How Often should you Practice Violin for Fast Progress?
How many times a week should you pick up the violin to improve quickly?
In my violin studio the biggest challenge for students of all ages is to practice
Regardless of talent I’ve always observed that those who practice consistently improve and those who pick up the violin once in a while don’t.
The main reason students quit playing the violin is that they don’t practice enough, don’t see results and lose motivation
The key to staying motivated and enjoying the violin, is to practice consistently. Yup, also on the days you don’t feel like it, are tired, are busy and have so many other things to do.
On your off days I recommend to put the violin under your chin anyway, even if it’s just for a couple of minutes.
Is an hour long session in the weekend more effective than 5 minutes a day?
Training your motor skills takes a lot of time, repetitions and maintenance. When you practice once or twice a week, even if that’s a ‘long’ session, this is not enough for your muscle memory.
In this article I explain all about how LONG you should practice and what improvement you can expect.
Here’s what results you can expect out of your violin practice session:
1 to 2 days a week: no progress or getting worse
In the days between practice sessions chances are your muscle memory forgest more than you learn in your practice time.
If you’ve established a reasonable level of violin playing and you switch to practicing once or twice a week, this is not enough to maintain your level. Your playing can get worse.
In case you consider picking up the violin and you’re not willing to practice more than twice a week, reconsider!
3 days a week: can work in the very beginning
For very young students with a short concentration span, it can work to practice three times a week to learn the basics.
For an adult amateur three quality practice sessions a week might maintain your current level.
However, if you want to improve quickly and stay motivated, three times a week is not enough.
Yeah, of course it can work if you’re extremely talented, but in that case: why ‘waste’ your talent by doing nothing four days a week?
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Hi! I'm Zlata
Classical violinist helping you overcome technical struggles and play with feeling by improving your bow technique.
5 days a week is pretty good!
Even if your practice sessions are short, because longer sessions simply don’t fit in your life, five times a week is ok.
However, try to have at least one practice day in between the two rest days.
If students have trouble practicing enough, I usually put them on five minutes a day. Try to establish that routine first. After that it’s very easy to go to twenty minutes or an hour.
Ho, I’m not saying five minutes is a good practice session. Read here bow long you should practice depending on your situation.
Once you play the violin and enjoy it, it’s not so difficult to keep playing! That’s the trick in my five minute practice recommendation ;).
The most difficult is to have the discipline to pick up the violin every day to begin with.
6 days a week is perfect: it’s good to have a rest day
When you train your muscle memory in an effective way, it even keeps processing and building while you sleep and in your rest day.
It’s so refreshing to have a day of rest! You’ll notice that after that day some things suddenly work for you.
Of course practicing 7 days a week is just as good.
Most important is the QUALITY of your practice!
I know you know this, but I wouldn’t end this article without this disclaimer.
Don’t obsess about how long and how much you practice!
You can waste your time by making your playing worse in a 5 hour session and you can achieve a lot in 30 minutes focussed and effective practice.
Read my article on how to practice effectively right here!
How often do you practice?
Share it in the comments below! Will you change something after reading this article?
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