How much practice time is ideal, appropriate, reasonable, absolutely necessary for a violin student?

Let’s assume (as I have) a new violin student could survive, progress even, with 15 minutes of practice everyday. I’m not talking about setting the world on fire, winning fiddle competitions or doing well at auditions; but surviving. By the same token, let’s assume a student anywhere between Books 3-5, excepting students planning a career in music, can do a reasonable job with 1-2 hours of daily practice. Based on those assumptions, a new violin student could start with 15-30 minutes per day and add 15-20 with each book (see figure below). I know, I know… everyone is different, but I think this gives a framework in which to plan time for an instrument. And I’m all about planning; ask anyone.

Amount of practice time needed for violin students

For the past two years, I’ve been trying to convince my own Book-1-Folk-Song-Playing son that our practice time would go a lot faster (15 minutes, not 30) if we didn’t bicker. I’m not talking about the flimsy and subjective “time would seem to fly by” faster- but the real, concrete minutes we could save. Like any self-respecting young man, however, my son rarely takes my word for anything. Usually he demands proof from a more “credible” source like YouTube or Wikipedia (or someone under the age of 7 from school) before he will concede a point. That’s why tomorrow morning I will present him with the graph below.

How We Spend Our Practice Time

This graph shows the average amount of time we waste in the course of bickering. I’ve calculated an average of 18 minutes spent practicing on good days versus 33 minutes on difficult ones. It shows that an average of 15 minutes can be saved by just getting to work (er, play)… that’s a 54% time savings: 54% more time to spend playing Legos, wearing masks, engaging in light saber battles… the list goes on.

If you’re a string student or parent, how much time do *you* spend on practice? Feel free to borrow my handy graph if you’re having practice woes of your own. I might even be persuaded to make a YouTube video to back up my claims if it comes to that.

  • http://www.minnesotastrings.com/2011/quick-poll-1-how-much-time-do-you-spend-practicing-your-instrument Quick Poll 1: How Much Time Do You Spend Practicing Your Instrument? | Minnesota Strings

    [...] you practice more, less or the same amount as your peers? Last week, I made some assumptions about how much time musicians need to practice based on their skill level. I posed the question to the beginning adult violin students group [...]

  • http://girlmeetspaper.com Jane Graham

    Thank you for the reassurance that ours is not the only family bickering around the subject of violin practice! I loved this article! In fact, I’m referencing it in my latest blog post :)  http://unofficialhomeschooler.com/2012/01/11/a-pre-practice-name-that-tune/

blog comments powered by Disqus