The Art of Practice

This next post is actually going to come in two parts. I'm going to quote Tharp and then put the transfers to music in parentheses.

"All dancers [singers] lead the same life; the lowliest corps members and the megastar still have to go to the same class at 10:00 [MWF11:00, 12, 2] to stay in shape... Soloists sepnd hours at their instruments before they rehearse with the orchestra [other choir members]. These habits don't disappear when you become recognized, honored, rich, famous, and otherwise validated [or upon graduation]. In fact, though everyone is free to practice as much as they want, it's the most acclaimed and skilled people who work the hardest to maintain those skills...the great ones never take fundamentals for granted. You may wonder which came first: the skill or the hard work. But that's a moot point. The Zen Master cleans his own studio. So should you." (The Creative Habit, page 166)

If you are like me, the action of practice is SO much harder than the act of performance. I remember as a kid hating the ritual of practice. My mom used to set an eggtimer to enforce the 30-minute rule. I'm not sure which rule I hated more...the 30 minute rule or the "you-will-play-every-piece-three-times-rule." (I think the latter, since you could speed everything presto and voila! You're done! - HA!)

I wish I would have practiced more. The only time I can remember being REALLY diligent about practice occurred during the 6 months leading up to my senior recital. You guys get off fairly easy. My recital was close to two hours long...memorized. For crying out loud, the Schubert piano sonata in A Major was longer than some of your recitals!

Anyway, I remember going down into the cellar of the ancient Andrew Carnegie library building (where some of our music department was housed) in sunny, warm weather and emerging 6 hours later to snow and ice! Such a lovely 2 mile trudge THAT was back to the dorm. A 40 degree drop and I was oblivious. Well, save for the occasional soccer game that we played in the hallway of the practice facility.

You get my point. Solitary practice is no fun but so necessary. The birds at the top of this post are so lucky. Their song comes naturally!

Next time, the purpose of practice.