How to Practise

Ever heard the saying "quality over quantity"? This rings true for flute and piccolo practise! In fact, numerous studies have found that, although professional musicians practise less than when they were tertiary music students, their practise is more effective now as it is more intentional and planned. Here are some tips to consider: 

Create a Plan 

Practice is most effective when you have a plan, especially if you have less time available than you'd like. Keeping practice and/or lesson notes can be a great way to prioritise what needs the most attention, ensures you stay on task to reach your goals, and reduces decision fatigue in the practice room because you already know what you need to work on! Having an overarching plan for larger goals such as an exam, audition, or concert can also be beneficial. 

You may also like to consider forming a list of non-negotiables in your practice; for example, ensuring that every time you pick up your flute to practise, you do at least one physical warmup, one long-tone exercise, and one scale. This ensures that you're building good habits and technique with whatever time you have available, whether it's one minute or one hour. 

Video Recordings 

When you don't have a teacher or colleague around to provide feedback, a video recording is the next best thing! It allows you to observe your posture and stagecraft skills as well as your musical output, improving your critical thinking, aural skills, and physical awareness. This can be a good idea even if you do have regular lessons with an excellent teacher. You’d be surprised how much you can discover about yourself (although admittedly, it can be rather confronting)!

Reinvention V. Repetition 

If you're finding a particular passage technically difficult, it is generally more beneficial to practice it with different rhythms than to simply repeat the passage as written. For example, if you have a passage of semiquavers that are tripping up your fingers, try playing it with a dotted rhythm, as a quaver followed by a triplet, and the inverse of these rhythms. You may also like to start with just two notes of the passage, then gradually add the next note in the sequence.

Different tempos can also be useful. Practise challenging passages slowly, so that you give your mind enough time to understand exactly what is happening mechanically, and then gradually speed up—no speed is too slow! The opposite can also help for slow and lyrical passages; sometimes, practising those passages quickly can help you understand the phrasing.

Befriend the Metronome and Tuner 

At the risk of sounding like your flute teacher: "are you even practising if you're not using a metronome?" Regularly using a metronome not only improves your playing in the moment but helps develop a strong internal pulse so that when it is not there, you are able to maintain tempo and evenness. The same can be said of a tuner: regular use improves your aural skills so that your intonation becomes more reliable and more 'fine-tuned.' Introducing a metronome or tuner often highlights small blemishes that ordinarily go unnoticed, so befriend these devices and your playing will only improve! 

Take Regular Breaks 

It has been proven that taking small breaks during your practise session has positive impacts on your physical health and memory. Firstly, maintaining a static posture for a prolonged period, not warming up your body beforehand, and/or using poor posture can increase your risk of stress injuries. Secondly, taking a small break allows your brain to better absorb information and commit that information to long term memory. This also improves your focus. 

Warm Up Your Body 

Leading on from the recommendation to take regular breaks, it can also be wise to warm up your body (not just your flute!) before playing. Just as an athlete would warm-up and stretch before a game or race, it is important that we get our bodies ready to play, especially as we tend to hold an unnatural and static position for long periods of time. Some physical warmup ideas include a full-body stretch, facial massage, and even tongue stretching! 

With all this in mind, what works best for one person is not necessarily what will work best for the next. Play around with different formats, conditions, times of day, and see what methods reap the most reward. Happy practising!