How much practice a day??

[tds]

Instead of practicing all the time, go and listen to an opera or read through a symphony, and you will find it will improve your piano playing much more.

agreed. or listen tochamber music or go to museum. and oh dont forget, have some life too

[go12_3]

There is another topic in the Student's board on "How do you pracitice?"  So that can be another insightful reading as well. 

[nearenough]

S. Richter admitted in his published notebook that he had practiced 12-14 hours a day (if my memory is correct). Horowitz said 2 hours or so a day. It depends on your sight-reading ability and memory capacity. Charles Rosen commented that most pieces should be in your grasp in your teen years. Maybe then is the time to put in a daily 4-8 hours. Thereafter, merely keeping warm is all you need. Rubinstein spent most of his time gormandizing and womanizing; that's all he wrote about in his memoirs, so my guess is he didn't practice much.

[nearenough]

S. Richter admitted in his published notebook that he had practiced 12-14 hours a day (if my memory is correct). Horowitz said 2 hours or so a day. It depends on your sight-reading ability and memory capacity. Charles Rosen commented that most pieces should be in your grasp in your teen years. Maybe then is the time to put in a daily 4-8 hours. Thereafter, merely keeping warm is all you need. Rubinstein spent most of his time gormandizing and womanizing; that's all he wrote about in his memoirs, so my guess is he didn't practice much.

[morningstar]

6-9 hours! That seems really excessive to me. At most I think I've only ever practiced for about 3 1/2-4 hours.

[drazh]

hi
I heard from tichter who said he never played more than 3 hours a day .

[drazh]

hi
I heard from tichter who said he never played more than 3 hours a day .

[iroveashe]

S. Richter admitted in his published notebook that he had practiced 12-14 hours a day (if my memory is correct).

Wow D8

[pianoperformer]

It really depends, though I’m trying to get up to 4-6 hours per day. That’s my goal, anyway. I did slightly over 3 hours yesterday.

I should note that I count just about anything musical as practice, and not all necessarily sitting at the piano or even having anything to do with the piano. I count rehearsing for choir as practice, too, and practice with my piano ensemble group, etc.

I don’t really think there is any such thing as too much time, if you practice properly. I practice in sessions of 20 minutes on a single focus, and then start something else. Every hour, I take a 10 minute break. I’ll usually go out and sit in the lounge and try to socialize.

I split all my pieces up into sections that I want to work on for these 20 minute sessions. They might be sections requiring technical work, phrasing, better interpretation, musicality, etc. The concerto I’m working on is split into about 45 sections (this is the first movement alone).

So usually I’ll have a practice schedule prepared for the week, of which piece I will work on for each 20-minute session. Then I just have to choose which section of the piece I want to work on (I haven’t included the sections in the schedule yet).

I don’t work on a section more than once a day, though. I’ll work on the piece still, but just on other sections. I find this helps to keep things fresh and prevents from getting too repetitive.

I did that last week for this section with very fast alternating octaves in both hands, and I was so much better at it this week, so I think I will continue this method.

The trick is to prioritize sections, I think, because obviously I can’t get all 45 done in a single day. I’ll have to work on, say, 8 for a week or so, then swap out a few of them for other sections.

Anyway, that’s what I’m doing now. I change my method every so often to see what works, but this has been the most promising so far.

I do have to comment to those who say that one should only practice when one feels like it. If you only do this for enjoyment, then that’s fine, but if you’re a music major, you’d have a rather angry piano teacher if you did that. With so many classes and also the need to study, you have to fit it in whenever and however you can, regardless of how you feel. I’ve found that once I’m actually at the piano, however much I didn’t want to practice before, I start to get into it and enjoy it. I basically stay out from about 8:30 in the morning until 10:00 at night (minimum), and practice every chance I get.

[ivoree]

Can you really concentrate for that length of time?

[pianoperformer]

Can you really concentrate for that length of time?

Are you replying to me?

For what amount of time? 4-6 hours? I take a break every hour, so I don't think it's that much of a problem. Also it's not consecutively, because, I have classes scattered throughout the day.

[learner of liszt]

I heard from a pianist a couple of days ago after a performance that all the best never practiced more than two hours a day. I find this hard to believe, if someone is to classify Horowitz, Cziffra, Rubinstein, etc. as the best.

[m19834]

How much practice a day obviously depends on the individual and the purpose.  For me, I could theoretically practice for about 10 minutes to 3-4 hours a day and still "progress," I *could* practice in spurts in between other activities, and I do all of that, too.  But, what *really* does it for me is having something like a 10-12 hour block of time, starting in the wee hours of the morning when the world is absolutely quiet.  I like this kind of time because it allows me to sink very deeply into the endeavor in a way that I personally can't do when I feel like I am just squeezing the time at the instrument into my busy day.  And, if I go too long without some solid, consecutive days (weeks, months, years ?) of that kind of practice, my entire universe becomes ... horrible, and I start to deeply ache. 

I just don't care anymore what other people do and think about that, except for my mentor.  I realize I do need variety in my life as well, and perhaps it's good for me to have some days when I don't just have those huge blocks of time and the freedom to dedicate that kind of energy to the piano, but it's something that I can't live without all the same.  And, I realize I will need to continue making this kind of time for the instrument a priority in my life, probably for the rest of my life.

[goldentone]

I heard from a pianist a couple of days ago after a performance that all the best never practiced more than two hours a day. I find this hard to believe, if someone is to classify Horowitz, Cziffra, Rubinstein, etc. as the best.

That wouldn't surprise me. 

[aewanko]

Just remember one thing about "practicing":

Quality over quantity.

[avguste]

I usually practice about 3-4 hours per day.
And I don't do scales or arpeggios because I have no time for that,especially when preparing for concerts