Why do we practice?

We practice because...

• it's our only hope for progress.

• it's our only hope against regression.

• we don't want to merely like the idea of being a pianist, but we want to be the pianist.

• there is so much to learn!

• nobody else will practice for us.

• somewhere, someone else is not making excuses.  They're getting better and playing the music you want to be playing.

• we recognize that practice isn't punishment or a chore, but the proven secret to success, the formula that thousands of musicians follow every day!

• if it were easy, EVERYONE would do it.  It's not always easy, but it's always worth it!

• we don't think of it as something we have to do.  It's something we get to do!

It's all of the above.

"Practice only on the days you eat." -  sign in a high school band room.

The Myth of Self-Starting

This post may have a few things to say to my teens and adults, but this is mostly for my younger students and their parents.  Since at least 2014, I have had the following section on my official policy.  I've underlined the most relevant part for this post.

• If your child is under the age of 10, they can really use your active involvement.  I encourage an adult to sit in on the lessons and then be willing to coach your child at home.  I have found that students stick with lessons longer when a guardian is actively helping them.   Please also understand that is not normal for a child to practice regularly without prompting.  Practice is work, even if they really want to learn piano, and is highly unusual for a child under 12 to be self-responsible in this area.

One of the things that scientists have learned in recent decades is that your memory is largely fiction.  It's not a tape recorder, but rather a movie that idealizes your past.  It also gets blurred with how you felt at the time with how your experiences have changed you since then.  I know from Facebook posts and the memories section that 2013 was a tough year from start to finish.  However, I don't feel that way any more, because one of the good things to happen from that year (and what seemed mostly like stress until near the end) has had huge positive impact on my work since then.  My current reality has re-written my impression of the past.

A lot of parents get upset that their child isn't practicing on their own because they expect them to be self-starting.  Nothing has ever saddened me more than when a parent withdraws their child from lessons because "they're having to be told to practice".  If they're in middle school or beyond, okay...I see your point.  If they're still in their first decade of life, I don't think you have realistic expectations.  Part of the justification for that is that you probably feel like you were a self-starter at that age.   Here are three statements about that, and I am willing to bet that at least one of them is true for everyone.

(1) You actually weren't a self-starter.  Your parents or guardians probably drove you to do anything that felt like work.  If you don't remember this, it's because of (once again) our memories' tendency to idealize the past, give ourselves more credit than we deserve.

(2) You never always feel like doing the things that require effort NOW.  But as adults, you learn to weigh the consequences, or trade-offs of letting it go versus doing it anyway.  This is a trait that has to be learned, and not at the young age you might hope as parents.  (And let's face it...quite a few adults actually DON'T do anything optional that feels like work, but that's another topic).

(3) You might have actually been a self-starter, but your parents somehow came up with the right motivation for you to do that.  Maybe it was some sort of incentive or reward.  Maybe it was nothing conscious on their part, but you noticed that they treated you in a more positive way when you were working hard compared to just taking it easy.

Until you accept that something that feels like work is going to be a challenge, you can't move-on and actually become a self-starter.  Here are some ways to do that at any age.

• Schedule your time on paper or in an app.  Block out your fixed activities (like work, school, appointments, homework, this lesson, etc) and look at what time is left.  Plan your practice time and officially schedule it as an event or activity that you agree to do.
• Log your practice time.  If scheduling is the before, logging is the after.  How did you do?  Write down the day, how much you practiced, what you practiced, what was easy, what was difficult, and what the next day's priority is.
• When possible, always schedule practice before something leisurely, rather than after.
• Give yourself a reward that is contingent on reaching a level of success with your work.  For example, every 10 hours of good practice (logged), give yourself a reward: a new pair of shoes, a nice dinner, a road trip, a movie, etc.  For the incentive to work, it has to be something you ONLY do when you succeed at your goals.  If you do it regardless, it is no longer an incentive.
• If you're more motivated by negative goals, give yourself a consequence as a goal of not achieving something.  For example, if you like dessert, you don't eat anything sweet on days you fail to practice 30 minutes (or whatever you had scheduled).  Or maybe you don't watch television, read your latest book, or play a video game.

Anyone can be a self-starter, but parents...PLEASE don't expect your child to magically inherit this trait.  It takes time and a lot of effort on your part as well as theirs.  In my mind, the biggest success I can give my students is to have the ability to someday learn a piece on their own, but I have to teach them the right way for them to do that and not solely depend on me.  Your goal as parents of piano students should be to train them how to respect the time and effort it takes to practice, and how to cope with getting it done even when they don't feel like it.  Until they get to that point, keep reminding your children to practice each day.  There's a 0% chance that I'd be writing this blog if my mom hadn't done that with me on a daily basis until I was probably 10.

Understanding the Reality of Trade-offs

I had time between lessons yesterday to walk over to the nearby mall and do some quick browsing.  I happened to walk past a gourmet cookie bakery.  I went in with the intention of just getting a simple modest chocolate cookie, but instead I got a giant cookie with lemon icing, a $2 cookie!  This photo isn't the very same cookie, but it's pretty close.

