Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner How Often Should I Practice Repetoire?

So like many people tend to do, I got too caught up in learning new pieces, to the point where my old pieces are starting to get dusty. So naturally, after finishing the last piece I was working on (Mozart Sonata K330, took me a month thank god that's over haha), I decided it was time to go back and brush up on all my repertoire again before moving along to new pieces. This might take a while though because I have about 14 pieces to work on(if you count movements of sonatas individually, otherwise it's just 10).

After I go back and bring them all back up to par, I'm obviously going to continue to regularly practice them so that I don't forget. However, how often would you recommend I go through repertoire? I'm pretty sure every single day is an overkill, but once a week seems like it might not be enough. And my list of pieces that I learned is growing way faster than previously expected(I'm learning a mix of old classical pieces I played and new ones I haven't. Boy did I learn a lot back in the day!). What should I do once the list starts to get really big and how should I go about splitting up the repertoire?

My practice routine is usually an hour to an hour and a half in the morning/noon and another session of the same time at night. On busy days, I only practice at night time. I always spend the first 15 minutes of practice working on my scales as a warm up and to make sure I keep the basics in check, then spend the rest of the time working on repertoire. As of now, the only new piece I'm learning is Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata Movement 2 as a kind of relief piece after the Mozart sonata. I have a file on my computer where I keep track of scales I know at what tempo as well as what pieces I know and what their difficulty ratings are. Here are the pieces I "know" so far (aka learned/relearned since May/June):

Beethoven:
Sonata Op. 79 No. 25 in G Major
Brahms:
Waltz Op. 39 No. 1 in B Major
Waltz Op. 39 No. 2 in E Major
Chopin:
Mazurka Op. 68 No. 3 in F Major
Prelude Op. 28 No. 9 in E Major
Waltz Op. 34 No. 2 in A minor
Waltz Op. 69 No. 1 in A-Flat Major
Debussy:
Arabesque L. 66 No. 1 in E Major
Prelude No. 8 Book 1 | "La fille aux cheveux de lin"
Mozart:
Sonata K330 in C Major

It might not be the most impressive(I know, I have no Bach, tsk tsk), but everyone has to start somewhere. And I REALLY want to have a big pool of repertoire, I just have bad time management skills haha.

Thanks for all the help! I'm sure others need help with their repertoire as well

I'm sure others are having problems answering this, as it seems a very personal answer, which will vary with each of us. I see the factors as:

do you want to keep the repertoire at 'performance level' or are you willing to resurrect it knowing it will not take you long to get to performance readiness?
Do you want all the scores to remain in memory, or is retaining by reading the score acceptable?
Are the scores AT, BELOW or ABOVE your typical repertoire level? This will affect the frequency that you need to repeat

For me, the more of a challenge it was to learn, the more frequently I rotate it through my repertoire. If it is a score that I can restore with a couple of play-throughs, I don't worry about the interval as I recognize it will not take much energy. Since you have these at performance level, I would divide them into (A: took a lot of work; B: not so much C: no big deal), set up an interval for each of the categories and see if the intervals need to be adjusted

Just my thoughts

I don't think any non professional should spend almost any time trying to maintain repertoire. Why do think this should be done?

I don't think any non professional should spend almost any time trying to maintain repertoire. Why do think this should be done?

Just because I'm a nonprofessional doesn't automatically mean I have a lower desire to be a good pianist. In fact, one of my non-career related goals is to become a very skilled pianist and musician. I have a ways to go, but it's something I've wanted to do for a long time, hence why I can still find the spirit to practice despite my often busy college schedule.

As for why I would want to continue to maintain my repetoire, I believe every piece has something of value to it no matter how easy or simple it might be. Yes it's true there are other pieces that I will discover that i will probably like more. But I picked these pieces to learn because I like them as well. Besides, I already took the time to learn it. So why not spend a tad more to make it so my efforts don't go to waste?

