10 Practice Tips For Musicians in a Rut

Sometimes it can feel like you have spent hours practicing a piece of music but have not improved, or, even worse, you make more mistakes now than when you started working on it. Practicing done right should give you measurable progress each time. “Measurable” is a key word here. Once you start thinking of your practice this way, it will really change how you spend your practice time and decrease the time it takes to learn a piece. Here are some practice tips for musicians who feel like they are stuck that are based on this concept.

1. Practice should be uncomfortable. And by this I mean that if you are not practicing something that is challenging you, why are you practicing it? Do not waste time playing the parts you can play well. It is easy to do this because it feels good to play those, and of course, if you are relaxing or showing off, have at it! But don’t then complain that you are not getting any better, because that was not the definition of practicing. If you are trying to learn a new piece, your practice should sound bad, and when it does really sound good, move on to the next place you sound bad. It is a simple concept, but one that musicians seem to frequently forget.
2. Have a goal for each practice session. This is closely related to the last point. You may have multiple goals, but there should at least be one. And, no, a good goal is not “I want to play this piece perfectly.” That may be a good big-picture goal to strive for, but you need to be more specific. Narrow it down to something you can achieve in one hour, or thirty minutes, or however long you have to practice. Identify what you are bad at. You need to be able to play those five beats cleanly at 132 bpm. You always have intonation problems in a certain phrase. Every time a specific rhythm appears it trips you up. Now take the time to end the problem. For good. Spend one hour on that one measure and nothing else if that is what it takes. The main point is to not pull out your piece and play through it as many times as you can until you are done practicing. This type of practice is aimless and usually only makes your mistakes a habit. Pinpoint your biggest recurring mistakes and target them.
3. Make slow progress. Now that you are determined to correct your mistakes permanently, you might need to break down these goals even a little further. One concentrated hour on one day may not be enough to create the habits you need. Even if you achieve your goal that day, I find that it does not always stick. The next day I may feel like I have lost my progress. This is because a lot of music is both muscle memory and mental memory, and these are not usually established in a day. Here is a place where I find measuring my progress is especially helpful. For example, not only do I have a specific goal tempo, but I usually limit myself to playing a passage only three metronome clicks faster in a day. Also, I never increase the speed unless I feel confident playing it at the current speed. So if I start at 100 bpm and that feels easy, I try 104 bpm till that is just as comfortable. The same with 108 bpm and then 112 bpm. Now that I have advanced three “levels” I stop no matter how easy it seems like it would be to keep going. The next day I start at 112 bpm and do the same process. If it is feeling like more or a challenge that day I may only go up one click. If I keep my progression slow, I find that the results are much more permanent. “Sleeping on it” between practices and even just forcing yourself to take more time really does make the skill stick.
4. Develop a good relationship with your metronome. And by good relationship, I mean that you don’t hate it and you don’t rely on it. This ties in with the last tip as well as the idea of practice being uncomfortable. Your metronome is one of the more obvious ways to measure your progress on a piece. The metronome is generally hated because it is hard to play with and can give that eerie feeling that it is changing on you when you are playing. But this is a good thing! We already talked about how we want to find what we are bad at and practice that, and if you are bad at sticking with a metronome and/or playing a consistent tempo this is a great discomfort to lean into with the goal of improving. Of course, there are pieces that are too expressive to use a metronome on and there is the worry some have of becoming reliant on the metronome to the point of needing it to play on beat. But in every scenario there needs to be some sense of internal pulse. If you want an internal metronome, you must know the feeling of an external one.
5. Record yourself. This is another one that is very uncomfortable, but it is so helpful. If you don’t know where to start in your practice or feel like you have run out of goals, listening to yourself playing a run-through of your piece is a great way to find more to work on. And if you don’t hear anything to fix, you are not trying hard enough! Hearing yourself played back without the mental effort of playing at the same time can be surprisingly different than what you think it will be. I like to do this multiple times when learning a piece and the most when I think a piece is nearly “done” and I am tweaking my performance.
6. Listen to professional recordings. This is really helpful as well in getting new ideas that you might not have thought of. I prefer to listen to a couple recordings when I first get a piece and then only again when I am doing finishing touches. This way I spend time on the work on my own and figure out my personal preferences and ideas. Then after I know the piece well, I listen to several professional players again and I notice more details about their performances that I may even want to work into my own. And, naturally, be sure to pick performers that you admire or are generally admired by others. The phone video on YouTube of someone’s high schooler performing your piece may not be the place to get your inspiration.
7. Keep a practice notebook. This also works with the other tips and the idea of measurable progress. Few of us have such a good memory that we don’t need to write our measurements down. You can write a list of specific skills or passages you need to work on; what tempo you last achieved so you know where to start tomorrow; notes (on your music and in your notebook both) when listening to recordings of yourself or others. I also use my notes to record little mental fixes that I discover. If I notice that my technique always falls apart at the same note, sometimes I can pinpoint the one finger that I need to focus on to make the passage go smoothly. If something as simple as this fixes a recurrent problem I have been having, I write it down so that I can review my fix later and not have that problem again. Measuring your progress every day will not help much if you cannot remember what you measured later. Your practice notebook is even great for outlining your practices with your main goals. Your schedule might look like vibrato exercises, then tonguing exercises, then ensemble music, and then solo work or whatever organization suits your goals.
8. Know your own limitations and tendencies. And by this I mean that you may prefer to focus on one little goal for a long period of time and get a lot out of that. Many others would not be motivated enough to spend so much time on one thing and prefer to do only 5 minutes of that every time they practice. Maybe you prefer to progress faster than I do in my example above with metronome markings. The bottom line is that what gives you results and keeps you motivated and interested is great and may not be what others prefer. Sometimes I am motivated by turning my practice into a game- how many times in a row can I play this perfectly, or how long can I play in this register without breathing and stay in tune? I beat my personal records and even give myself punishments for failing like having to play it slowly ten times in a row. Some might find this too stressful, and some might not care enough to follow through on their own “rules.” Be creative and figure out what works for you.
9. Appreciate your progress. Assuming that you are practicing for a performance, there is going to be a point where time is up and what you’ve got is what you’ve got. Don’t stress about what could be better, as hard as that is. Enjoy what you have accomplished. This is even good to do when it is not performance time and another reason that I like to keep a practice notebook. If you are feeling frustrated, look back on your old notes and what problems you have overcome. Listen to your old recordings, if you did not immediately delete them, and compare to new ones. I like to aim for perfection, but simultaneously I know that perfection is not possible and that is OK. Besides, the lack of perfection is a huge part of music’s charm.
10. Remember to have fun! I know I said earlier to not mindlessly play through your piece, but sometimes this is exactly what I advise! It can be easy to get bogged down in the nitty gritty of practice and lose all enjoyment in practice. Sometimes what is needed is playing through your piece, forgetting what you need to fix and having more of a “goofing off” attitude. Relax, remember why you liked this piece, and play it for nothing other than your own enjoyment and you will find that your love for that piece is reignited. Don’t be surprised if you also notice the progress you have made and maybe even solve some issues that were caused by tension and tunnel vision more than anything. Playing the piece with the big picture in mind and a whimsical “play-acting” attitude can solve more technical problems than you might think.

I hope these were helpful for you! If you are reading this in order to help a student progress, here is some advice for reluctant students. What are some other strategies you have used successfully?