Athletes adhere to a workout routine to keep their muscles lean. Writers book writing dates at local coffee shops to draft and redraft their masterpiece novels. Gardeners set watering schedules to help their plants grow tall. To keep our skills sharp and our playing constantly improving, musicians too must design effective, consistent practice routines based on specific goals for each session. Creating a practice routine that accomplishes these objectives requires a bit of experimentation and of course good old-fashioned advice from those of us who have tried, failed, and found our way to a routine that truly works for us. In this blog, I share some of my greatest nuggets to help establish your best practice routine ever. Keep it flexible. Keep it focused. And of course, keep it fun!
Map out your daily and weekly schedules first. What time do you have to work with in a typical week? Record all of your typical appointments and responsibilities. When are your work/school hours? When are your lessons? When are your rehearsals? Write down everything on a 24-hour type schedule to get a bird’s eye view of when you realistically have time to practice. There are a lot of great scheduling templates online. One of my favorite weekly calendar templates is from wincalendar.com.
Consider your energy power hours. Some of us are morning people. Some of us have more energy after the sun goes down. I learned this lesson the hard way. As a young flutist, I tried my best to practice before classes began in the morning, adding a second session after dinner. The morning session always felt like a chore and my post- dinner food coma had my scales running sloppy and slow. Something clicked for me during my summer at the Interlochen Arts Camp. Here, I had the freedom to experiment by practicing at different hours of the day. Throughout my tests, I discovered that my energy and focus were best from 8:00 pm onward. Experiment with different times in your own schedule. When are your power hours? When are you most engaged and productive?
Make sure your practice space is comfortable and free of distractions. You do not necessarily need a large space. A small room can be an efficient practice space as long as it remains free from distractions. Other family members and even pets can be unintentional distractions. Distractions can also be electronic. Put that smartphone on airplane or focus mode or, better yet, leave it in a completely different room.
Plan out your routine before you even take your flute out of its case. That’s right – write down all the pieces, scales, and excerpts you plan on tackling during your allotted practice time. How long will you spend on each item? Write it down and use a timer during your practice session. If you need more time to work on something, set specific goals for your next practice session.
Meditate before warming up. This is a great technique to clear your mind of any racing thoughts and your body of any residual tension you might be carrying with you into your practice session. Practicing your excerpts is a lot more difficult when you are still raging about how terrible traffic was on your commute home or how the neighbors are parking a little too close to your driveway.
Warm-ups are first! Try selecting a different melody each day to keep things fresh and flexible. One of my favorite books to warm up with is Tone Development Through Interpretation by Marcel Moyse. This book features simple melodies to play with your most beautiful, buoyant flute sound. Another great warm-up technique is to select a melody from a piece you are currently working on and slow it way down to a true warm- up tempo. Practice this melody with different tone colors, dynamics, and styles to add a bit of variety to your concert repertoire.
 |  |  |
Remember to add harmonic exercises. If there was one exercise I would recommend for daily practice, it is harmonics. Trevor Wye’s Practice Book on Tone has the best, most basic, and most time-tested harmonic exercises in the opening pages. Another new favorite is Eric Ruyle’s Fun with Flute and Piccolo Harmonics, which offers more variety and super fun tunes to use in your harmonic warm-ups. Finally, Patricia George’s The Top Octave Book also has some clear, effective harmonic exercises in the introductory chapters.
Scales are the broccoli of your practice routine. Sometimes they make your stomach turn but they are super good for your flute playing and necessary to master. If you know your scales from the get-go, they are way less intimidating when they show up as complicated runs in solos and orchestral parts. It’s just a scale. You’ve got this! Scales are also a great way to practice various articulations such as double and triple tonguing or weird rhythms that show up in other places in your music. Play each note of each scale with that weird rhythm. It’s not so bad with a little bit of practice!
Etudes are next! Etudes keep us in great shape. These are the crossword puzzles of our practice routines. Etudes keep our fingers working for the money! They also help our eyes practice the art of looking forward, keep our brains sharp by processing note patterns, and our air strategically working out those seemingly endless phrases.
Pick an excerpt! Any excerpt! I like to follow up etudes by practicing an orchestral excerpt or two. A fun activity is to literally pull a couple of excerpts out of a plastic bag and work on just those for the day. Randomize it! This is, after all, how it works at a typical audition. You never know which excerpts the panel will select.
End with repertoire. You may allot a bit more time for each piece than the previous exercises. That is totally okay! Remember to set your daily goals for each work. Bracket the sections that need the most attention. If other sections of the music are sounding great, then keep them on the back burner while you prioritize the more difficult runs and phrases.
End your practice routine with a minute or two of improvisation. Literally close your books, look out the window, and play whatever comes into your mind. There is no right or wrong way to do this. Practicing improvisation is just an opportunity to make music that comes straight from your heart. Let your creativity fly free for a moment!
Finally, this practice routine checklist is not set in stone. You may have days when you really need to concentrate on repertoire. Or days when you really want to focus on fundamentals or intonation. Select one or two days per week to focus on one thing or another. These can be themed practice sessions. Remember to start with your goals for the day to help keep your practice session on track.
How do you design your own practice routine? What have you learned about your approach to practicing over the years? What does your practice look like and are there ways to make it even better (and more distraction free)?
Happy fluting (and practicing!!)
***
About the Author, Rachel Taylor Geier:
Rachel Taylor Geier holds a DMA in Flute Performance from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, an MM in Flute Performance from San Francisco State University, and a BM in Music Performance from DePauw University. Former applied instructors include Immanuel Davis, Linda Lukas, Anne Reynolds, and Rhonda Bradetich. Dr. Geier currently teaches and freelances in Davis, California and hosts a popular Flute Friday Blog Series.