Not to mention, it is always nice to be able to play something well when somebody asks, whether you are a professional or not. In my latest incarnation as an amateur pianist (after 30 years away and a snapped tendon in one bicep and a severed tendon in one pinky from a car accident) I play through every piece I know slowly once, ironing out the kinks, then once to see how I would play it in performance. Since I've only been back a year it takes about 2-3 hours to play. Starting next year I will probably alternate days (half the repertoire one day, half the next). The rest of the time is spent learning new music and getting new music up to speed. Caveat: I practice 2.5 hours in the morning, 2-3 at night and 6-7 hours a day over the weekend.

+1. It's highly variable. But the good news is the more you do it, the less you need to. Now while it's all rusty, you might run through it all two or three times a week or more, and not do much else. When pieces feel secure to you, drop them out of the rotation every other time. Then if that works, run them every third time. Keep on cutting back until you feel something weakening, and then increase the frequency for that piece. Eventually you may be running everything only once a month, or even less. It all depends on how your brain works.

But like muscles, memory strengthens with use. The more you use it, the easier it gets.

I don't think maintaiing repertoire has much to do with becoming a good pianist.

Why would your efforts go to waste if you you don't maintain old pieces in your repertoire? IMO one could argue that any time spent trying to maintain rep(which would keep on increasing with each piece you learn)could be spent more beneficially learning new rep.

My guess is that most amateur pianists don't worry much about maintaining pieces in their repertoire. They might try to have a few pieces ready if someone asks to hear them play. I'm not even convinced that pro pianists do much in this area either. For starters, they would have so many pieces that really maintaining them would take an almost impossible amount of time. My guess is if they plan to perform a previously learned piece they just try to devote enough time before the performance to review the piece.

This is how it works. Highly proficient pianists don't spend time maintaining repertoire, they are simply able to refresh it back to performance standard quickly if they need to use it.

Every amateur has to decide for himself/herself how much priority they want to place on maintaining existing rep.

I remember reading somewhere that a respected teacher once saw a passenger on a cruise ship playing three pieces very well, from memory. On speaking to her, it turned out that those were the only pieces she could play, because she only ever played them and nothing else for years, so she could play them very well. She never bothered to learn anything new, and was simply happy with what she had.

On the other hand, there are those who have hardly anything they can play well (from the score or from memory), because they are always 'in between' learning pieces and never perfect one before discarding it and going on to the next new thing. Students in their early years might well do that with their teachers, and (unless they're doing exams) because it takes too long to perfect any piece they're learning, their priority is to develop new skills rather than perfect any one piece (to the best of their ability at the time) only to move on once done. Certainly, in my student years, I never maintained any piece, and the exam pieces - the only pieces I 'perfected' - were discarded once they had served their purpose. My priority (and my teachers') was to develop new skills and move on to new pastures, learn new rep etc. I never performed as a student.

Now that my student years are far behind me and I'm performing regularly, my priorities have changed somewhat. I need to have at my fingertips a selection of memorized pieces which are performance ready at all times, which I keep adding to (a few pieces a year), as I learn new ones. Some of those that I've been playing for years don't need reviewing more than once a month; others that I've only recently learnt need reviewing at least once a week. But I'm still continuing to learn new pieces all the time, though not necessarily for performance purposes - some I'll discard once I've gotten what I wanted out of them, others I might keep playing and improving on for a while, with no thought of ever playing them in public.

When I was starting out in a career as a pianist in my late teens and early 20s I was never one of those who could just refresh a piece because I was (and am) a psychological disaster area. If I wasn't playing it every day for awhile I wouldn't play it in front of my mother, let alone an audience. It was not a technical problem, all in my head. But I had friends who could just pick something up a few days before that they used to play and give credible performances. My current teacher is like that. Everybody is different.

