Practice Makes Perfect!

Sounds odd, doesn't it: Practice makes perfect. But it's true! In our world of music, the original saying is backwards.

One thing I like to explain to my students when we first begin our journey together is that your brain is smart: you can look at a piece of music that is your level (and sometimes even more complicated than you are playing) and understand most of what is there and how it should be executed.

So yes, your brain is smart, but your hands are stupid! This usually elicits a laugh (or a complaint that I used the word stupid). But what it boils down to is that a major part of our job, especially when we first begin to learn a new piece, is to train our hands to do what our brain can do easily. We need to strengthen that connection between the brain and the hands.

So we try and try and try, and we get it right! We celebrate! But is once enough?