Take this good advice by the one and only Wynton Marsalis:
Source: The Education Digest | September 1996
1 • Seek out instruction
Find an experienced teacher who knows what you should be doing. A good teacher will help you understand the purpose of practicing and teach you ways to make practicing easier and more productive.
2 • Write out a schedule
A schedule helps you organize your time. Be sure to allow time to review the fundamentals because they are the foundation of all the complicated things that come later. For example, if you practice basketball, be sure to put the time in your schedule to practice free throws.
3 • Set goals
Like a schedule, goals help you organize your time and chart your progress. Goals also act as a challenge: something to strive for in a specific time frame. If a certain task turns out to be difficult, relax your goals: practice doesnʼt have to be painful to achieve results.
4 • Concentrate
You can do more in 10 minutes of focused practice than in an hour of sighing and moaning. This means no video games, television, or radio, just sitting still and working. Start concentrating for a few minutes and gradually work up to longer periods. Concentrated effort takes practice, too, especially for young people.
5 • Relax and practice slowly
Take your time; donʼt rush through things. Whenever you set out to learn something new – practicing scales, multiplication tables, and verb tenses in Spanish – you need to start slowly and build up speed.
6 • Practice hard things longer
Don’t be afraid of confronting your inadequacies; spend more time practicing what you canʼt do. Adjust your schedule to reflect your strengths and weaknesses. Don’t spend too much time doing what comes easily. Successful practice means coming face to face with your shortcomings. Don’t be discouraged; you will get it eventually.
7 • Practice with expression
Every day you walk around making yourself into “you,” so do everything with the proper attitude. Put all of yourself into participating and try to do your best, no matter how insignificant the task may seem. Express your “style” through how you do what you do.
8 • Learn from your mistakes
None of us are perfect but don’t be too hard on yourself. If you drop a touchdown pass or strike out to end the game, it is not the end of the world. Pick yourself up, analyze what went wrong, and keep going. Most people work in groups or as part of teams. If you focus on your contributions to the overall effort, your personal mistakes wonʼt seem so terrible.
9 • Donʼt show off
It is hard to resist showing off when you can do something well. In high school, I learned a breathing technique to play a continuous trumpet solo for 10 minutes without stopping for a breath. But my father told me, “Son, those who play for applause, thatʼs all they get.” When you get caught up in doing the tricky stuff, you are just cheating yourself and your audience.
10 • Think for yourself
Your success or failure at anything ultimately depends on your ability to solve problems, so donʼt become a robot. Think about Dick Fosbury, who invented the Fosbury Flop for the high jump. Everyone used to run up to the bar and jump over it forwards. Then Fosbury jumped over the bar backward because he could go higher that way. Thinking for yourself helps develop your powers of judgment. Sometimes you may judge wrong and pay the price, but when you judge right, you reap the rewards.
11 • Be optimistic
How you feel about the world expresses who you are. When you are optimistic, things are either wonderful or becoming wonderful. Optimism helps you get over your mistakes and go on to do better. It also gives you endurance because having a positive attitude makes you feel that something great is always about to happen.
12 • Look for connections
No matter what you practice, you’ll find that practicing itself relates to everything else. It takes practice to learn a language, cook good meals or get along well with people. If you develop the discipline it takes to become good at something, that discipline will help you in whatever else you do. It’s important to understand that kind of connection. The more you discover the relationships between things that initially seem different, the larger your world becomes. In other words, the woodshed can open up a whole world of possibilities.
Some of these tips may work for you, but we know that every performer is different. The best way to tackle stage fright is to sit down with your instructor and come up with a personalized plan. We know music isn’t just about playing — it’s also about performing and making new connections. At LIVE! School of Music, we offer an experience that takes you from the practice room to the stage, with help at every step.
