Piano Forum

I've been learning classical piano for about 6 Months now. Even though I'm not interested in becoming a concert pianist (My biggest ambition is to start an amateur Symphonic Metal band and play a few Nightwish covers), I chose classical piano for a reason, I respect the general concentration on technical ability and discipline, not to mention most of my favourite Keyboardists were classically trained and I'm of the mentality that if you can hit high you can hit low.

Therefore I don't want an easy way out, I'm prepared to put as much into this as possible, one thing I don't have is time.

I made the decision to practice all the scales and arpeggios every day early on in my training, from day one when I could barely play the C scale seperate hands. Everyday I played it until I got it right once. Eventually I learned the G scale, D, etc. Again I played them one after the other until I got them right, as long as I got them right once, tone, dynamics and everything, everyday, eventually I'd get them right HT instantly.

Eventually my teacher introduced me to the metronome... so I decided to practice them with a metronome, starting from 40 bpm and adding 20 bpm every month for each scale....which made getting them right each day considerably harder.

He thought me how to play the arpeggio of each scale... so I started doing the arpeggios too.

Then he made a comment that my sightreading wasn't good enough... so I started after a while I started practicing each scale without looking at my hands.

Then my teacher said that getting them right once, everyday wasn't enough.... so I played them until I got them right three times in a row.

All this was manageable at the beginning, but back then I barely knew all the white key major scales... now I know all the major and harmonic minor scales (flats included), not to mention their arpeggios, the chromatic scale, and the time it takes me to get through this excersize is ridiculous. One hour, at least, each day, JUST ON ARPEGGIOS AND SCALES leaving me little time to acctually practice any music.

I'd acctually like to learn the melodic minor scales at some point, not to mention other types of arpeggios besides major and minor triads. I have absolutely no time to do any other technical excersizes, I'd like to practice thrills maybe, and set time specifically for sightreading excersizes.

My teacher is absolutely NO HELP on this, he just gives me a piece I have to learn by such and such time and leaves me to it. When I asked him for advise regarding this he just fobbed me off with the typical Practice, Practice, Practice... that's the PROBLEM!.

Personally I don't think I'm practicing right. Scales and Arpeggios can't possibly be this damn time consuming, I don't think I need to practice them everyday.

I was thinking of playing the major, harmonic minor, melodic minor, major and minor arpeggio, chromatic, and maybe a few other excersizes for one key everyday. So C one day, then G the next, etcetera, etcetera. This would be a lot more manageable in my opinion, not to mention it would cover a wider area.

This would mean though that I wouldn't be practicing each scale, each day. But is that a bad thing, do I REALLY need to practice each scale EACH day?

Also, does playing them right three times in a row help any?