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My recollection as a child who was compelled to practice, is that I rarely did more than half an hour a day. I got out of it whenever I could.

Between the ages of about six and fifteen I managed to bluff my way through ABRSM grade 8 and all the preceding grades (not Mount Everest I admit, but not a grassy knoll either) with distinction at each exam, on this miniscule amount of work, supplemented by a weekly lesson.

So, this was maybe 3 hours a week on average.

Now I do 3 hours a day (sometimes as much as 8, like the last couple of days). And my teacher is still pushing me to improve, improve, improve to professional standards with my oh so slowly expanding repertoire.

So either I have got thicker. Or music has got harder. Or examiners were satisfied with pretty weak perfomances 25 years ago. Or all of these things.

In fact, I think that there is an absolutely enormous gulf between the pre diploma standard (ABRSM system - diploma is similar to a music perfomance degree) and the professional standard.

And my teacher tells me that she is still unhappy about the standard of her playing!

The quest for perfection is a path with an elusive destination.

Am I alone in seeing it this way?

not at all ajb. I got my grade 8 distinction last December doing even less practise than you, and thought i was at the height of piano playing, in my small world.

then i started to gain an interest in classical music, heard a lot more difficult pieces and realised that there was some way to go. Applied for two competitions, got average marks in both (expecting to win.) Spending a little time on this forum plus watching some performances on Youtube have all opened my eyes to the fact that the reality is - i suck!

Long way to go from here. But, thats what makes me happy

Wow Adrian,

Sounds like you are really serious about improving your playing. Is your goal to play at somewhere near professional level? That's some serious dedication.

My feeling is that one should constantly improve as a musician. It really is a life-long endeavor, and I am not quite sure if there is a point at which one can proclaim perfection. As David Oistrakh supposedly said (rough quote), "A day without any improvement as a musician is a day wasted."

--c5

"Am I alone in seeing it this way?"

Certainly not, I don't think music would be so rewarding if there actually was a peak to reach! That is what has kept me going really, the knowledge that I really don't know how much I will improve in the next month, the next year, and I have no idea where I will be in a few years time. It's very exciting.

As I posted (accidentally and ineptly elsewhere), this amount of practice (around 19 hours in two days) has actually made the ends of my fingers feel quite worn and tender. My old calloused finger tips from guitar playing have disappeared in the last few weeks and I am lucky to have any skin left from all the wear against the keys. I kid you not! Adrian

Absolutely.

As a teenager I worked my way through the Trinity College exams, a grade a year. On maybe an hour or so a day (I can't really remember now), I sailed through easily all the way up to Grade VIII. In fact, for both VII and VIII my marks were high enough to win an 'Exhibition' award as one of the top few overseas students. Pretty good, I thought ...

After Grade VIII comes Associate Diploma, perhaps about the same as first year degree studies. I doubled my practice time, and just barely scraped a pass in the practical exam (and never did get around to sitting the theory exam). The next level after that is Licentiate Diploma, which is supposed to be roughly equivalent to a degree, and I was warned that the step up from ATCL to LTCL was larger than that from Grade VIII to ATCL.

Best wishes,
Matthew

What are these grades??
How do i get one?/
Does my teacher test me or something???

Debussy20

So either I have got thicker. Or music has got harder. Or examiners were satisfied with pretty weak perfomances 25 years ago. Or all of these things.
I think there is a distinct external possibility-- your practicing is actually causing destructive interference to the learning process. If you find yourself sitting at the piano and wander into "less disciplined" for even five minutes, or even to play through a passage three or four times that you know you shouldn't, this is destructive. It would be better to take ten minutes, play the passage right, and then rest away from the piano to give your mind time to absorb and adjust to the information. Then come back and work it again.

Above all, do your very best to NOT sit at the piano for three hours straight. It is, in every sense of the word, counter-productive.

Yes - sometimes the best practise is done away from the instrument, when the brain has time to process what it's just done...

Adrian,

You might be working at the piano too hard. Your brain needs time to absorb the lessons you're being taught. You'll find that if you step back a bit, you'll actually make some headway towards your goals.

John

Thanks guys.

However, as I have posted occasionally in other threads, I do in fact work in only short segments. Typically 15 minutes to half an hour. I don't keep playing things that I already know, and I only practice through a section a few times. I do not allow myself to repeat mistakes (my teacher has drummed this into me!).

The real issue in fact, and the slant that I was taking in my original post, is that having re-started piano, it was easy enough to recover to grade 8 ABRSM standard (Debussy - these are independtly examined, and include sight reading, exercises, pieces and theory).

However, to play the repertoire that interests me - the lower echelons of concert pianist rep in terms of difficulty, then that is a big step up and has required a great deal of work for me.

It is also apparent that as we graduate to top quality teaching, the standards expected by that teacher are a great deal higher than was required for public examinations. She is coaching me to perform as a professional would - and indeed this is the level of insight I seek from her.

Both physically and intellectually it is an entirely new challenge. This can be a bit of a surprise, as Matthew noted.

Kind regards
Adrian

I shudder when I look back at the liberties I used to take in terms of sloppy technique, lack of consistency and complacent approach to practicing. OK, it got me a distinction at ABRSM Grade 8 at age 14, though this was greatly helped by scales, aural tests and sight-reading (which counted for 21/18/21 respectively of the 150 marks), where I would often score 19/17/19, as I found those parts easy for whatever reason.

