If you’re taking up a new instrument, you might be wondering how much progress you can expect to make when you first start. It can be useful to have a rough idea of how long it takes to get to certain stages in your playing to help you motivate yourself. Finding this information can be difficult and it can vary quite a lot between people but I’ll talk about the sort of progress you can expect to see dependent on a variety of factors.
Everyone progresses at different speeds, however, there are some influencing factors. Young children with no prior musical knowledge will usually take a minimum of 12-18 months to reach grade 1 standard, whereas older beginners who play another instrument might only need 6 months. Your progress will also be dramatically affected by the amount of time you can dedicate to practicing.
Your progress on any instrument is heavily influenced by your previous musical ability. If you start having never played music of any kind and are unable to read music, it will take you longer than someone who has been playing another instrument for years and fancies learning a second one.
Practice time is also hugely important, if you’re able to practice for 3 hours a day, you will obviously progress more quickly than someone who is only able to practice 3 hours a week. Your age will also have an impact – young children may progress more slowly, as they are still developing in other areas as well. I’ll talk about how age affects progress first.
How does age affect your progress in flute playing?
While it’s true that children often pick things up much more quickly than adults, in terms of learning a musical instrument, there are some disadvantages that children have. One important one is their size. Lots of children start learning an instrument around the age of 8. This is often a good age to learn, however, some children may struggle with the logistics of playing an instrument at this age.
It may simply be that the instrument they want to learn is too big or too heavy for them and they can’t progress properly because of this. You should be very careful when letting your child pick an instrument to avoid this. The flute is one of the lighter instrument and is also available with a curved head joint for children that find it too big a stretch. This can make flute one of the quicker instruments to learn for young children.
Usually, if a child starts playing an instrument around the age of 8, and is able to practice regularly (at least half an hour per day), they will be starting to learn grade 1 pieces after around a year. There is some variation in this, a particularly good beginner may be able to take the grade 1 exam after a year, while some may only start thinking about learning the pieces after this long.
A child’s attention span can also be a big limiting factor on their progress. Some children can concentrate much better than others on tasks and are therefore more able to practice effectively. If a child is easily distracted, it is likely that they will either not practice enough, or not practice in a particularly helpful way. Patience is a very important part of learning an instrument and this often improves with age.
If you’re an adult who has never played an instrument at all, you may find it takes you a bit longer to get the hang of it than a child. On average, it’s easier for a child to pick up a new skill than an adult, and the older you are the more difficult it gets. However, you are likely to have more discipline than a young child, possibly making the practice you do more effective. You may also have a better chance of understanding the theoretical side of music, as this can be complicated for children.
Adult beginners may find it takes them closer to 2 years to reach grade 1 standard. However, it is likely that they will have had more experience of doing exams of some kind than children and therefore they may potentially be less susceptible to nerves affecting their playing in the exam. Things like expression in music will often come more easily to adults than children as well.
How does previous musical experience help with learning flute?
Players who have had previous experience on another instrument tend to have a big head start. If you have played another instrument, it’s likely you can already read music, which saves a lot of time. You may also be learning an instrument with similar fingering to the flute (e.g. clarinet or saxophone), which will also make progress much faster. Players in this situation might be able to get to grade 1 in as little as 1 term, if they also have plenty of time to dedicate to practice.
One thing that can hold instrumentalists back with the flute is the blowing technique. This is different to other woodwind instruments so even if you already play a different woodwind instrument, you might find that this bit takes a while. It’s a lot harder to get a first note out of the flute than other woodwind, but once this is mastered, progress gets much quicker, and it’s probably one of the easier instruments to learn.
How much do I need to practice the flute?
The amount of practice you do will obviously affect how well you progress on an instrument, as will the amount of lessons you’re able to afford, and how good your teacher is. It isn’t always best to find the cheapest teacher so you can have more lessons, you should find the teacher that you work with best and if they are more expensive, maybe have fewer lessons if you’re not able to afford them as regularly. It’s a good idea to have a couple of trial lessons to find the right person when you first start.
In terms of practicing, it’s more important to practice often than to practice for long periods of time. One hour-long session per week is likely to be less useful than 3 twenty minute ones, as you’re more likely to forget your progress and go back a few steps in between if you have big breaks. Work out how much time you think you can dedicate to practice and try to split it as evenly as possible throughout the week.
Practice is also much better if you have a clear plan of exactly what to practice. With the flute, it’s important to dedicate some time to blowing technique as a beginner. Starting a practice session with some long note practice can really help with this. Even if you don’t know many notes, just practice by playing a long note and try to get the nicest sound you can. You might then want to move onto playing pieces you are learning if you have progressed that far, or the notes you are learning if that’s the stage you’re at.
You should be sure in your practice not to push yourself too far and get frustrated. The tendency in that situation is to revert back to playing stuff you can already play. While this can be useful at the start of a practice session, repeating things you’re already capable of playing isn’t really practicing and won’t be particularly helpful in your progression. Try to have a clear indicator of where you want to get to by the end of a session and if you’re not sure how ambitious to be, discuss it with your teacher first.
If you’re not an experienced musician, you will also need to practice playing with an accompanist, as you will need to do this in an exam. This is all about timing, and if you have the timing correct from the start on a piece, it shouldn’t be too difficult, but it’s just one more thing to account for in how long you need to prepare for an exam.