Many of us have been in a situation where we need to learn a piece of music quickly and efficiently. I was recently presented the opportunity to perform two new solo pieces with less than a week of preparation time. While this may seem like a daunting task, it is attainable using mental practice techniques.
Why is mental practicing successful?
Mental practice is the act of using imagery to rehearse an event without physically completing the movement. This is a successful technique because your brain is utilizing the same network of commands to imagine a task as physically completing the task.
A look into the research
A study was done at the University of Iowa by Drs. Guang Yue and Kelly Cole investigated if muscles could be strengthened by using imaginative exercises. Two groups were created, one for imagined exercise and one for the physical exercise of a finger muscle. Both groups exercised for four weeks, Monday through Friday. The imagine exercise group did fifteen imagined contractions of the finger with a twenty-second break. The physical exercise group completed the same routine, but instead, they physically contracted the finger. The results are astonishing and the physical exercise group increased their muscular strength by 30 percent and the group that had simply imagined the movement was able to increase their muscle strength by 22 percent!
Another study by Alvaro Pascual-Leone used transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to study the changes of the finger maps in the brains of novice pianists. Similar to the previous study, there were two groups of participants and both groups were taught a specific sequence of notes on the piano. One group physically practiced playing the sequence of notes for a duration of two hours a day for five days and the other group simply imagined playing the sequence following the same protocol. All of the participants had their brains mapped throughout the study and the results revealed that the same amount of progress was made in the motor communication area of the brain for both the imagined and physical groups!
It is evident through this research that mental practicing is an effective method to enhance your practice sessions. While mental practicing is a fantastic tool, it should never be used to replace physically practicing the instrument! If you are curious about how to implement mental practicing into your daily schedule, here are five examples to help you get started today!
- Listen to the music with a score
Listening to the music is perhaps the easiest and quickest way to create a mental image of how a piece should sound. Be sure have the score available because this will allow you to create a visual and aural image of the music. Also, listen to several different recordings and take notice of how each performer interprets a piece of music. It might be beneficial to keep a list about which qualities you like from each recording.
- Sing through the music
Singing through the music is a great way to assess how well you truly know the piece. Be sure to use the correct pitches and follow dynamic and articulation markings as closely as possible. It is also helpful to finger along on the horn while you sing.
“If you can sing it, you can play it”- Jackie McLean
- Imagine Specific Performers
Try imagining yourself sounding like Denis Brain or Radovan Vlatković playing a Mozart Horn Concerto. You might be surprised at how good you sound when you try to imitate someone else’s playing!
- Notice changes and variations throughout the piece
Take the time to look through the music to see what areas are repeated or where there are subtle changes in the music. This will allow you to maximize your time in the practice room by not making simple mistakes or repetitively practicing unnecessary parts of the music. For example, take a look at the third movement of Beethoven’s Sonata for Horn and Piano, Op. 17.
Measures 4-10 represents the primary material for the movement and there is a direct repetition from measures 12-16. While measures 12-16 are the same as the beginning, measures 17-20 are not and noticing that this material has changed prior to playing it on the horn will help you learn the music much faster.
5. Create a story for the music
Giving life to your music will provide a deeper meaning to your performance. This can be done in a variety of ways and a few examples could be to write a story, draw a picture, or choose a color that represents the music.
Using a memory or an image can also create inspiration for your music. This picture of a Door County, Wisconsin sunset is the image that I have used recently when performing the opening to Paul Basler’s Canciones.
