Music Practice

[BearAusten]

I have nine year old who is learning to play piano (a year - about Grade 1 standard) and a woodwind instrument (just over 2 years - around about Grade 4 standard).

Over the last couple of years I have always helped him practice. My main question is should I be allowing him to practice on his own now. Are there are benefits to doing this?

Moreover, (I have asked this before some months ago - sorry) how long should you be going over a piece - not necessarily for exam purposes? I am a bit concerned about his teacher getting him to concentrate on a certain amount of pieces for so long and ds still struggling with the sight reading aspects.

Sorry for the long post.

The piano is the most difficult instrument to learn. Getting through the first low grades (1-2-3) can take years, and there are also the theory exams (assuming he is doing RBSM exams).

The exam pieces are learned and practiced ad nauseam, and for the higher grades, the pieces can take 1-2 years to learn. Sight reading also takes years, and the more complex pieces are a combination of sight reading and muscle memory.

It really is a case of practice, practice, practice, and it requires many hours per week. So I'd say a combination of (lightly) supervised practice, and having some easy fun pieces to play just to keep him on track with pieces he will be able to "achieve" and feel he is making progress.

That is more or less what I was thinking. The piano practice is fine - Grade 1 pieces seem mostly to get there within a month/two month period. It is more the other instrument.

His woodwind music teacher wants them all up to performance standard and at the moment it seems to be going to four months +. Ds memorizes them relatively quickly and I strongly suspect no longer follows the music on the page.

Firstly wrt practice, the transition to independent practice is s very child dependent but I wouldn't be in a rush at 9. I still 100% supervise my 9yr old (similar standard to yours on her instruments) and have only this summer backed out of the practice room with DD12, although I'm still 'around' during her practice to help if invited. I know lots of accomplished 12/13 yr olds who still get some level of support/guidance with practice.

How long to stick on a piece... there should be a balance of quick study and 'performance' standard work ideally. We wouldn't flog a piece for too long as everyone loses interest! DD12 tends to take 6-8 weeks per piece and then perform it, and she has several pieces on the go at different stages, so there'll be one she's learning, one she's polishing and some technical studies. DD9 has been on her current set of pieces since just before the summer hols but we are going really detailed on these as they are for an audition. She has limited tolerance for sticking at the same pieces for a long time so we tend to turn things around more quickly with her.

Thanks Folkmamma that has made me feel a bit better. The difficulty seems to be his teacher has a different viewpoint . I have broached the subject with him but to no avail in regards to keep practicing pieces to the point where no progress is really being made. Moreover, the music teacher wants him to take complete responsibility for practice. Ds has even said he prefers to practice with me.

The real reason for the post was I was wondering if it was me just being a bit difficult and controlling. Not sure about what to do though.

Hmmm... tricky. As I've said on previous threads, for me the teacher/pupil/parent triangle is absolutely essential and so any teacher needs to work with me as well as the girls. But we've been really lucky in that sense. The only teacher it didn't really work that way with didn't last very long!!

For me, they often need supporting with how to practice. So not just playing through but isolating tricky bars, playing rhythm only, etc. Practice only makes permanent, not perfect so doing the wrong things over and over again won't help. My DD is 9 and learning a wind instrument, I would say I supervise about 50% of her practice as she still needs quite a bit of help, with tricky rhythms or whatever. The older DD is 12 and I probably only make the odd comment eg 'tuning'! Or she needs dad to accompany her. Regarding how long to have a piece, that is down to teacher style and philosophy I would have thought but my DD s both have same wood wind teacher and they do loads of pieces, consequently their sight reading is amazing and confident. The older one does have some pieces that are done to performance standard, but not all.
Maybe your ds needs to get more info about what specifically needs to improve in a piece so he can progress so he practices 'smarter', ie focuses on the tricky bits instead of the parts which are already good.

We had practice alongside supper preparation when the children were young. They played whilst I chopped. They were increasingly independent from secondary age but still wanted me to listen lots of the time.
My daughters best friends father is a conductor and professional composer. He supervised her practice and played accompaniment until she was in sixth form..

I support practise for my 9 year old. The major part is reminding him what his teacher wants him to work on. So scales, hand technique exercises or whatever, hands seperately, hands together and SLOWLY.

His teacher is very keen on me being involved, i dont play piano but another instrument, so im not flying totally blind. The system here means lessons are limited to 20 mins so teacher is keen for me to support/reinforce teaching points (i sit in on lessons) as well as basic theory so he can focus on actual piano teaching in the lessons. Teacher prefers all pieces to be polished but is open to varying repetoire to keep up interest so ds is currently playing a piece from elissa milnes easy little peppers that he chose himself having declared the next few pieces in the standard curriculum book as being 'boring'. (His first instrument is drums and he generally finds the piano curriculum rhytmically rather samey).

I also support practise for my older kids but in a more hands off way, remind them to actually practise not play a concert for themsrlves and yell SLOWLY through a closed door are the most common things

lol Mending at yelling 'SLOWLY' through a closed door!!!!

So I checked in on DD12 today (tomorrow is lesson day).

Me: "Have you set been setting the metronome to 55?"....
Her: "....[stares blankly]"
Me: "What about this bit, did you do the slow practice there?"
Her: "....[more blank staring]... no, but I did practice that bit in second position (not on list)".

Cue lots of deep breaths and subtle eye rolling...

Thank you all. Horseymum we do focus on 'tricky bits' when necessary.

You are so right about the triangle aspect Folkmamma. I am not sure everyone is on the same wavelength. I think I need to be very direct with the music teacher, which I am not very good at in person. Your younger dd seems similar to ds, but whilst he is not always vocal about his 'intolerance' to spending so long on a few pieces, it is obvious when he practices.

I think as they progress there is so much more to the pieces and they will naturally spend longer on them. Maybe he would enjoy spending some time playing slightly easier pieces and getting through more repertoire at this stage though. I don't think it would be unreasonable to ask teacher.

On the sight reading front - is there a wind band he could join? Ensemble playing has been a turning point for both DC's sight reading. Much harder to memorise when you don't have the tune and too much music anyway.

I have also independently of teacher just had DD read through a book of easy music from time to time, one tune a day. More fun than purpose made sight reading exercises.

And really solid sight reading can meaning cutting to the chase quicker with the main pieces he's learning too.

At the moment teacher is giving DD studies to learn alongside her piece which are close to sight reading level but have bits of new skills to practice. So she gets a new study ever week or two to keep things interesting while pieces last longer. Something like that might be a good alternative to just asking for easier music all round.

I find that interesting, Thirdfiddle, about your dd's music teacher giving her pieces which help her gain new skills. That would be useful. I think the best idea would be to aim for more of a mix between potential performances pieces, short technical ones and easy fun pieces. Ds has just started playing in two music groups, which he seems to be enjoying, so hopefully that will help his sightreading.

I think practice supervision is really helpful for most children and teens and keeps them focused and on track.