"practise makes perfect!"

[pianoman53]

That is probably one of the most common phrases about practising - Practise until it's perfect.
I don't really know about that... Many times, I feel like the more I pracise, the worse I play. Ofc it's a bit too simple to say it like that. Like an example:
I play the 2nd ballade by Chopin. First I practised a lot on it. Then I let it rest for a while, and now I've brought it up again. The first playt trhough was, ofc, not very good. But the second was actually very much better, and the third (after just a bit of practising) was even better again. Then it went not as well after that. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't as good as it was before.
(not note wise, or really musically. But the excitement of playing somewhat disapears)

And then there is the other thing: Practising a halv new piece, and try to make it perfect. I mean, everyone knows that you can't play every note perfectly. Sometimes not even a phrase. If one tried to practise until it was perfect, we wouldn't really get that much done, would we?

So, when do you stop practising?
Is it when you've got the main idea, or a bit later than that, or maybe even before you get the main idea? And how do you feel it's working out for you?
 

[pianoplayjl]

Before every practice session we must set ourselves a goal and we must achieve that goal to stop practicing. YOu must have felt a sense of accomplishment and improvement after each session. I once read somewhere that at the end of each session devote 10 minutes of your time to practice the spot/piece a few times without mistakes. Don't force yourself to practice if you don't feel like it. Only practice when you feel like it. Maybe when you don't feel like it only practice half an hour to an hour. I always practice half an hour when I don't feel like it.
However I haven't or rarely achieve the above stuff.  I only stop practicing when I hear a slight improvement, not when I know I improved. The phrase 'practice til perfect' I use a lot of the time but come to think of it it is impossible to achieve. But I'm like you, in the way the more I practice in some pieces, the worse I get.

JL

[49410enrique]

sorry, i think it's the most idiotic phrase that just won't die, though i wish it would already.

perfect practice makes perfection is much more correct.

which essentially means you get what you put in, if you practice correctly, that is work doing it right, then you will get the correct/right result.  the other side is true, if you practice and don't take care to make sure it is  'perfection practice' you very well could be creating bad motor patterns,  harmful physical habits, destroying the true essence of a work, now take all of this and repeat repeat repeat...and you'll get very good at automatically doing it all wrong.

[quantum]

I prefer the phrase "practice makes practice." 

By setting ourselves up for the goal of perfection are we really doing service to our learning and growth?  Or are we setting ourselves up for the disappointment in never being able to achieve perfection?  What is perfection anyways?  Does perfection really contribute to a meaningful musical experience?   

[pianoman53]

No, I think I didn't explain very well. It's some sort of over-thinking I think. The whole "play as you feel" almost dissapears if you, too much, practise every phrase. It's not about not practising with lots of focus, but to put too many thoughts in your head.

I heard that Shakespear and Moliere often rehearsed a very short time, to keep the play fresh, even for the actors, so that they didn't have time to overthink it.

[49410enrique]

I prefer the phrase "practice makes practice." 

By setting ourselves up for the goal of perfection are we really doing service to our learning and growth?  Or are we setting ourselves up for the disappointment in never being able to achieve perfection?  What is perfection anyways?  Does perfection really contribute to a meaningful musical experience?   

so true, like a favorite quote of mine from the steinway documentary 'note by note'  roughtly, "we chase an impossible goal, as such we can only strive to improve..."

[keyboardkat]

How do you practice?   Do you just play the piece through, say, "Oh, that was terrible," and play it again, and say, "Oh, that was terrible,"  and play it again, etc.?  That is a waste of time, because you are not practicing with your mind.  And you will be learning your mistakes, which will be that much harder to unlearn.

Take the piece in small bites.  Practice slowly, hands alone, and NOTICE what you're doing.  Play one hand on the piano lid while the other hand plays on the keyboard (this is great for memorizing).  Practice passagework in different rhythms.  There are a lot of things you can do to cement the piece in your mind, as well as in your fingers.

[jtguru]

Oh, the phrase "practice makes perfect" is perfectly true; most people just misinterpret it. Whatever you practice you will indeed get perfect at. If you practice playing the wrong notes, with inefficient movements, you will get quite perfect at playing the wrong notes, with inefficient movements.  


Anyway, to address your question, you stop when you have achieved your goal for the practice session. So this means you have to know what your goal is. Before sitting at the piano, you have to decide what, specifically, your aim is for the session (preferably doing short 15-20 minute sessions at a time; this makes it much easier to set a specific goal). Decide if you want to master these 5 measures hands separate, or put hands together in those 4 measures, or completely master (HS and HT) these 2 measures. Whatever your goal is, you have to be able to tell when you have achieved it. When you finally play the passage in question without mistakes once, this does not mean you have achieved your goal; you have to repeat the passage "perfectly" several times. But you also should never repeat said passage hundreds of times. If you do, you will start to make mistakes again as you get tired / lose focus, and then the performance that your brain will take away from the practice session will be one containing mistakes, rather than the mistake-less repetitions that were made earlier in the session.

