Practice, Practice, Practice
Sunday, May 21, 2017 by Hamdani, Laurie | Practice
Much has been written about the merits of practice. I don’t subscribe to the old adage “practice makes perfect” as some aspects of musical interpretation are inherently subjective. But, there is no doubt that “pracices makes better performance”. Part of my job as a music educator is to teach students not only why practice matters, but how to do it. A recent study showed that successful performance was less about the number of times a piece or a passage was played correctly but rather about the number of times mistakes were made and then carefully studied and revisited in order to understand how the error occurred. In my workplace outside of my music studio, we have studied the conscious competence ladder (read more here). This model applies to any new skill one hopes to acquire and master and is also relevant for students learning to read music and play an instrument.
One hallmark of success is continuity and repetition. One needs only to recall a child learning the alphabet or mastering multiplication facts or an adult learning to salsa dance or prepare for a marathon. To this point, Lydia Keeney has great suggestions in her article below:
Need more ideas or inspiration? Please let me know!
