Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum The Simple Truth to Mastering Piano

Ten years of daily practice.

That is what studies have found that it takes to "master" just about anything (of course, to master is a relative term.)

1 down, 9 to go.

Well, I always say it takes 10 years for most to really learn how to drive. Which means there's still a lot of newbies on the road.

"10,000 hours," I think, was the actual claim.

And this has come up a lot around here.

Baloney, really.

(And yes, I spelled it that way purposefully.)

Simple truth? I don't think so - not much, but especially piano study, is that simple.

For example, how many hours per day over those 10 years?

At what intensity and with what motivation and enthusiasm?

Are there different levels of sub and super mastery, and at what time period?

If it's one hour per day then it logically follows that if you practice 2 hours per day you will achieve mastery in 5 years, correct?

And on and on...

JF

Good luck, see you in 10 years!

And on and on... exactly.

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The original research is actually quite convincing. The problem is that the media seized on the number without the caveat. The conclusion of the original studies was, basically, that masters of a specialty like piano playing required at least 10k hours of *deliberate* practice, carefully defined. "Native ability", whatever that may be, did not correlate with subsequent mastery.

I don't believe a word of it. There are far too many variables when it comes to playing the piano that can't be summed up in a simple number.

Mastery is another loaded term. Just ask any of the 'masters' how many hours it took them - many will say mastery is as elusive as it was on day-one.

Glen

The REAL truth is *quality* practice time, not quantity.

10,000 hours of Mary had a little lamb every day will produce a master of nothing.......except performing Mary had a little lamb of course!

Completely false. I had women figured out by the time I was 9 and a half. If only I had a piano then... and learned to tell the truth.

I think 10,000 hours is a good benchmark. I will probably have done about that much in a few years on my primary instrument (approx 28 years at 1 hour/day) and I would be surprised if my playing gets much better from here on out given the rate of progress over the years.

Ha! You only knew what they wanted you to know...and they were either dazzling you with deception or baffling you with bulls**t ...maybe by 99 1/2...maybe...

JF

You mean , of course, that you had figured out that you would never understand them.. lol

Well, I read that Kenny Garrett have practiced over 50,000 hours in his lifetime.. and I think someone once said it took him 15 years to be able to play the Chopin etude Op10 #2 well. It may be true that with 10,000 hours of practice you will be competent, but if you want to be a "master" like the people we look up to, chances are they put in a lot more than 10,000.

I know people who have probably practiced more than 10,000 and still suck, mostly due to the fact they were just playing for that time instead of doing actual practicing. Effective practicing requires the kind of discipline you would need for boot camp, and knowing how to practice is probably more important than putting 10,000 hours on an instrument.

This is not some froot-loopy made up self-help. The original research was done by Anders Ericsson, and published in peer-reviewed journals. Take a look at the papers and then decide.

Here's a link to get you started: http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.html