Part I
What is really going on?
Part II
Any ideas what to do about it?
Part III
Calibration, applying deliberate practice to your deliberate practice.
Postlogue
The Practice Journey (The Learney) and long term development
…in answer to these questions from a Practiclass
- I've been playing since I was a kid, why am I not farther along?
- How much time will it take until I can play something well in front of people?
- How much practice time is needed each day?
Part IV
This is a little epilogue to the last three blogs. The italicized text is something I jotted down years ago that occurred to me about my practice. I think it worth consideration. I’m talking about the mystery of…
Long term development
Over time we start seeing less and less new things. The only things that need attention are the rarer and rarer new things like mm. 14-21 in Browuer study 15* or No. 16 m. 4 b.2. These were really tough inside of a much larger piece that was much, much easier than that. My fingers just had not seen that before.
I was astonished, it took months before it ‘clicked’.
These things get solved over time and with effort. Then even less things will be new to us.
Is this part, a big part, of the formula for long term growth levels? We can only solve so much in the short term, but as we do, in the long term, we get much better even at things we have not actively practiced in a while. The bigger this library, the learning of which also provides contextual interference for previously learned information, the better we are at everything including things we had already learned and wondered how we would ever improve.
That would explain a lot.
The good news is the little bits of control we are building from learning easy music are money in the bank when it comes to our future progress. We are eliminating many difficult parts one movement at a time in easier music, instead of trying to do things that require numerous undeveloped moves in more difficult music. Be kind to your cognitive load during your growth. It will make that a lot more enjoyable.
*Brouwer study 15: This is from a collection of beginer/intermediate/advanced studies that I used to refine my skills once I had come close to reaching the highest levels of my playing. That is right, I did what I’m asking you to do. I returned to much easier music to learn some lessons, and boy did I! I removed excess difficulty so I could see the basic areas of my technique more clearly. It was time well spent.
The reason I bring it up is the piece, and all of those studies, are relatively easy for me, but there was a short finger twisting section that took me months to solve. I had to keep dropping it and coming back for another round of solutions.
It is not fast, or virtuosic, but I just couldn’t get it. The finger combination was just something really weird. No matter how many ‘tried and true’ things I used it wouldn’t come under control the way other things did.
I finally realized that other things were easier because I had already ingrained thousands of similar technical movements, and the leap from seeing combinations of those to playing them was not far. However, that fingering in the Brouwer was unique and I did not have past experience to rely upon. I had to learn and grow with it over time just like the other techniques I had absorbed over the years. For that measure I was much closer to being a beginner than my overall level.
Now that I’ve taken care of that my ‘library of learned movements’ has grown even larger. Building this library in our long term memory takes time. It is not possible to experience everything by learning a few pieces or giving a few performances.
So, while our performances can be enjoyable from the beginning of the learning process to the end if we choose what we learn wisely, we are always building the library. That is the slow, but empowering, progress over time that, while giving enjoyable performances of level appropriate music along the way, happens if we go about our learning correctly.
If I knew about this when I was a student I would have adjusted what I was playing and enjoyed the ride a LOT more.
Enjoy the ride.
Hi Gregg,
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to work on my “kindergarten” performance piece yesterday. When I first chose it I thought, “this will be a walk in the park”, it could so easily have been pride before a fall! Definitely Dunning-Kruger at work. The few bars of this little piece have highlighted several issues, it’s been a revelation to work on it. I shall definitely work on many more like this, it’s much more fun than working on the same piece for months and still not being happy with it. I’ve actually grown to quite like playing it, it incorporates part of the G major scale, modulates to D major and ends in G major but on the dominant (D), not what’s expected but that’s Bêla Bartock for you. I think I’ve interpreted it correctly. My theory knowledge isn’t great! The 10 minute spacing starts this evening to hopefully iron out the pauses and help the hand position changes.
I encourage any subscriber to take the opportunity to perform next Saturday. If I can do it anyone can, I’ve always been the person who sits at the back of the room hoping not to be noticed. Find a few bars of an easy piece and give it a go, you’ve nothing to lose and everything to gain.
See you on Saturday, you’ll be glad to know I won’t be wearing a backless, extremely short, glittery dress!
Awesome, Julie!!
Part of the goal of doing the workshop has been to allow for the deeper comprehension of the learning process by stripping away the technical difficulty and leaving only the practice difficulty.
This is why you are seeing things that have escaped your attention before, and this is a wonderful gift! I can talk about it all day long, but there is no substitute for experiencing it. You are learning.
I suspect that some of our performers will have the same experience in the workshop next Saturday. You got a preview by playing in the Practiclass last weekend.
Pro tip – we can get this in our practice by paying close attention to what we are doing and noticing every single little undesirable result that we can. We can support that process by recording our performances for review (and much of the benefit will happen from just the pressure of recording!! This is a good thing.)