The best time of day to practice piano, plus assorted piano hacks

In my opinion it's best to practice at set times of the day. Ideally this
should be coordinated to when you naturally feel most alert. When I have
several weeks free, I find the best time for me to practice is usually
either early morning or around 9pm at night. Any other time is ineffective
and leads to diminished results; for example, if I attempt to practice piano
during the afternoon, I get sluggish and don't do very well. This varies
from person to person of course, but it's worth investing time to find out
when you naturally perform best.

Most people's lifestyles prohibit this kind of accuracy, however, and so
other tactics must be employed...

If you come home from a day job, you might want to consider having a short
nap (20 minutes for a micro-nap, or increments of 90 minutes for longer
periods) before practicing piano. I find that after I sleep I have a more
focused mind, as well as being refreshed from the day's activities.

Similarly, after I eat Thai food I find myself with greater energy (this is
because thai cuisine is minimally cooked to preserve as many vitamins and
nutrients as possible). Consider looking at the way your lifestyle affects
your musical ability

Here are some other ideas for learning piano:

Hack 1: One tactic I used to better my piano skills whilst still in high
school was to befriend the resident musical prodigy. This person played
cello to an almost world-class standard, had studied at Chetham's, and was a
gifted improviser on the piano, able to rapidly construct complex pieces. We
used to hang out and mess around on pianos. I always learned a lot - just by
being around him my musical intelligence increased. Just like "you are what
you eat", I say that "you are your peer group". Thus: don't spend your time
with people who struggle to learn piano.

Hack 2: In my report I advocate learning hard pieces. This is because, due
to the piece's perceived complexity in relation to what you believe your
skill to be, you will be almost frightened into plowing more energy into
learning it. The piece's difficulty is a catalyst, a powerful stimulus to
force you to work harder than you normally would. It is akin to the notion
"it's easier to do the unrealistic than the realistic".

Hack 3: Practice sight-reading large orchestral scores, for instance a
Wagner opera, or a Tchaikovsky symphony. Go very slowly and try to turn the
piano into a full orchestra. This is an excellent tool - once you return to
reading normal two-staff piano music, it will seem much much easier to
understand and play.

Hack 4: Practice good posture. I took up Yoga and Alexander Technique (at
first not because of piano) but found that my posture whilst playing piano
improved, thus affecting my confidence. And increased confidence led to
better performances and the tackling of harder pieces, which resulted in
more rapid improvement all round.

There are lots of different things you can do to help your piano practice
become more efficient. I encourage you to be creative, and to deconstruct
the learning process so that you can streamline segments.

About the Author

Article by Sebastian Mitchell. Click on this link www.pianoaccelerator.co.uk
to see my report 'Learn Piano in 3 Hours or less'. You'll get many more 
in-depth methods for increasing your learning speed and efficiency.
Here it is again: www.pianoaccelerator.co.uk

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