Do you ever wonder if your Piano Practice is as effective as it might be? If you’d have asked me last week whether I practiced effectively, I’d probably have quite proudly answered ‘oh yes’. And I’d have really believed it.
Why my practice should be good
First, I have a very well defined planned set myself goals. I spend the vast majority of my daily practice sessions working on specific goals rather than just playing through pieces. If you read my post on practice planning, you’ll know that I put some time into this.
Secondly, I’ve done lots of research on effective practice, I’ve bought and studied books on the topic and implemented as many ideas as I can.
Thirdly, I regularly record myself so that I can self-critique. I even went as far as building the ability to record directly into my home-made Practice App on my iPad. I just plug my microphone into my iPad, press record and get a good enough quality recording to be able to really listen to how well I’m playing my pieces.
Surely then, I’m practicing effectively? I’m certainly practicing better than I ever used to.
How I discovered it isn’t
Well, despite all of the above, I discovered that in fact I’m not quite being as effective as I had imagined.
This realisation came when I decided to film myself practicing. As I said, when I practice, I spend the majority of my time working on specific things. I work on small sections, exercises built on problem areas and the like. I spend very little time actually playing. If I’ve filmed a practice session before, it has been a modified session where I’ve just played through my pieces so I can listen to them all back.
However, one Saturday afternoon, I decided to film a normal session. I just got the tripod out, attached my phone, plugged in my mic and pressed record. My original theory was that this would help me see weak areas in my playing …. however, what it showed me was how sometimes the actual weak area is how I’m practicing.
Liszt said ‘think ten times, play once’. If you follow me on Facebook you’ll have seen me post this fantastic piece of advice … advice that I was convinced I was following.
In Graham Fitch’s Piano Practice Series he talks about the importance of listening when you practice. Spotting errors, thinking about what you didn’t like and then how to fix the problem. Again, advice that I was convinced I was following.
So, still practicing wrong notes
So, now imagine my surprise when I realised that quite often I didn’t think even once never mind ten times. I simply played it wrong, immediately repeated it wrong, and then immediately repeated it wrong again. This is the classic case of Practicing Wrong Notes. I did a video on this some time ago as I thought it was a lesson I’d learned.
Basically, I was sitting at the piano and actually reinforcing those mistakes rather than fixing them. There was no pause (not even a second or two) to allow myself to consciously think about what went wrong. There was no effort to try to isolate what was actually tripping me up. However, what surprised me the most was that if you’d have asked me without my having seen that video, I would have honestly said that I would never just sit repeating wrong notes!!
Try it for yourself
So, I highly recommend you try this out for yourself. Just get your phone, position it somewhere that you get a good view of your hands, press record and then just get on with your practice. Don’t do anything that you wouldn’t normally do … no point in trying to fool yourself … just do your full usual practice routine.
You might want to think about getting an external microphone for your phone too. This post explains why it helps.
Then, later on, find yourself a quiet corner, put on your headphones and watch yourself intently. Watch once without paying much attending to how things sound … just consider are you doing what you believed you were doing? If you think you do lots of Hands Separate, is that true? Sometimes, you might imagine you’ve done lots but in reality you see that you’ve maybe done 30 second HS and then immediately returned to HT. If you think you are doing ‘slow’ practice, ask yourself honestly is it? You might think you’re playing at half speed and then discover that you start off half speed but within a couple of bars your not far off the performance tempo.
However, before you beat yourself up too much, don’t forget to congratulate yourself on those areas where you are practicing as you intended. There were things I was doing that were exactly what I believed so it’s not that I was totally wasting my time. Write down everything that was good and bad and before you practice the next day, read through your list.
Check your playing too
Only now, and as a bonus, watch again and listen for areas in your ‘playing’ that aren’t quite what you imagined.
It can be good to spot some of these things at the very early stages. Bad habits can easily become engrained long before a piece is good enough for you to think about recording it to listen to.
You can double check your phrasing and evenness (even at slow tempos). Study the score at the same time and you might spot the odd wrong note caused by mis-reading the score whilst playing. Check whether or not your hands are fully synchronised, whether the melody is properly voiced, whether your overall tone is what you had imagined.
This way, that single hour of practice (or however long you usually spend) will not only contribute to improving your playing, but improving your practicing too!
Let me know in the comments what discoveries you made when you tried this. Happy practicing.