[pianoman53]

Okay, this thread got the completely wrong turn... It's not really about my practising. It's more about the practising itself. If you compare two top notch pianists, say, one that practise A Lot and one that practise not so much. For me, the one that practise not so much always has got this, Lively part left. It's like they are a bit surprised over the sound and the notes. Rubinstein said, I think, that he never practised so that he knew everything, to not lose that sort of surprise. The same with Shakespear and Moliere, who never rehearsed more than 2 weeks.

So if it's possible, maybe this discussion can go away from my playing, to a more philosophical though of playing in general.

[prongated]

Apparently Horowitz once remarked how "people practise, and then they got on stage and practise some more".

So I'll be one of those that disagree with the original statement. Practise doesn't make perfect, but you do have to perfect what you practise. Putting together the piece in your head (sensing hythm, tempo, flow etc. as though you are a conductor) is one way to achieve this.

As well, a week before an important (well, relatively, given what I do) performance or recording, I always play my program through once every morning (9am, since I'm not a morning person) as though it is a performance. This way you'll pick up where things do fall apart, have the opportunity to fix it, and try "performing" it again the next morning.

Then again...

Okay, this thread got the completely wrong turn... It's not really about my practising. It's more about the practising itself. If you compare two top notch pianists, say, one that practise A Lot and one that practise not so much. For me, the one that practise not so much always has got this, Lively part left. It's like they are a bit surprised over the sound and the notes. Rubinstein said, I think, that he never practised so that he knew everything, to not lose that sort of surprise. The same with Shakespear and Moliere, who never rehearsed more than 2 weeks.

Interesting...apparently Horowitz also never played a piece in its entirety a week before a performance, frustrating himself so as to enjoy the moment on the concert stage when he finally put everything together.

And indeed, Rubinstein was one incredibly gifted guy! He did say he never practised much in his youth - until Horowitz came along (apparently he then spent a decent part of his life practising 6 hours a day...)

[pianoman53]

That's soemtimes what I feel too. And that's a bit what I meant, with practising too much. It's like you know the piece too well, so there is never the lift you should get from performing it - it's either as good as you normally do, or worse - and I, sometimes, feel that the audience can feel that too. If you know too many things, then you can never really relax and feel the music.

Interesting that Horowitz said it. Even though I'm not always fond of his playing (please, forgive me) he always have this freshness.


However, would that work today?
Since hitting all the right notes in the right way now is so very important, do you think there is a alternative to not practising until perfection, even if it means to become a bit dull (I'm thinking of winners in competitions and similar)

[roseamelia]

When I practice I get a lot better at it for me that is true When I forget to practice I'm not very good at it but you still can't have a perfect piece of music.

[csimmons0]

The OP mentioned letting the piece rest for a little while. A teacher once told me that you'll never master a piece the first time that you learn it. In the course of learning it, you will inevitably pick up some bad habits. He said that after a while, you should stop playing the piece so that you can unlearn those bad habits and that you'll be able to play it better the second time that you learn it because you'll quickly re-learn what you learned correctly the first time and you'll be able to avoid picking up those bad habits again.

[gn622]

I found that in my case, i can almost never play what i learned the same day, ill have to practice it  till at least the note sink in my brain, but still can't play it correctly.

the next day when i wake up, i just try it few more times and ill be able to play it with ease
it really strange but it happens to me

[jtguru]

I found that in my case, i can almost never play what i learned the same day, ill have to practice it  till at least the note sink in my brain, but still can't play it correctly.

the next day when i wake up, i just try it few more times and ill be able to play it with ease
it really strange but it happens to me

First of all, if you aren't able to play something pretty well at the end of the practice session in which you learned it, then you tried to learn too large a chunk at once. When you set a goal (whether that goal be mastering a new passage hands separate, hands together, or just connecting previously learned passages together) you should be able to have achieved that goal within a short time, often ~15-20 minutes, at which point you move on to the next goal. If you can't do that, your goal was too ambitious and needs to be cut down. The smaller chunks you work with at a time, the easier everything will be to play in the end, as long as you overlap those chunks so that you don't have difficulty putting it together. Of course, you don't want to cut the chunks too much smaller than you actually need to, though, because that will waste your time almost as much as trying to work on too large a chunk does. Finding the perfect length of a section to work on at a time is something you get better at with experience as you get more used to your own capabilities.

Now, as for what you say about being able to play something better the next day, I know it seems odd to you, but this actually isn't strange at all. This is what people refer to as post-practice improvement. The fact is, the brain needs time to process things that you learn. That is easiest to do when you sleep, when the chaos of the conscious mind isn't getting in the way. And this is why you shouldn't bother practicing the same passage for hours in one day, because that really isn't doing anything to help your unconscious process what you've learned, and is in fact a great way to start ingraining mistakes into your memory.

I understand that you say you often are able to play a passage with ease the next day even though it wasn't close to perfect the day before. Post-practice improvement is useful, but you have to be careful. Relying on it too much to the point that you never bother to master a passage one day and just expecting PPI to kick in and perfect it for you can be dangerous as you tackle more and more difficult pieces. The more difficult the passage is, whether from high speed, intricate fingering, or something else, the easier it becomes to ingrain in your memory a mistake that will be very difficult to fix. As I said earlier in this thread, "practice makes perfect" completely applies to perfecting the wrong way of playing something.