little time invested. Appearances are often deceptive. When you start to keep accurate logs you find out just how much they really do.

. No it is 3,500 - give or take a few hundred to account for genetic differences and previous experience.

Unfortunately the figures in the study are presented in a bar chart, so it is hard to read off accurate numbers per grade, but Grade 7 to Grade 8 appears to be about 1000 hours - which is almost as many as it takes to go from beginner to Grade 5



Not so simple. According to the same study the time to improve by one grade is not constant. It gets greater with each successive grade. (See previous point)

Perhaps we can treat the DipABRSM as being somewhat below a professional standard of performance, and so requiring fewer than 10,000 hours. Perhaps 7,000 is more realistic .

I am sure there are people that can achieve it but I wont be one of them. It would take me a whole year for my sight reading to improve to the next grade!




Yes I agree with that... I was just being silly really!

Surely a beginner would progress alot faster with a good teacher to encourage them and show good technique?

great info from all the feedback!
Just hope i can motivated myself toward next grade. Hopefully can achive better playing in few years time.
At least now i knew i should try to get 1- 2hour per day for effective practice.

how we know which is a "good teacher"?
what is the criteria of a " good teacher"?

This thread is really interesting as I have just finished reading about the 10,000 hour rule in Outliers By Malcolm Gladwell. Though his book implies that the 10,000 hour rule is more about getting to world class level rather than just a professional standard.

The research he quotes was done on how much practise music students had completed by the time they were 20 - all were at a standard good enough to be "an elite Academy of music" so I assume that means Conservatoire so surely already all at least grade 8 if not close to DipABRSM. Before asking for assessment of the level of practice the tutors assessed the students into 3 groups: firstly the stars who had potential to be world class soloists, second those considered merely "good" and thirdly those who were unlikely to make it playing "professionally" (though still good enough to get into conservatoire).

By age of 20 the first group had generally done at least 10,000 hours, the good students 8000 hours, the third group 4000 hours.

The level reached by the 10,000 hours practice people here seems to be well in excess of the DipABRSM. One of the points made in the book is that this research is done on people who already have enough ability to get into music school. But not sure whether the research has been skewered to fit in with the theme of the book though as this then ties in with other points he makes later on.

The book you quoted about the hours to grade 8 sounds very interesting, and maybe more robust in its citation of research. I'll see if I can find a copy. Outliers is more of a light weight read, and some of the examples seem to have been manipulated a bit to try and fit his point but I found some of it quite interesting.

I estimate it took me about 500 hours practice to get to grade 5 on the oboe, but I wasn't a complete beginner as I could already read music and play another woodwind instrument so not sure how that influences the practice hours as I could transfer some skills across. I'm thinking of keeping a log to see how many hours it takes me to get to grade 8!

It would be interesting to know if the level of practice required is different for different instruments. I read something (also talking about the 10,000 hour rule) in a book that I borrowed from the library which suggested that it was! Was the research from Keele based on one particular instrument or a cross section?

I think the most heartening part of the research quoted in Outliers is that they found no "grinders" - i.e. people who put in significantly more work than others while still being stuck in the third or second group. So the key thing that I took away was that if I practise then I WILL get better!

Take a look at INNATE TALENTS: REALITY OR MYTH? http://www.bbsonline.org/Preprints/OldArchive/bbs.howe.html

This talks about the 10000 hours figure and also mentions 3300 for Grade 8 (where my 2000 came from I can't recall but apparently I have more work to do). Incidentally I did mean 0-8 in 2000 hours. Anyhow bearing in mind a "Group 3" conservatoire student will be a pretty good player, I'm not going to worry too much about trying to pack in 10000 hours. I've left it a bit late now.

Interestingly I was looking through the RNCM prospectus today. They have a scheme where a 3rd year undergrad student can have their year end recital judged for LRSM and postgrads can have their final recital judged for FRSM. That perhaps puts into context the relative standards.

