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If you want to establish a career as a musician click to find out more, then you need to put in the time and effort it takes to play like a professional.

It’s ok to make mistakes during the writing and recording process, but when it comes to playing live, you need to make sure your musicianship and stage presence is on point every time.

Whether you’ve been playing your chosen instrument for years, or you’re just getting started, no one is perfect and everyone can improve. So if you’re hoping to take that next step towards playing like a pro, or looking for new ways to hone your skills, here are our tips to help you become a better musician.

10 Tips on How to Become a Better Musician

Practice techniques
This may seem like an obvious one, but the point we want to make is that simply playing your instrument is necessarily not the same as practicing.

When a professional musician practices their instrument, they go through scales (or rudiments) repeatedly, working hard to improve their technique. Set yourself a dedicated practice or warm-up regime for each day to burn those scales into your memory.

Not only should you practice scales and exercises to maintain your abilities, but you should also challenge yourself to master something new as often as possible.

Set yourself goals
Set yourself realistic targets at every opportunity and work towards them, whether that’s learning a certain scale by heart during one practice, or mastering a full song by the end of the week.

These might be short term goals such as practicing for 60 mins each day or learning a new piece. Or it could be more of a long term goal like putting on a full performance.

By accomplishing set goals, you’ll enjoy a greater sense of achievement as your skills begin to develop, and approach each practice session with a more productive attitude.

Patience
Perhaps the most important quality in a musician looking to perfect their instrument is patience, especially if you’re just starting out. No one becomes a virtuoso overnight, so if you hit a wall, don’t worry, just keep going until you get it right. It takes a lot of time and effort to be a truly great musician.

Don’t take your frustrations out on your instrument! Keep calm and carry on practising!

Keep it fun
While it’s important to work on your scales and other (more boring) techniques – don’t forget to keep your practice sessions fun! Learn your favourite songs and work on new material around your more regimented exercises to make sure you feel fresh and enthusiastic about your instrument. The worst thing for a musician is when playing becomes a chore, rather than an enjoyable experience.

Organise a jam session
Whether you’re aiming to set up a new band, or just enjoy a friendly jam with friends, playing in a group can help to not only improve your technique but also your timing and improvisational skills.

Playing with other people can expose you to new ideas and methods, and is a great way to receive honest feedback on your playing style.

Know what key you’re in
Following on from the last point, if you’re planning on jamming with other musicians, it’s important to be able to identify which key you’re playing in at any given time, and adapt your approach accordingly – unless you’re the drummer of course!

Learning scales can help you to stay in key during a jamming session. As the more experienced musicians among you will know, each musical scale focuses around a specific key. So, the more scales you know, the better you’ll be at staying in key, improvising on a track, and making sure you sound great playing alongside other musicians www.dadehealth.org.