Get Organised on Practising Piano

Learning and practising piano is an art that's capable of enhancing Life; and often the 'Life skills' of the learner. From my teaching experience, I've encountered numerous examples of students who were shy, self-conscious and indecisive (like when I was a teenager who was once labelled with autism by parents); once developed sound practice planning and learning habits, their confidence boosted significantly; and became someone much more organised and proactive in every aspect of life.

Developing a practice plan:

To every busy student so full with everyday activities, it is essential to develop a practice plan diligently, this is especially true for all musicians. Despite having to deal with endless homework, assignments, exams and daily work responsibilities, a true musician always find time to practice his instrument. Of course one cannot possibly give up sleeping, eating and resting time. Without a clear daily practice plan & schedule, practice time seems to slip away without a trace on any unplanned day. Even our student years were long over, we still seem to face this problem of a lack of time, even more so than ever. Not every musician is as lucky as my friend who got a permanent piano teaching & accompanist job in a private school; in his case it is natural that practising music is part of the daily work schedule. Most private studio music teachers' sole focus is to serve and educate students, putting students' music first but their own practice and performance skills last; throughout the years of teaching career inevitably their own pianistic skills decline. This is what a piano teacher must believe: If one wishes to keep a high level of joy & fulfilment in music creation & education, in order to become students' role model, then one must guarantee a routine performance and practice time for himself.

Apart from those lazier students who are reluctant to get up in the morning and prefer later class time, to most professional musicians they discover the best time to practice is in the early morning just after getting up. Lets face the truth, putting practice after a long and exhausting work day, the practice session certainly won't be very effective. As energy level is drained and there's little energy left for quality attention and self-listening. The high level of focused listening is crucial to an effective practice session. Common opinion would say that routine fingers exercise on the keyboard without involving the brain would be better than not moving the fingers at all. But we must realise, a tired brain will lower the learning quality. During a practice session, one should never allow daydreaming. We should not treat piano practice as merely fingers exercise. Even if there's one moment that you allowed your attention to slip and you're unaware of what you're doing musically and technically, you are wasting valuable practice time.

Way of practice:

When a serious pianist sit on a piano, he gives his all to control and focus his mind, to utilise every precious moment. If a student can apply the rule of 'break-down practice', he can significantly reduce dry technical exercises and improve his musicianship to the next level much faster.

The point of 'break-down practice' is to divide and conquer. To break down complex and difficult tasks into smaller & achievable bites. The first step is to divide practice time, such as into warm up time with scales, exercises and etudes; the next part could be repertoire pieces, leaving at least 10-15 minutes to sight read new materials, as this is one of the most important part for a pianist to expand his musical horizon and develop new understanding and technique.

Further to dividing practice time into different elements of playing, the next step will be dividing the individual music pieces into sections, so that they could be tackled more efficiently in daily practice. It is recommended that a student can play through the whole piece once before practising, to get an overall feel on what needs to be worked on. Further polishing is needed with attentive and careful listening for the self-diagnosis of existing problems to ensure correct note reading, rhythm, shaping of musical lines and fingering etc. until every detail from start to end of the music is digested and understood by the student.

Practising with a metronome can be helpful on developing steady rhythm from slow to faster tempo, but students should not rely too much on mechanical device. As the ultimate goal is to develop an internal pulse and sense of rhythm. To be able to control the rhythm internally and accurately without the metronome is what one should aim for. Practising with counting out loud is a much more difficult, old-school and reliable way that help the student internalise the sense of rhythm.

Avoid unconsciously repeating mistakes and wrong playing, never assume that they will be magically corrected. Be your own worst critic and teacher, even you are a student. Before becoming an artist, constant awareness and analysis during practice is necessary to identify your own problems and weaknesses, so that they can be overcome. Ask yourself "Are my fingerings clunky?" "Do I need to adjust my hand position and shape?" " Are my shoulders and arms tensed?" "Are my fingers supporting my weight?" " Am I playing accurately with the correct movement and sound?" etc. Once zeroed-in your problem, they can be solved in a much shorter time than repeating the same thing for a thousand times.

Don't forget to make the most out of our times, we are in a digital age. Get a habit and listen to music that inspires you, record yourself when you practice, develop ears that appreciates music and distinguishes what makes music sublime, then put your passion and love into practice.