I played viola for a few years, have sung and dabbled with other instruments. When I started oboe last year, my teacher said "well your not a beginner". I reckon I got to Grade 4 in a little under 400 hours and I reckon 600 will get me to Grade 5 so I'm sure previous knowledge and experience do help. I am expecting that as I progress into the higher grades that early advantage will be less apparent.

The research was apparently carried out on violinists and pianists and came to similar conclusions.

Indeed. In fact the article I posted a link to suggests "talent" doesn't enter into the equation. However, I think it is important to bear in mind that the hours quoted are an "approximate average". Some people, for whatever reason, will need less time and some will need more. I have no idea what the distribution curve would look like.

I would just sum up by saying I think it's daft to berate anyone for asking the question "how long will it take"? It's a perfectly normal thing for someone to contemplate. I have an idea based on my experience so far of how long it will take me to get to Grade 8. But I accept I may be completely wrong and that it's not a race. The journey is interesting in itself.

I started violin in October 2007 and in December 2008 passed my grade 4. I had played an instrument before so reading and understanding music wasn't a problem I also had sat in my son's violin lessons so understood a lot of what my teacher was trying to teach me.
Since then I've concentrated on developing my technique. Initially I hadn't thought about exams but in the back of my mind I do keep wondering if I could make it to grade 8. I'm not in any rush as it'll only be for my own satisfaction.

An interesting answer to this question for grades 6-8 can be found on the UCAS Tariff. (In case you don't know what I'm on about, UCAS are the university application people, and some universities make offers based on UCAS points achieved rather than specific grades - for example, one of my university offers was 240 points, which would equate most directly to 3 Cs but could instead be ABD or AAU. Every A and AS Level grade has a certain number of points attached to it in their Tariff, and many other qualifications can also carry UCAS points, including grade 6-8 practical and theory exams).

http://www.ucas.com/students/ucas_tariff/factsheet/music



These were the figures given by the Expert Group who were consulted in order to assess the exams and work out how many points they should be awarded, in April 2002. The Expert Group included the ABRSM Director of Examinations and the Syllabus Development Manager, the Edexcel Chief Examiner for A Level Music and a music lecturer from Kings College London. You can read and download the full Expert Group report (PDF) from the UCAS website - it makes for very interesting reading, though it is 53 pages long.

It's important to note that these figures also include lesson and practice time, so if you take off lesson time the actual amount of practice is reduced further. Based on that, if you allowed for a 1hr lesson per week you could get from grade 7 to 8 in a year by doing 40 minutes of practice per day, or with a 30min weekly lesson with 45 minutes of daily practice:

294 hours/52 weeks = 5.65hrs per week
5.65 hrs per wk - 1hr lesson = 4.65hrs
4.65hrs*60mins = 280 mins per week
280/7 days = 40 mins per day

I'm not entirely convinced by that (the people I knew in high school doing grade 8 were putting in 2-3 hours a day by that stage) but I presume it's possible. 45 hours to go from grade 5 to grade 6 theory would be 15mins of work per day for 6 months, without any dedicated face-to-face teaching time. I only really have my personal experience to go on with theory, and I think it took me about that (I did an average of about 30mins a day for 3 months, but then I don't know how I did in the exam yet!) but I don't know if this correlates with other people's experiences.

The words 'average' and 'typical' are always dubious in any case, as the 'average' person and the 'typical' teacher are both purely hypothetical and neither actually exists. I've been told approximately a grade per year and about 10 years to get to grade 8 is average - obviously that doesn't add up, I think the latter is a more conservative estimate taking other commitments into account, and allowing for a longer than 1-year gap between starting the instrument and taking grade 1, as well as time to include the passing of grade 5 theory. Essentially, it takes as long as it takes.

I don't know what planet these people are from, but these are woeful underestimates of how much work it takes. The much higher figures (by a factor of 3 or 4 !!) from Sloboda's work (which I quoted earlier) are much more reliable - they are based on actual records and experiments rather than the opinions of the members of a commitee.

The report mentioned contains a table (page 18) showing the number of hours required. Allowing for the typos, the way I interpret it is that, for instance, getting to G6 needs 2 hours practice per week for a year. From what starting point though? The figures quoted are indeed nonsense. As are those in the table on page 26 - figures provided by ABRSM representatives (Philip Mundey, Director of Examinations and Nigel Scaife, Syllabus Development Manager).

