All The Time In The World…

I just realised today that when you practice music you’ve got all the time in the world, haven’t you?

You must have.  Because you can’t hurry it.

It must be practiced at the right speed.  So you can’t be in a hurry.  You have to calm down to that speed.  You have to be ‘in’ or ‘at’ that speed.

That’s how you’ve got to be going.  That’s how you’ve got to be thinking about things, about your current state, about the time available….

Sort of a first step into escaping into your world of music is simply that:  escaping into the time of your music.

So there’s no such thing as a ‘quick practice’.  I’ve only got a few minutes, I’ll just have a quick practice, race through a couple of numbers…

I mean, even if you did ‘race through’ a couple of numbers that’s simply setting the time faster and you still have to adhere to it.

You wouldn’t think of yourself as short of time when playing a number that required great speed, would you?

Similarly you’re not short of time when playing a number at a speed greater than its normal speed.

Or to put it the other way round:  hurried practice is not practice.  It is some kind of an abortion, an aborted,  crippled practice.