The first bite was GREAT!  Soft, sweet, lemony.  I started eating it the moment I walked out of the cookie store as I headed towards the other end of the mall.  I continued to eat as I walked.  By the time I had passed 5 stores, let's say 200 feet at the most, the thrill was GONE!  I was left with a few tremors and a feeling of guilt for shoving that whole thing in my mouth.  It was a matter of time before I felt a total lack of energy after the sugar crash set in.  Worst of all, the pleasure of the taste (the WHOLE reason I got it in the first place) was over!  With this experience in my memory, I could approach a cookie like that right now, and ask myself one question before buying it.

Is the 2-minutes of joy this cookie brings worth the hour or more of misery that will follow?

Well, that's an easy answer when I phrase it like that.  But when I want the easy craving at the time, I forget to step back and just ask: What's the trade-off here?  And is it worth it?

Wait! Isn't this a PIANO blog?  What does eating a giant cookie have to do with piano?

Bear with me.  I'll get there eventually.

Every decision...not nearly every decision, but EVERY decision in life comes with at least one trade-off.

You keep using that word "trade-off".  What do you mean?

A trade-off is also known as the flip side.  You can't do everything at once.  Making a choice to do something denies you that chance to do something else.  Back in the early days of TV, before streaming, before internet, before DVR, before VCR or other video recording, if you had time at 8pm to sit down to watch a television show, you had to choose which one to watch with the knowledge that you were not watching the other choices (at first, only 2, but later more).  Here are some more examples.

• Staying at home means you can't go to the beach.  Going to the beach means you can't just stay home.
• In NC, going to the mountains means you don't go to the beach (at least at the same time), and vice versa.

But those aren't great examples, because you're not making a hard choice in any case.  What about when there's a harder choice?  You have to address the decision in a way that lets you know the flipside and the consequences if any.  For example:

• I love the taste of sodas, and sometimes I just CRAVE one.  I also happen to know that soda-drinking is one of the biggest triggers for causing me to get canker sores in my mouth.  I almost never get them when I stay away from soda.  So, would I rather have the few minutes of sweet taste, or avoid the not-certain-but-more-likely days of pain that will follow?
• I like eating out.  I also need to save money, and don't particularly like taking time to pack a lunch.  What do I want more, the convenience of eating out or saving some money for something more meaningful?
• This video I'm watching is really interesting, but it's getting very late, and I have to get up early in the morning.  Is the enjoyment of the video worth the price of not getting much sleep?

You see where this is going?  Any decision has at least one trade-off if you take time to think about it.

SO, what are the trade-offs related to your choices regarding practicing your music?

• If you watch a television episode instead of practicing, you're making the decision that the entertainment and escapism is more important than the opportunity to get better at your instrument.  Is that true?
• If you play a video game instead of practicing, you're making the same choice.  Is your goal to be really good at video games, or really good at piano?
• Time at the piano spent just playing old favorites is time that you could be spending working on your more challenging new music.  You're choosing comfort over challenge.  It's a common choice, but the trade-off of comfort is to not make progress.
• If your time is diluted with such a variety of extracurricular activities other than music (martial arts, sports, church, drama, etc), you are accepting that you will most likely be acquainted with many experiences, but be less likely to get really good at any of them.  I'm not attacking this lifestyle.  It's certainly possible that you are okay with this.  For many people, knowing a little of everything is more important than being selectively focused on a very few things.  But have you at least considered this trade-off and decided if it's what you really want?

In summary: You can't do everything you want or even need.  Giving your time to one thing means not giving it to something else.  Striving for comfort denies yourself the struggle that makes you better.  Sometimes, you may want to dial it down and enjoy that video game or TV show because the pleasure is worth missing the chance to improve at piano, at least for that one day every now and then.  Sometimes you need the satisfaction of affirming your favorite pieces you've already learned more than learning something new.  But I challenge you to at least BE aware of it.  You can do just about anything you want, as long as you recognize what it is you're giving up in exchange, and are convinced that you've made the best choice.

Student Survey

I am planning to make some changes in my teaching approach as soon as the Fall.  This survey will help me greatly.  It is intended for current students or prospects who have committed to at least one lesson, primarily intended for school-age students though all ages are welcome to participate.  Please download and print a copy, then complete and bring to your next lesson.

You can find the document HERE.

The Blog Returns/Learning Difficult Music (10 Steps)

Hello Again

Part of me is tempted to use my absence from this blog as a metaphor for how bad practice habits can become catastrophic.  My previous post was from November 2015, well over 2 years ago.  Did I mean to take a 2-year sabbatical from this blog?  Or did I mean to quit the blog entirely, and just came back early?  No and no.  Right after November, came Christmas.  In January 2016, I was preparing a show.  After that...  Okay, there aren't any real excuses except that it became easier and easier to move this down on the priority scale.  It's easy to say:  I'll just keep what I've already posted active, but there's no hurry on getting any new posts.  Then it becomes a habit not doing new posts.  Then it becomes hard to get around to it.  Practice is like this.  One excuse becomes two excuses, becomes multiple excuses, becomes the habit of not practicing.

