Welcome back to piano! And welcome back to Piano Tell! đ
ZigZagStory I can only focus for a few minutes and I feel that the level of playing has degraded so much that this makes me frustrated
Does anyone have tips on how to manage this âonboardingâ process correctly?
As a matter of fact I do!
First, acknowledge that it will feel like youâve forgotten everything, but recognize that you havenât truly forgotten, you just have to bring those piano memories back to the top of your mind form whenever theyâre buried at the moment.
This might feel like you have to re-learn, which can feel frustrating, but a lot of it is more like remembering than re-learning. So rest assured that re-learning is much quicker than learning from scratch.
Next, think about the different things (skills, techniques, knowledge points) that you will have to re-learn and remember. One skill is probably concentration and/or patience, the skill that makes it possible for you to beat the piano for, say, 30 minutes to an hour.
One way to develop this skill is to make sure thereâs nothing distracting you will youâre practicing. Are you worried about work? About house work or chores you need to do? Those things will make it harder for you to be focused at the piano, before you sit down to practice, take a minute to remind yourself that thereâs nothing else you need to be doing at them moment, other than sitting down at the piano.
Another approach that will help you be able to concentrate is to have a pre-set plan (and this will be connected to my next point). If you know at the start of the session that you have a few piano tasks you want to accomplish, then when you sit down to practice, you donât have to think âok, what am I doing here?â This also helps with concentration, because if you start to lose focus, you can switch tasks. So say youâre going to start with scales and then work on a new piece. And say you want to spend 10 minutes on scales, but 5 minutes have passed and youâre getting frustrated or thinking about giving up. Well, thatâs 5 minutes youâve practiced scales, so go ahead and move on to the next task on your list. If you want to practice for 30-45 minutes, and you have three piano tasks on your list, and you on;y do each of those tasks for 5 minutes, that will still be 15 minutes youâve practiced, which is perfectly fine as youâre trying to get reacquainted with piano practice.
So that brings us to the next step: the piano tasks you want to accomplish during each practice. I like to think of this as creating a practice menu. What should go on your practice menu depends on what you were working on in the past and how you like to structure your practice sessions. So first decide whether you want to include exercises and scales, and decide which piece(s) you want to focus on. Regarding scales, I recommend you choose to do a practice structure that is more similar to (rather than more different from) what you did in the past. If you want to make big changes, maybe do that after youâre back into the habit of daily or regular practice.
Next, pieces. Here, there are basically two approaches, one is to start with something youâve played before, and the other is to start with something brand new. Here, my recommendation depends on whether youâre a âreaderâ or a âmemorizer.â If you are someone who is comfortable reader from the score while playing, and if you tend to continue actively reading even after youâve gotten apiece into your fingers, then I would recommend you start with something youâve learned in the past. This is because you should be able to re-learn from reading the score and your comfort-level with the score will reduce some of the frustration or re-learning.
OTOH if youâre someone who memorizes music pretty quickly and you tend to play/practice from memory and donât really read or look at the score closely, then I recommend you start with a new piece. This is because feeling like youâve forgotten something you once memorized will feel frustrating and may be de-motivating.
Having said that, if youâre getting frustrated with previously learned pieces feeling like theyâre too hard or feeling like âI should remember this,â just start with something brand new.
The other piece of advice I have about picking pieces is to start with something easier than the last fewer pieces you worked on. Again, you want to ease back into practice and give your fingers time to get back into it.
In terms of motivating yourself to get to the piano regularly, two things I do that help me a lot are 1) write a âPâ (for piano!) on the calendar every time I practice. Whether itâs five minutes or two hours, I still get the P. Seeing the Ps add up is motivating in itself. And 2) I keep a practice journal where I write what I practiced, and at the end of the session, I leave notes for myself about what to practice or focus on for the next session. For example, sometimes my notes just look like a list of what I played. But other times, Iâll write things like âstart with measure 12â or âwrite in fingering for p. 2.â I know not everyone likes to do this, but I find it takes the guesswork out of it. I donât have to try to remember what I played yesterday, I donât have to think about where to start etc.
Lastly, be kind to yourself. Recognize that a little blank makes it feel like youâve forgotten everything, and that is legitimately frustrating. But take comfort in knowing that. Your piano memories are still in your head, you just have to dig them out.
So to re-cap, here is my advice in a nutshell:
Acknowledge that it will feel frustrating and be ok with that.
Give yourself time to get reaccustomed to extended practice sessions.
Have a pre-set plan, a practice menu for each session.
Pick easier pieces to start with, and be strategic about whether to start with a previously learned piece or a new piece.
Consider using a calendar and a practice journal to motivate yourself and help you keep a practice menu.
Be kind to yourself and patient with the process.
Good luck and keep us posted on how it goes!