How Long Does it Really Take to Learn an Instrument?
Challenges 😩
Learning an instrument is a difficult challenge and it’s often compounded by the expectations that we put on ourselves and the desire to get to a particular level of competence. However, it isn’t quite as simple as you might think because there is a lot that goes into learning an instrument. This can be broken into two parts; learning to physically play the instrument and learning how music works.
Learning to physically play an instrument can vary in difficulty depending on the instrument you are learning. Learning to play the recorder would typically take less time than the violin for example. This is because with a recorder, getting the note to sound is much less of a learning curve and you wouldn’t have the issue of tuning. The timpani might be considered to be less of a challenge than the French horn, because the French horn requires a difficult embouchure (face and mouth placement). However, each instrument still presents its own challenges, and this can greatly affect the time needed to learn it.
The second component to learning an instrument is learning music itself. Regardless of the instrument you are pursuing, music will operate in much the same way. Each instrument requires note reading, scales, rhythm, chords (even for instruments that play single notes) and many other elements that make up music. This is perhaps the most time intensive aspect of learning an instrument.
2. The 10,000 Hour Problem ⏰
Malcolm Gladwell claimed in his book “Outliers” that achieving true expertise in a skill takes 10,000 hours of practice. While this has since been somewhat debunked because many skills take different amounts of times to develop, it is still an interesting attempt at quantifying the required effort. So let’s do the maths!
Let’s say you practice for 30 minutes per day, 6 days a week. That would result in 3 hours per week, 156 hours per year and a whopping 64 years to learn how to play an instrument!
I think it’s safe to say that it doesn’t take most musicians 64 years to learn an instrument to the level that most would consider “being an expert”.
So let’s say you practice 2 hours per day, 6 days a week. That would be 12 hours per week, 624 hours per year and only 16 years to learn the instrument.
While I have no doubt that I have personally spent 10,000 hours several times over learning the piano, I do think these numbers aren’t particularly accurate. They do, however, tell us that it is likely not going to take a week!
My biggest issue with this way of quantifying the time taken to learn an instrument is that it prioritises quantity over quality. As with any skill, the process of practicing has diminishing returns when practicing for too long in one session. You could also be siting at the piano playing something that you can already play for hours on end and not really improving. So I would simply say that to learn an instrument, it requires discipline and consistency over several years.
Having said this, if you are the type of learner that finds motivation in quantifiable goals, 2000 hours is a much more reasonable aim. BUT…with one big caveat:
GOAL: 2000 HOURS
A HIGHLY FOCUSED HOUR = 1 HOUR,
A SOMEWHAT FOCUSED HOUR = 2/3 HOUR (40 MINUTES)
AN UNFOCUSED HOUR = 1/3 HOUR (20 MINUTES)
Using this (entirely made up) formula can give you a much more accurate reflection of how fast you are progressing and it also takes into account the quality of your practice. Although, that isn’t to say that once you have reached 2000 hours that you have completed learning the instrument - but you would likely be pretty good!
3. Beyond The Information 📝
As I suggested earlier, although the process of physically learning an instrument does have its limit, learning music itself and, more importantly, what music means is an endless and ongoing endeavour.
Similar to when we read a book in an attempt to learn from it, we aren’t really focussed on learning to read, reading is just the vehicle…we are much more focused on learning the underlying meaning and trying to gain information and perspective from it. Learning music is much the same, the learning that we gain from the music is endless! No matter how much you know about music or how well you play an instrument, every single piece you attempt to learn will come with a new set of challenges and a new way of understanding not only the music but also the world around you.
Although it can be helpful to have quantifiable goals to work towards, it’s also important to understand that learning music is a lifelong commitment and is something that you will be learning forever. It needs to become a habit and a part of your life if you really want to learn the instrument, rather than hoping that there will come a time when you’ve learnt all that there is to know. If there is a time when you’ve learnt all there is to know, let me know…because I am yet to find it!
Matthew Cawood
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