Okay, so I did give into that temptation.  I don't have a fixed schedule for this blog, but I still have plenty more to say that doesn't need to be limited to individual lessons.

Learning a Difficult Piece or Passage

I was in the midst of practicing Cesar Franck's Prelude, Fugue et Variation, op. 18 - originally an organ piece that has been transcribed for piano by Harold Bauer - with a "business as usual" approach.  I got to a 11-measure section that was difficult, 5 measures which I found VERY challenging.   I also was working on a piece by Prokofiev that starts sight-readable (see my definition below under step 3), but every 8 measures gets more and more difficult. When this happens, and it WILL, you have to modify your approach, but can still have a very productive practice session with it.

1.  RELAX
This is a lesson that I didn't follow as a child (or even young adult).  Decades of experience have taught me that getting frustrated is never the cause of success and is usually an impediment.  Just relax and take a deep breath.  Also, try this:  Shrug your shoulders and give yourself an amused smile.  Try a chuckle.  Think or say, "Oh well.  Here we go."  This is the first of 2 attitude adjustments.  The second is...

2.  ACCEPT THE CHALLENGE
You can do four things with difficult music.  (1) Don't try it.  Quit.  (2) Practice it with carelessness and/or apathy.  (3) Practice it carefully while dreading it.  or (4) Practice it with calm delight.  Please tell me you've never seriously considered the first two.  I can't help you there, but hopefully I can encourage you to move from the third approach to the fourth.  Accept it!  This music (piece or section) is hard.  You're not going to be able to just plow through this or sightread it.  You're going to have to dissect it, slow it way down, concentrate harder, and struggle...yes struggle.

There's a great quote that is the basis for many memes: "Embrace the struggle. It will make you stronger, and it won't last forever."

This will be hard, but this will be fun.  And in the end, you'll learn this just like everything else, and you will be SO proud that you stuck with it.

3.  CUT YOUR MUSIC IN SMALLER CHUNKS
Here's a good scale that I use.  EASY - means I can just about sightread it up to tempo, or at least 2/3 of performance tempo.  SIGHTREADABLE - At a slow tempo, I can keep playing without much difficulty.  NORMAL DIFFICULTY - Too challenging to sightread well, but I can work for 20 minutes or so within an 8 measure section and make significant progress.  DIFFICULT (what we're talking about) - Need to cut to 4 measures, or maybe 2, or maybe JUST ONE measure at a time.  Review the steps RELAX and ACCEPT THE CHALLENGE, and just go ahead and do this.  Trim your music until it gets to be an appropriate section for the challenge.

3a.  Identify what are truly the most difficult passages within your section and work on those first.  Often, it's a few beats here and there.

4.  ENGAGE THREE SENSES with INTENSE FOCUS
(1) SEE the notes on the staff.  SEE the keys you are playing.  LOOK at your hand-shape and finger alignment.  Are you hitting each note or chord squarely?  (2) LISTEN to the sounds of each correctly played note or chord.  (3) FEEL the shape of your hand.  MEASURE the distance from one jump as you do it repeatedly.  Pay hard attention to each of these.  Don't play them while your brain wanders off somewhere else.  If you want to learn difficult music, you have to give it your FULL ATTENTION.

5.  REPEAT EVERYTHING MANY TIMES.
Get it right once and it's possibly a fluke.  Get it right 5 times, and you're on the right track.  Get it right 10 times, and you probably have it.  Get it right 20 times, and you've probably mastered it.

6.  SLOW TEMPO, NOT SLOW MOVEMENTS
This is crucial.  Slow the beat way, way down.  If it's 1/10 performance tempo, who cares?!  Slow it way down.  However, move from one position to another with deliberation and full speed.  Play the keys full speed and with emphasis and confidence.  Trills, grace notes, arpeggiations, and other ornaments all go at full speed ASAP.

7.  MAKE A TECHNICAL EXERCISE
This can include practicing in varying rhythms.  If it involves broken chords, block them.  If it involves scales or arpeggios, try some that are similar to your passage.

8.  SEPARATE THE HANDS
If two hands are hard, try just one until that gets easy enough.

9.  STOP WHEN YOU NEED TO
If it's truly difficult.  You probably won't master it in one sitting.  Make progress, and know when to move on.  Don't be surprised if the next time you practice feels like you've regressed a little, but you should quickly get back to where you were and be able to surpass it.

10.  PRACTICE DAILY UNTIL MASTERED
Don't get this started (like I did this blog), make some progress and leave it alone.  Leave things alone when you cannot overcome frustration.  If you're making progress, no matter how slowly it's coming, and can stand to face it again.  Keep coming back.  Eventually, you will have it and may soon forget why you found it difficult.