Presumably that's starting from a Grade 5 position and then a number of hours per grade in which case they look quite reasonable figures to me.

3 days and fourteen minutes.

Allan









(I figured that seeing as everyone else was making a stab at effectively guessing a question which you can't guess the answer too, I'd have a go too...)

I also made that assumption, and on that basis they are huge underestimates. What "looks reasonable" can be very misleading. More reliable figures from properly documented studies (e.g. Sloboda quoted above, amongst others) come up with figures of approximately 1000 hours from Grade 5 to Grade 7, and about the same again from Grade 7 to Grade 8. A thousand hours equates to about 2 hours a day for a year and a half. That seems far more reasonable to me, at least it is a lot closer to what it took me, back in the early 1970's. There may well be some students that could achieve the grades in the study time suggested by UCAS, but they would be amongst the fastest learners. They would not be average - nowhere near.

Those UCAS people seem to think that acquiring performing skills on a musical instrument is comparable to typical classroom learning in conventional subjects. It is not. It is much more demanding in terms of time, intensity, and committment.

I agree with Mad Tom. The figures seem out by a factor of about 3. Grade 5-6 in a year on 2 hours practice a week? No way.

I would also imagine there are the type that work only to the syllabus, for example Grade X passed, then onto the next set of scales and exam pieces, so this could have the potential to shorten the time required to reach the next grade.

I know this seems to be the case with some children/parents. I am not sure about adult learners though, I would imagine most of us build in a lot of repertoire at each level.

True - but not by a factor of 3 or 4.

I would like to know whether everyone can reach grade 8 at all?

I did piano at school and passed grades 4 to 7 (one a year from age 12 to 15) but then couldn't make any progress at all, in fact I think my playing deteriorated and I gave up. I don't think I could ever have reached grade 8 however much I practised. I think I had reached my limits or is this not true?

You may have reached the limits of your persistence, or of the time and effort you were prepared to devote to it. I doubt that you were anywhere near the limits of your potential as a pianist.

Sometimes I have to abandon pieces and then tackle them a few weeks later and suddenly the difficult piece falls into place. Whether it was working on another piece that gave me the technique to resolve the tricky piece or just time, the same could be said for abandoning grade 8. At that point in your life you found it difficult, but you may not now.

I think as someone else said you might have reached your limits of perseverance rather than the limits of your actual technical/musical ability!

For me I view grade 8 as like a musical equivalent of a black belt. It shows a strong degree of dedication and perseverance, but is not an end in itself. Really it means you have reached a good point to really move into music at a deeper level.... [Imagine some Elgar paying while reading that ]

Of course I am still some years away from grade 8 piano, but when I returned to formal lessons in 2005 I set myself grade 8 as some kind of holy grail.

Cheers
N

Just thought I'd resurrect this topic, as the time figures for my Grade 6 are now in!

I took my Grade 5 exam on 11th March and my Grade 6 on 3rd December, 37 weeks and 1 day later. The total number of hours of practice/lessons in that time period was 162hrs 55mins, so call it 163hrs. This is 11% more than their estimate for Grade 5-6 of 147hrs, and I would argue that I am not their 'average' candidate - I'm 23 for a start, and I think the average age for a Grade 6 is about 15, and I've already got two other instruments at (and above) this level under my belt.

I will be continuing documenting my hours for Grade 7 and Grade 8. Is there anyone doing Grade 5/6/7 who would like to join me in this entirely unscientific experiment?

Dip abrsm is about the same standard as grade9 would be if there was one and is miles and miles below professional standard. At 1 grade a year it would take 9 years to get there.

Yes - strangely enough I was just thinking about this thread the other day!

Oboe is my third instrument - I already had grade 8 piano and grade 5 flute when i started, so probably couldn't class myself as a complete beginner. But I estimate it took about 500 hours to get from beginning to passing grade 5. This includes lesson time. I then didn't play for about 7 years.

