Organizing Practice Time: an Overview

I'd like to give a full explanation of my approach to practice, preparation, and conditioning, but today I'll just give an overview and explain the details in future posts.

It's generally understood that musicians need to spend a a considerable amount practicing their instrument if they are going to be any good. It's less understood how the time should be spent. To recycle some old sayings, "It's quality, not quantity", and "Practice makes perfect, but only if you practice perfectly."


Unless I'm preparing for a recital or an audition, I rarely practice more than an hour and a half in addition to a rehearsal and performance schedule. I would practice more, but I do have to stop when I risk physical fatigue and overuse. With the limitation of time, I need to be organized, efficient and goal oriented. Hopefully, I have some time left over just to play for the enjoyment of playing. However,not all practice is physical. I can accomplish quite a bit without the bass in my hands, by studying the music and phrasing, or going through the mental process of learning the rhythms and bowings.

Practice Organization

I divide practice into two large categories, technique and repertoire. Within these two categories are many subcategories.

Technique Goals: physical strength, speed, accuracy, AND mental strength speed and accuracy. With the physical goals, we are running our bodies through the paces so we are consistent in our playing. With the mental goals, we are conditioning our musical perception of music in terms of pitch, rhythm, and harmonic understanding.

Repertoire Goals: I try to balance between orchestral, solo, and Bach. Lately, I've been having to make room for bass quartet music. Years ago I used to reserve time to learn jazz tunes, its physical techniques, and scales.

It's important to use practice time wisely. If you tend to play something incorrectly in your practice, you will have that same tendency in your playing in performance. Don't practice beyond the point of fatigue. If you can only manage to play an exhausting passage for just 5 minutes at a time, move on to something else and just come back to it more often. When I have a lot on my plate, I'll start up a new practice log and a "to-do" checklist. Sometimes I'll even keep track of the minutes I've spent on a passage-it might help me decide to go back to something when I know I felt like giving up after just a few minutes.

I'll get into more detail in future posts.