Bounce

Are high performing music students talented, or do they just practice more than other students?

An answer to this question comes from a surprising source, one-time table tennis champion turned sports journalist Matthew Syed’s book “Bounce”.

Bounce is based on the latest research into performance by cognitive neuro-scientists.

This research, from fields as diverse as tennis, fire fighting and music, points out that practice (or experience) is much more important than any amount of “natural aptitude”.

As music is the field that many believe is dominated by the naturally talented, music was one of the first fields for studies into performance.

The idea that natural talent existed was tested in a key study of violinists at the renowned Music Academy of West Berlin. Researchers divided the students into three groups. One group was of “soloists” i.e. students who were considered to be likely to go on to perform as leading soloists. Group two consisted of “orchestra players” i.e. students likely to go on and play in leading orchestras, and finally, a group designated as likely to be music teachers. All of theses students had been considered “very talented”

This grouping was based on the assessment of their professors, and the student’s performance in open competitions.

A detailed biographical history was taken of each student, and they all showed remarkable symmetry, in all factors but one – time spent practicing.

The top students had without exception practiced for at least 10 000 hours, which was 2000 hours more than the students likely to go into orchestras, and 6000 hours more than students likely to become teachers.

Not a single top performer had practiced less than the 10 000 hours. This lead to the formulation of the ten thousand hour rule, i.e. any one wishing to be world class in any field, would have to practice for 10 000 hours. Research also showed that, as more than about 3 hours practice a day was not productive, this has become the ten-year rule, i.e. roughly a thousand hours practice a year over ten years.

What is more, there was no evidence that in the long run, any of the top performers learned any quicker than anyone else. So top performers were not quicker learners, they just practiced harder.

What this suggests is that the more time teachers spend encouraging, monitoring and rewarding practice, the more successful their students will be.