Musician Empowerment: How to Maintain Your Summer Practice Schedule

 

Tools For Success: 6 Tools for Creating Successful Practice Sessions

By Emily Kulinowski

Multi colored beach ball in a blue pool

According to a 2022 study on deliberate practice, “Results indicated that musicians who implement effective practice habits are focused on solving problems related to music playing and often refine their practice routines to increase their effectiveness. “

As summer break is now here, many student musicians are heading into a period of uncertainty. Summer can be a period of growth, busy schedules, or even a full break from our normal routine. No matter how you spend your summer break, it’s important to build practicing into your schedule.

The Challenges of Summer Break

I’ve personally found that when I didn’t have a structure on breaks I lacked motivation and consistency with practicing. Even though I had more time open for practicing, I often took the breaks as a time to step away and recharge before going back to school.

Taking summer break to refresh yourself for the next school year is very important. Our bodies and minds need time to rest before going back to our busy schedules at school. However, it’s also important to make time for practice so you can keep your playing abilities active. Even if it’s only 20 minutes a day, consistency is key to maintaining your chops.

Maintaining a practice schedule over the summer isn’t always easy. We may be busy with summer jobs, music camps, and just having fun. 

Having some practice tips in your back pocket can help you maintain and make the most out of your summer practice sessions.

1.Set Goals

Going into each practice session with a goal in mind will help you better structure your time. Practicing without a goal to accomplish can make it harder to be productive since you are more likely to spend time figuring out what you want to practice.

I know I’ve gone into some practice sessions without a goal, and for part of those sessions I was just aimlessly figuring out what I should get done that day. If you plan ahead what you want to accomplish before you head to the practice room you will be able to get more done in your session than if you didn’t have a goal.

If you aren’t sure what to practice, don’t be afraid to ask your teacher. Your teachers are there to help you and they want you to succeed. I had an amazing percussion teacher, and he always had great advice when it came to practicing and music making.

Once you have some goals mapped out be sure to write them down. Have a journal or even a digital document where you can keep track of your goals and your progress each practice session. This will help you track what you’ve been practicing, how you’ve grown, and how close you are to achieving your goals.

2.Be Sure to Warm Up

As musicians, we know that warming up is an essential part of practice and performance. However, it’s easy to want to rush it or even skip warm ups entirely in order to get to the music.

“A muscle is like a car. If you want it to run well early in the morning, you have to warm it up.”
— Florence Griffth Joyne

Our bodies and minds are all muscles, and being a performer is not only a mental task but a physical task as well. Warming up allows both our mind and body to ease into playing our instrument. 

Warming up doesn’t have to be complicated or boring. When using a metronome, you can swap it out for a fun clicktrack or even use popular music to groove along with. Find ways to make variations in scales and etudes. 

Take excerpts of the music you’re working on and make exercises out of it. Making warmups out of your music can be helpful in not only warming up your instrument, but it will help you play your music better in the long run because you are giving more detail to sections you may struggle with.

Consistently warming up in ways that are fun and effective will help make your practice sessions more productive because your body will be better charged to take on the music and goals you’re about to accomplish.

3.Balance Your Practice

You wouldn’t go to the gym and only do the treadmill, you’d balance your workout sessions to include some form of weights and cardio. The same goes for practice- you need to balance your practice sessions to ensure all of your bases are covered.

There are three main areas that you can focus on: facility, musicality, and originality. Balancing these might not be easy at first, but focusing on each area a little bit each session will help you become a better musician.

Facility can refer to technique, coordination, movement, timing and reading. Technique is one of the most important aspects of playing because if we aren’t playing with proper form our sound as well as physical health over time can be affected. Having proper posture and movements will help the sound you want to come out and your overall playing ability will improve.

Musicality is something as musicians we are very familiar with. Things like our style, feel, tone, groove, touch, and listening are key elements to how we create our own distinct performance.

Trying to sound like another industry professional can be a good place to start, but eventually you should move away from that and make musical choices that allow you to stand out from the crowd.

Going off of that, originality is another way to set yourself apart. Practicing improvisation, experimentation, different tunings, and elements like your setup can really change your performance.

Be sure to practice some improvisation each practice session as that is a skill that you only get better at with time. Play around with your setup to see what works best for you.

3 Tips For Productive Practice

Tips For Productive Practice- The Den Collective

4.Listen to Your Body

It’s easy to want to power through how we’re feeling so we can still perform. However, ignoring how we feel can often lead to unproductive practice sessions or a hindered performance.

If you’re feeling under the weather stay home and get your body the rest it needs. If your wrist or arm is hurting you make sure you go to the doctor if need be. Ignoring a serious ailment that isn’t going away could be a sign of something bigger, so getting it looked at sooner than later can help find out the cause of your pain.

Going for regular checkups is also important. Physicals, eye appointments, and hearing exams are important ways to make sure our bodies are functioning well. From personal experience, I know I have some hearing loss so I make sure to go in for regular hearing exams to see where my hearing ability is at.

Listen to your body- if something doesn’t feel right take a break or schedule an appointment as soon as possible. The music isn’t going anywhere; it will be waiting for you when you get better.

5.Practice Smarter- Not Harder

We’re often conditioned to want to practice for hours at a time in order to achieve success. However, the more time you spend in a practice room without a break the more likely your willpower will decrease.

You’re more likely to get more done in thirty minutes to an hour than if you try to practice for five hours straight. 

Practicing isn’t about who can practice the longest- it’s about how productive you make your practice time. Quality over quantity is the goal, and setting a timer for a short period of time can help you break up your tasks into manageable chunks. 

Try to focus on one thing at a time. If there's a specific passage or measure that’s giving you trouble, break it down into the simplest components and slow it down. If you can’t play it slow you likely can’t play it fast. 

If something isn’t coming together yet that’s okay! Take a step back from the difficult music and come back to it later or even the next day. Sometimes having fresh eyes on the music can make it easier the next time.

6.Have Fun

While making music can be about working hard to improve your abilities, don’t forget that you should have fun too. Remember how fun it was when you started learning your instrument or getting into more challenging music? Remember that feeling when you go into the practice room.

We all want to be good at our instrument and be the best musician we can be. Despite all of the hard work we put in, don’t forget music making is a joyful act and you should enjoy the opportunity you have to make music. Your music might not always be your favorite and that’s okay, but you can always find ways to make the act of playing more fun.

Music is not only fun for the listener but the musicians as well. As you improve you get more excited about your accomplishments, new goals, and harder music you can play. 

It’s easy to get stuck in the motion of focusing on your abilities and sometimes compare yourself to others. Remember that everyone is on their own journey and everyone's path is different. Have fun and enjoy your musical journey because there are so many great things to come!

Person practicing violin in a practice room, as seen through a window

Building a Productive Summer

Maintaining your summer practice schedule can be tricky, but having some practice tips on hand can help you have productive practice sessions this summer.

There are many tools when it comes to practicing, and understanding how you can improve your 

The Den Collective partners with musician empowerment resources William Seji Marsh and Caleigh Drane to provide sessions to those interested in improving their musical expression and goal achievement. More information on our coaches can be found here.

Knowing how to have productive practice sessions will help you maintain your practice schedule over long breaks. Myself and The Den Collective are here to support and help in any way we can!

 
Tips & Advice, Musician EmpowermentEmily KulinowskiEmily Kulinowski, Musician Empowerment, practice, practicing, practice schedule, summer break, setting goalsComment