Since this is the Struggling Church Musician website I’m going to tell you before you even start, Pray. Every day. Not only during your daily devotions but during the week pray before you play. Pray before youplay. Pray before practice and before performance. Pray for the Lord’s blessing upon your hands and that if your music can minister to anyone it will.
Then…
Practice every day. A few minutes every day is better than one hour on day a week. At the very least try and practice every weekday. If you’re a church musician you’ll get enough hands on practice on Sunday.
Also…
Think about what you are about to practice. Don’t just slam through your studies. Don’t just play a song super fast to get it over with. Listen to yourself and how you sound. Is that pleasing to the ear? Ask yourself this. Whatever you are practicing will be what you are playing when it is time to perform. If you’re bumbling through your practice session, not caring and just going through the motions, your body will remember this and this is what you will perform. I’ve seen and heard it. Not pretty.
For organizing…
Try breaking your practice session up into 3 groups.
1. The first part of your music practice time can be considered a warmup because you need to warm up. Whatever instrument you play this is the time to prepare yourself for the beautiful music you will be playing. Most people find this the most boring part but it’s like cooking. Do you just dump a cake in the oven and then turn it on? No! You warm the oven first, because everyone loves cake and you don’t want to be guilty of destroying it. Everyone loves beautiful music, you don’t want to be guilty of destroying your craft now do you?
In the first part of your practice time practice your scales.
- Major Scales, both hands
- Minor Scales, both hands
- Chromatic Scales
And the different ways they can be played such as staccato, legato, in chorded blocks and more. Also practice your
- Primary chords, both hands,in all inversions
- Chord progressions
- Any extended chords that you would like to learn that can enhance your playing.
- 9th chords
- 11th chords
- 13th chords
- sus chords
- tri tones
These include…
In the second part of your practice time work on two or three songs you are learning or working to perfect. Remember to never stop and repeat a section you mess up on. Just do the whole song over again OR rework the particular section you keep messing up on until you get it right.
Now I’m not saying do this all in one practice session. Don’t overwork yourself. Pace yourself. Give yourself a time limit on each session and section of each session. A few minutes(2-3) reworking the offending section and then try the song all the way from the top. Then put it away until th next day.
But keep working on this section and song just like this until you have conquered the offending section.
3. The third part of your practice session could be devoted to playing that which you will be performing. These are songs that you already know very well. If you are playing the coming Sunday then play the ones you will be playing. If not then play a few pieces from your repertoire to keep it fresh in your head and fingers.
These are just some ideas to help you get the most from your practice time. Hopefully they will help you in your musicianship.
