You only have to practice on the days that you eat.
I love to eat every day. Sometimes I’m not crazy about practicing piano every day. We all know that if we just said we were taking piano lessons and then did nothing – nothing would happen. There must be some application and regular practice before there is any progress. Figuring out what works for us can be tricky. We all need a break from our daily work occasionally. At the same time, regular practice is a must with piano lessons.
I have come across the 10,000 hour rule in numerous readings, which originated from the book “Outliers” by Malcolm Gladwell. That it takes 10,000 hours of intensive practice to achieve mastery of complex skills and materials. According to other research, it has been debunked numerous times although still rings true in many ways. Practice is important but the way we practice can make a huge difference.
I have had students who put in their allotted time to practice and still don’t know their music. The reason behind this is because they are ‘playing through’ the same mistakes over and over and practicing their mistakes. They are putting in the time, but they are not being deliberate in learning to play the correct notes. Besides putting in your time practicing piano, being deliberate about how you practice will get you further in mastering the instrument verses putting in lots of time and not making changes as you go.
In my earlier days of teaching, I would give students the option of taking a day off during the week. I would tell them they could pick one day a week for not practicing. The problem with this, is that once they had that day off, they would lose momentum and then one day would turn into almost all week. Then realizing a lesson was coming up, they would do a panic practice. Or, say you missed a day but then the next day was your designated day off, by the third day you would already be on your way to being in the habit of not practicing.
What seems to work better for students (and myself), is to tell a student that they must practice every day. That way, when life happens and it will, you just get back into practicing the very next day because it’s not your day off. Figuring out what works is going to look a little different for everyone, but in the end, it will be regular, consistent, deliberate practice that helps make progress. Doing practice sessions in small increments on a regular basis and correcting mistakes along the way will get you much farther in the long run. For the beginning piano student, it may be 5-10 minutes a day. As a pianist gets more experienced and music gets longer and more complicated, this time will naturally go up.
Maybe you love playing piano or another instrument so much that you will get to 10,000 hours of practice at some point. Putting in meaningful practice on a regular basis will be more helpful than checking off your time spent in front of the piano. Finding a schedule that works for your lifestyle will help you find momentum in your practice. Like eating, making practice part of your everyday schedule is one of the keys to the art of learning piano and the mastery of the instrument.