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How To Get The Most Out Of Your Violin Practice Time

The old adage "practice makes perfect" would possibly not be wholly true when it comes to violin practice, but practice certainly does make you a better player. If you'd like to improve , you need to practice.

Violin practice should be enjoyable and not a pain, but it must be productive too. Simply playing some tunes you know by heart is not really practice, though it could be fun. So as to get the maximum out of your practice time you must try to keep a few points under consideration.

Try to find an area to practice where you won't be distracted. Finding a room without a television, Internet access, and so on. Is maybe an excellent start, and letting the answering machine pick up any telephone calls will help. Be sure that you have what you need immediately to hand. Obviously, things like your violin and bow, a music stand and sheet music for any tunes you would like to work on, but less manifestly, a metronome and a recorder of some kind (audio only or auvio/video). A bottle of water or other drink is optional.

Violin practice is best done with quality instead of quantity. You do not want to practice for hours every day, but you need to try to practice at least 3 or 4 times per week. Spending hours on violin practice in each session can essentially be counter productive. You do not learn well if you're too exhausted or frustrated. You will learn better by spacing out sessions. Repetition is a good thing. The more that you work on the same thing the better you will get at it - although not all at the same time. Violin practice works best over a period of time. Instead of working on one section of a piece for hours at a time, you will find you have better results if you're employed on the section for a minute or two, and then switch to something else. Maybe revisiting it again later in your practice session, but even better let it sink in and try it again in your next practice session. I have discovered that I'm able to be working on a piece and just get exasperated in an effort to get it right and then the next day it all slots into place easily.

If you are learning a complete new piece, break it down into sections. Break it into logical sections four or 8 bars at a time and then move on rather than attempting the whole thing immediately. Listed to a recording of somebody else playing the same tune. Listen for the accents and flavor the other player adds to the tune. Don't just try to play music as it is written, add your own interpretation. You can play all the same note, but play them differently - it is a sophisticated excellence, but you can actually hear the difference.

A good way to approach violin practice is to start with a warm up of some kind. Some fast scales, arpeggios or exercises are good to begin with. I find I've a couple of arpeggio exercises that I tend to run through very quickly at the start of any practice session. I then run through a tune or two that I know by heart before buckling down to learn something new. I typically practice only for twenty or thirty minutes at a time, but I do incline to pick up an instrument more than one throughout the day.

To prompt yourself to practice violin, keep your instrument near you and out of the case. Keep it near your desk or couch. You can pick up an inexpensive stand for your violin that will allow you to keep it close to hand and safe from damage. You may not pick it up for a full practice session, but you might find it handy for a quick mini practice when time authorizes.

Remember when you do practice violin, make it good fun. If you're exhausted or simply don't feel like it - put it off. Don't force yourself to practice violin if you don't enjoy it. You won't learn well if it seems like work. Work on your violin practice, do not work at it.

Greg Weir is a fiddle (violin) player from Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, Canada. Greg runs the Violin Price website, a web resource for people interested in learning, playing or collecting violins. Visit http://violinprice.org/ for more information on violins, violin value and violin and fiddle music.

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