Practice routine and lazyness

[stormx]

Hi !! 

this question is directed to amateur pianists (that just play for pleasure, without any intention to make a professional career).

1- Do you stick to a practice schedule, and you follow it even when you dont feel like playing?

Or,

2-Do you just practice when you feel like it?

I belong to category 1, trying to practice 1 hour every day. However, i must admit that many times i have to drag myself to the piano.

Thats because i beleive that if i practice only when i feel like it, i will not make enough progress.


What do you think?

[casparma]

well, for most of us, as far as I have learned here,...

practice does not mean you play the pieces you already know over and over again, but instead try new pieces which are harder and more challenging..

beside, you cant really practice, or improove without a teacher...do you have a teacher??

otherwise you are just playing your old pieces over and over again....

[bernhard]

Hi !! 

this question is directed to amateur pianists (that just play for pleasure, without any intention to make a professional career).

1- Do you stick to a practice schedule, and you follow it even when you dont feel like playing?

Or,

2-Do you just practice when you feel like it?

I belong to category 1, trying to practice 1 hour every day. However, i must admit that many times i have to drag myself to the piano.

Thats because i beleive that if i practice only when i feel like it, i will not make enough progress.


What do you think?

I guess it depends how often you feel like it

Seriously, a schedule to which you stick is important because feelings are ultimately unreliable. Also, how many times have you experienced the following: You don't feel like playing/practising at all, but you drag yourself to the piano anyway, just to really get into it and have one of your best practice sessions ever?

Feelings (emotional ones) are not that important. Take note of them, but then do the deed anyway

Best wishes,
Huskyan Bernhard

[ted]

I shall reinforce what Bernhard has said because I think this principle is important enough to have application in composition, improvisation and areas of life unconnected with music for that matter.

There must be some sort of discipline, even in regions commonly thought to be the preserve of "inspiration". The real benefits of establishing a discipline come later in life. If you keep working over the years, it becomes such an enjoyable habit that you rarely experience "off days" or laziness anyway.

Admittedly this is probably easy for me to say because music has never given me a bad moment and I honestly cannot remember many times when I "couldn't be bothered". I may sometimes be lazy in the specific but rarely in the general. Nevertheless I have found that the quality of output was often grossly uncorrelated to the emotional impetus which gave rise to it.

My reactions to my own music are markedly variable. Sometimes I think, "Wow, that's good !" and then the next day, the next time I hear it, "That sounds a bit slack. I shan't try that way again." I have learned to take delight in the ordinary as well as the extraordinary. Indeed, the older I get the more important this discipline and delight in the ordinary is getting.

Then every now and then, something extraordinary does occur and I realise that saying about the Buddha being the hedge at the bottom of the garden is quite true. Discipline and serendipity - two parts of the one thing.

[tac-tics]

I started playing the piano about a year an a half ago. However, in my own opinion, I'm much farther behind than most players who have been playing for two years. I don't think it's absolutely necessary to stick to a rigid schedule, but if you want to improve, you do need healthy exposure to practice.

beside, you cant really practice, or improove without a teacher...do you have a teacher??

Although my experience in music is relatively nothing, I have experience in other disciplines. Through self-instruction, I've learned Japanese and computer programming among other things. Compared to the other students in my programming and Japanese classes, I'm usually in the upper tier in my classes despite my informal, instructorless education.

I'm not saying instructors are a waste of time or that you can just do what you want and become the best there ever was, but with proper self-awareness and discipline, you can get by decently without a formal education.

[ada]

I'm an amateur too but my problem is dragging myself away from the piano.

I've fallen into a routine where I usually get up around 5.30-6.00 am and do "serious practise" till 7am. This includes scales, Bach inventions and the new pieces I'm working on, namely a Chopin waltz, a Beethoven sonata and my Debussy piece.

By 7am I have to get off and get myself ready for work, kids ready for school, etc.

It's usually about 9pm before I get a chance to get back to the keyboard. Then I'll pour a glass or two or three of red and just play whatever I feel like or a tinker around with new material.  I'll be there anywhere between 30 mins to 3 hours.

When I'm not playing I just ache to. Like now. But I've got work to do.

*sigh*