"Why would your efforts go to waste if you don't maintain old pieces" you ask? Well I play piano because I want to be able to play music, and a lot of it at that. My priority isn't just to just develop technique. I actually want to be able to play all the pieces I enjoy listening to. And if I don't maintain my repetoire, then what's the point of learning any piece, if you're not even going to bother remembering it. According to your logic it's ok to just keep going on without so much as a glance at what you learned before. I'm sorry, but I don't see exactly what your point in practicing is if you don't care about the pieces you learned before, but I play because I want to learn to play a plethora of music and remember that music. And I'm not some piano god who can just pick up a piece after after just 2 plays after months of not doing it.

Also you claim I could be using that time to learn new repetoire is the best use of time, but I beg to differ. It is NOT the best use of time FOR ME becautse I want to know a lot of pieces not just the new ones I am working on. Your priorities might be different, but do think to look through other people's shoes once in a while. Thank you and good bye.

Your feelings about this issue at age 20 will probably be different than your feelings about it at age 70 (trust me ).

Just curious - when you talk about "remembering" music - do you mean playing pieces in your repertoire by memory - or from the score?

Lol Carey, that's not my age. I do appreciate your concern though.

By remembering, I mean like learning pieces I played before back when I had teachers, but forgot over time. As I said, my goal as a musician is to be able to play all the music I enjoy playing and listening to. As for when I'm 70, we shall see. Only time can tell us that

Without addressing several of your ideas I don't agree with, just the logistics of what you want to do will soon become impossible. If you spend 2-3 hours/day reviewing your present rep what will you do when your rep is two or five times as large?

Nowhere did I say I wanted to practice every single day. If you read the post carefully, I explicitly said "I'm pretty sure every single day is an overkill". I said my practice routine is 2-3 hours a day usually, but I never said anything about using all that time everyday just to go through repetoire. If I did that, I wouldn't have my list of pieces



I just need productive answers like the one dogperson very kindly gave to me to help me pace myself better. Hope you can understand the intent of the post now.

You mentioned your "busy college schedule" so I just assumed......incorrectly it appears.

At 70 I sometimes have trouble remembering that I was working on a specific piece only a month ago. Apparently I get easily distracted. But picking it up again is no big deal., and eventually I get it learned - and recorded - so I can say "I played it" and move on to something new. Resurrecting old pieces usually isn't a problem for me (even stuff from 50 years ago) - unless they are incredibly difficult and require starting from scratch - in which case I usually opt to rest on my laurels and work on something easier.

Well, with all due respect of course my friend, but people's conditions can vary greatly at that age depending on how they lived their life. You seem to be doing very good and I'm happy for you! But alas, if we all knew what would happen in the future, wouldn't our current lives be so much more different? It's what we do in youth that shapes our future

I commend you for maintaining a regular practice schedule. That should definitely help you achieve your goals. It wouldn't be unreasonable to play at least two of your finished pieces on a daily basis. That way, in the course of a week you'll manage to play everything at least once, and you'll still have time to learn new repertoire as well.

Also, you may be surprised how well you can remember and whip a piece back into shape if you haven't played it for awhile - even after several years (I do it all the time !! ) .

As for the age thing.......what we do in our youth definitely shapes our future. Good genes, a good attitude and good luck also play a big part.

Glad to hear that you're working on the Pathetique 2nd movement. From 1960 to 2000, there was a distinguished gentleman named Karl Haas who hosted a public radio program called Adventures in Good Music. The Pathetique 2nd movement (played by Haas himself) was the show's theme song !! Definitely a good stand alone piece to have in your repertoire.

I've known players who know literally thousands of different songs, and could theoretically play non-stop for two or three days without running out of material. Maintaining that memory takes less time and effort per piece because playing that much music changes the way your brain works. Music seems to get into the parts of the brain that usually deal with language -- at least that's my guess.

There are studies that have been done on London cab drivers, who are required to memorize the whole city to get a license. The part of their brain that physically contains memory has been scanned, and it very clearly grows.