One of the nicest things about being self employed is that you can set your own schedule, and that means that Succot is a week off to enjoy family time. Whilst I sit by the piano for many hours each week, helping and guiding my students through their pieces, rarely do I have the time to sit and play for myself. So this week I decided to set myself a challenge; to expand my repertoire and learn a new piece, by Beethoven. Every evening once the kids were asleep I sat at the piano and practiced. I can't remember the last time i managed to make time to do this every night for a week but it was an exciting experience and it gave me lots of food for thought.
I spend so much energy teaching people the importance of practise, and how to practise well and it was really interesting to see which of my daily mantras helped me in my practicing. Here are some reflections on what I learnt:
1. It is really tempting to just play the piece from start to finish over and over again. I knew that kids like to do this when they are practicing, and I also know that it is an inefficient way to practice, but I didn't realise just how compelling it is to want to 'play the whole' piece. I found myself doing this, even though I know that it is not going to help me perfect the piece. When playing the piece through, every time you get to the problem bar you will slow down, stumble through it and continue on, without having actually fixed the problem. I had to make a conscious effort to stop myself doing this, and to make myself really fix the problem bars in isolation.
2. Practicing, the right kind of practicing, is addictive. Once I got started, I found I couldn't stop. I would keep playing until my hands were aching, and when my eyes got blurry I knew I had to stop. I was so desperate to improve, that I didn't want to give up until I knew it was at least better, if not perfect. Over the week, the piece grew everyday and my hands began to learn the passages and things that had previously been difficult would become second nature and I would find my hands playing the notes before I had time to think about the 'difficult bar coming up'. This sense of driving the piece forward, and feeling it become embedded in your body is what I want to try and help my students achieve. The sense that you can't stop because your not done yet, that if you stop now then you will have to go over it all again tomorrow, but if you keep going for another 5 minutes and really know it, then tomorrow you will be able to pick where you left on and learn the next section.
I am excited to get back to teaching today, but I hope I can make time to practice too. In a week I managed to learn the first 2 pages of a 7 page piece so perhaps for the Chanukah concert I will be ready to share my music with you all!