I took up the instrument again last Summer. From starting practicing again - (probably around about grade 5 level, maybe a bit below to allow for the break) up to taking my grade 7 exam I did almost exactly 350 hours of lessons, practice and playing.

The estimated figues given are Grade 5-6 147, and Grades 6-7 195. That gives a total of 5-7 of 342 - so not really far off my experience!

I did wonder whether to include lessons and orchestra playing in my total, even though it isn't "directed practice" - in the end I decided I would as whenever I play I am improving my stamina, thinking about embouchure and tone - orchestra playing allows work on intonation and sight reading so I decided it was significantly contributing to my progress towards being a better oboist and so should strictly count in my hours!

I will also be counting my hours from grade 7 to 8 to see how long it takes!

Don't forget the time for reed making, and adjusting reeds this is very important for double reed players, and can be counted as practice.

Now you really are talking rubbish.

Yes it is important. No it doesn't count as oboe practice in my book, it is in addition to practice.

In that case so was the well known professioal oboist who said that 40% of practice should be reed making.......

Blimey it took me 15 years to reach 2nd Dan on around 8 hours of practice a week

I have gone from Grade 0 to Grade 4-5 in around 18 months on piano. I have practised a lot, at least 15 hours per week. I have had comments like "Oh you must be really musical/talented etc"

No, I practice a lot

I don't expect my journey from Grade 5 to 8 to take the same amount of time. probably quadruple the 18 months at least. I have discovered the joys of repertoire that is not on some exam syllabus for one! Although I do like the exam route to keep up some momentum but that's a personal choice.

How long it takes to get to Grade 8 is entirely dependant on how much work you are prepared to put in

So instead of doing two hours a day playing, I should be playing for about an hour and ten minutes and reed making for 50mins?

This is up to you. But you may find that if your reeds are working really well, you can get more benefit out of your practice session. Bought reeds are usually on the cheapest staple. However the staple is really an extension of the bore of your oboe. So in an ideal world, it is better if you play on reeds, where the staple matches the bore of your oboe.

In that case, if it's all the same to you, I'll stick to doing two hours playing and find some additional time (outside my "normal" practice sessions) for reed making.

What staples could you recommend? What would you say are the cheap ones to avoid? Which ones will suit my Howarth?

Which oboist was this? Sauce?

Lots of professional musicians are clearly bonkers, so this wouldn't surprise me.

Oh, and..

Your teacher or Howarths will be able to give you advice on this. Of course once you have bought your ideal staple they can be used over and over again. Some of mine have had several reeds on them.

What cane do you use? Do you find it more or less important than the staples? Which are the cheap staples to avoid? Howarth list staples from 1.90 to 13.50. Should I just avoid the cheapest or should I buy the expensive ones?

Yes it is! Aiming at each successive grade is what makes me practice. It is not what makes me play, but it is what makes me practice. The prize being my own personal satisfaction. Nobody else will ever particularly care what grade I achieve - it is just my own motivational tool.


LOL

Thought I would update this thread, just in case anyone is interested (Tixylix are you still counting?):
it took me 283 hours of practice/ playing to get from Grade 7 to Grade 8 (reasonably similar marks in each). This didn't include the time spent practising aural (easily another 10-20 if not more hours)

the UCAS thing quoted earlier in the thread suggested 294 hours...so actually not that far off, if my exam date had been a week or two later it would have been spot on!

I estimate it has taken me approx 1150 hours to get to Grade 8 from starting the oboe, though I did start from a position of being fluent in reading music and having previously played a wind instrument.

I am indeed still counting, my total for this year is around 175 hours so far. My Grade 6-7 time was 59 hours, but then I did 6 in November and 7 in March which is probably quite unusual. G6 mark was 110, G7 was 117 (I totally messed up the A piece in my G6, if I'd not fluffed that it would probably have been around the same). I'm doing G8 in the spring, probably around the beginning of March and so far my time from G7 to now is about 116hrs. I know I'm flying far under the radar here, which is...slightly worrying to be honest, though I suspect there will be a lot more hours in the weeks leading up to the exam.