When I then embarked upon studying for what was then an external ARCM (now called DipABRSM), it was a shock as to what my teacher expected in terms of much greater attention to evenness/regularity of touch, dynamics, etc. I never took the exam, as school workloads increased and general adolescent laziness intervened. I became complacent and just couldn't see the point in putting in the extra work to move up to the next level. I could play well enough, (better than most in my immediate vicinity of a comparable age), so why bother? :rolleyes:

I chose another subject for university study[1], and music became an occasional hobby for a 10 year period, before I started playing again more seriously as an accompanist for church and secular events from the age of 25 or so. That all fizzled out again, when I moved here in 1999 (new job, house, etc), until I decided to start yet again in earnest, and bought my first grand piano in 2002.

After 3 years of fairly disciplined (though not too regular practice) on my own and then, more importantly, the past 15 months of weekly hour-long lessons with a great teacher, I can now make fair attempts at repertoire that would have laughed at me as a teenager[2]. My style of playing and practicing has changed radically. On reflection, I don't think that I understood how to play such pieces before, in terms of wrists/arms, remaining relaxed, visualising shapes and movements, etc. My teacher at the time may well have done his best to explain, but the message never got through. Once the level of difficulty was cranked up, I would play everything with and from the fingers, stiff wrists, arms and shoulders, (over)stretching left, right and centre, which would lead to missed notes, harsh tone and a general unsatisfactory result. My experience as an accompanist/improviser meant I could busk through and cover up my many inadequacies such that the (wo)man in the street might think it still sounded pretty good, but that's hardly an admirable goal...

These days I feel as though I have pretty much cured my addiction to being satisfied with just 'getting through' pieces; what I play now is as true to the score and the composer's intentions as I can make it, the result of deliberate slow practice, studying the music closely and a disciplined, thought-out approach. And now that I have more of the technical tools available, I can achieve more of what I want from a musical and interpretation perspective.

On our first meeting I told my current teacher to be brutally honest (I was 38 and he in his early 60s I'd guess[3]) and he has been. His candour and insight has permitted me to focus on weak areas, work hard to improve them, pretty much completely overhauling my whole approach to piano-playing. There is of course still a huge amount to do, but that is all part of the adventure; setting realistic but demanding pianistic challenges, working seriously towards achieving them (and sometimes even succeeding!) has now become a bit of an addiction in itself .

Sorry for the long post...

- Michael B.
[1] My parents and teachers had long assumed I would study music, and I did continue it to A level. I even undertook a preliminary visit/interview with a Music Fellow at Merton College, Oxford. But I chose languages in the end.
[2] E.g. Schumann Kreisleriana/Faschingsschwank, selected Chopin Etudes/Préludes/Ballades (+ Barcarolle ), various Beethoven sonatas (e.g. Opp.2#2,22,109,110), etc.
[3] And I'd definitely beat him in a fist-fight .

I agree that there is a vast gap between G8 and any remotely excessible diploma. Up to G8 your utmost priority was getting the notes and elemantary character of the piece then you get distinction simply by doing this. From the diploma level they require complete control over the entire music - evenness and phrasing had been a new concept to me only until a few years ago.

I have seen a lot of people refusing to dedicate their time to improve their evenness, thus giving up progressing. This is partly down to teachers under the pressure to constantly reward the pupils with 'result' ie the speed at which you can play the notes while failing to see the broader picture composed of small touchs. Another reason is down to people's perception of classical piano as virtuosic instrument. I wish that playing the piano could be as simple as playing football. People do enjoy it everywhere whatever their ability is at. As for the original post, the pressure of playing at professional level should not overide satisfaction and enjoyment you get out from playing the piano. I'm yet to find a solution for the balance between being complacent and striving for perfection...

[1] My parents and teachers had long assumed I would study music, and I did continue it to A level. I even undertook a preliminary visit/interview with a Music Fellow at Merton College, Oxford. But I chose languages in the end.
Everyone thought I was going to do the same thing (music). But in the end, I took a long circular route that started with engineering and shifted to business/marketing. But I'm hoping to get back into the arts, because they're my "twuuuuue wuv." If you're going to marry your profession, it better be one you love. "Mawwiage is a sacwed sacwament," after all.

Michael

I think you have explained exactly what I was trying to get at extremely well.

Thanks

Adrian

Some beautiful novels written in this forum...

Adrian:

I don't really understand those English exams, but I guess there's another explanation that you should keep in mind, and that's diminishing returns.

Personally, I passed Italian conservatory exams up to the seventh of ten years[1], and I did that by studying about an hour a day regularly, and about four hours a day in the couple of months leading up to the exam. I play much, much less now, and mostly chamber music which is easier on the fingers.

Anyway, my point is that I am astonished by the results I can get by practicing three hours a week. I don't think for one moment that if only I practiced eight hours a day I'd be the next Rachmaninoff. [2]

This probably applies to every piano student and pianist around.

[1] I get to have footnotes too! For the record, I tried the eighth-year exam once and I did not pass, which was expected because I was a private student and not a Conservatory pupil, and although I was a good student I was not a boy wonder or anything. My university studies got in the way of a further attempt.

[2] This footnote business is fun ... Stojkovic: not that I really care, and I hope I'm not starting a holy war or anything, but it really is Rachmaninoff: OK, obviously it's Рахманинов, but his own signature in Latin characters ends with ff. Surely his spelling preference deserves being respected?