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Is 30 minutes practice time enough?
- Thread starter JordiL90
- Start date
Probably me - sorry to derail things. I just wanted to make sure the counterpoint was heard to those who say you must go immediately to 4-5 hours/day from nothing or you have no chance. I'll shut up now.
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I think people are just trying to be realistic, I know that's my intent. Ask any professional player how much they practiced when they got started and how long they've been playing. I don't know any really great players that didn't practice at least 3 or 4 hours a day in the early days, and many of them practiced much more. When I was in college I rarely practiced less than 5 or 6 hours a day and on top of that had rehearsals and performances. That's who your competition is.
When you mix different experiences & strong opinions & passion, the result can be a little contentious sometimes.
You came here to ask if 30 minutes a day is a good enough start to becoming a professional. The answer is yes, because 30 minutes a day is better than no start at all. But the answer is also no, because 30 minutes a day will not increase your skills and abilities enough for you to become a competent professional, and that would be true no matter what your age is.
You indicated that your plan is to start with 30 minutes and work up from there. If you do that, your chances improve.
Everyone here can give you tips on how to practice better or more efficiently. My advice is to plan on your 30 minute practice, but also keep your bass plugged in and ready to play so that you can sneak in another 5 or 10 or 15 minutes during other times of the day. And then sneak in as many of those extra moments as you can. What to practice? Just play a song you've been working on. Or scales. It doesn't matter as long as you're actually playing something.
Actually, irrespective of whether 30 min daily practice (but zero on weekends) is appropriate to become a professional musician, I wonder about the following point: if you passionate about music, how can you stop practicing after 30 minutes ? How can you refrain from practicing on weekends ? And if you are not passionate about music, why would you think of becoming a professional musician ?
Yeah. And to think, I once got a post flagged because I said I thought a bass was ugly. S.M.H...
True. In that case, unplug it, but leave everything else right where it is.Unless it's got active pick-ups/electronics LOL
One of my life rules is: The easier you can make something, the more likely it is to happen. That's the idea here.
Bingo. Well articulated. I have some shoulder issues and set a timer for one hour to remind me to stop practicing. If I forget to set it, I often play for 90 minutes or more before I realize I've gone way over my hour.
Talkbass is a community with something like a quarter million members. You'll get all kinds here, and you'll get people clashing. Check the Rules/FAQ and use the "report" button if people are breaking the rules, mods will look at it. There's also the ever-popular "ignore" button if there are members you don't want to hear from.
As far as your original question; there are different kinds of professional bassists. For instance, look at Adam Clayton. He was a founding member of U2 as a teenager, the band put out songs that became big hits and they gradually built up to big concert tours and now are basically a corporation in their own right. I don't know how much time a day Clayton spends practicing, but most people would say he doesn't show terribly advanced skills as a musician. 30 minutes a day and you'll be able to play like Adam Clayton pretty quickly. Will you be putting out big hits and strike it rich like him? Well, anything's possible, but I wouldn't plan on it.
The other kind of professional would be the hired-gun studio/touring musician. This is a person that gets called by record producers and tour managers to lay down a track on an artist's album or support them in concert because they know the musician has the chops to play whatever they're asked - people like Will Lee, Pino Palladino, Rhonda Smith and so on. That would be a skill level that you're unlikely to reach practicing 30 minutes a day. Full-time musician means full-time work on music, which would be hours a day of practice. There's more than just practice to it - it's also networking, and it's a small, tight world to try to break into. There are also bands that play weddings and corporate parties and stuff like that.
Either of those assume that by "professional" you mean "paying your bills by playing music alone." It might be you just meant that term loosely, that you want to be able to play a paying gig. Probably the bulk of TB's members, including me, are in that boat. You can play at local bars in a cover band on the weekend, get $100 a pop (here in the US - don't know what's typical elsewhere), and have a great time. A lot of us play a few gigs like that each month and it's a bit of extra pocket money, but that's not going to pay the rent, and we have day jobs. Half an hour a day of practicing and you'd probably be able to keep up in the average cover band just fine before long.
It is not very clear to me what you mean by "record from home and earn a living that way". What kind of market do you have in mind ? For most musicians, being a professional means primarily playing with other musicians either in front of some audience, or in a studio, not alone from home.
I don't know anyone who earns a living this way. If you do, I would suggest to discuss thoroughly with this musician about his/her learning path, and about the sustainability of this as an income source.
It might be possible, from-home sounds like monetizing videos on Youtube or maybe getting onto Patreon and people supporting you there. The kind of people who make money doing that are usually music-school whiz kids, the Basstheworld players and Adam Neely, Davie504 (whatever his real name is), people like that. It's usually instructional video series or demonstrations of amazing chops. I would say that having a shot at making money that way would require a LOT of practice.
At the risk of being labeled a naysayer, that is going to be a very tough road. Your music will need to be very, very special to cut through all the noise on the internet. Even then, not may people are willing to pay significant money for music these days. How will you promote yourself?
Aside from the current pandemic mess, why would anyone hire you to record a track for them as opposed to someone they can work with directly in the studio? Do you already have a network of musicians to build from?
Sorry of I'm just being negative, but I see this as more of a sideline than a professional career.
I don't know if music has changed much in the last ten years or so, but recorded music is not where the money is at (thank piracy, primarily).
Touring is what brings in the big bucks. Why else would irrelevant dinosaurs (KISS, Fleetwood Mac, The Stones, etc.) be touring in-between Social Security and Medicare appointments.
Why would bands who absolutely hate each others' mere breathing get back together?
It's where the money is.
If you want to make a whole pile of cash (and who doesn't?), be ready to hit the road.
This, x1000. The music biz has inverted in the last decades. Used to be the big money was in the records and the tours generally were just to sell the records. Now it's the opposite. Very little from recording. Even more so because everyone and his chicken can now have a home studio and put on the Tube whatever it is they do. No filtering for quality, no cream rising to the top. So the market is flooded with mediocrity.
That plus there are simply dozens more entertainment choices now than ever before. So yes, to make a living I'd imagine your music would have to be extremely good and very special. And you mentioned guitar also. Do you already play guitar? Or would that practice have to be squeezed in?
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I tend to give these 'characters' a wide berth as I can't cope with more than a few milli-seconds of the 'schtick'. It might be that I am missing out on some or other nugget of bass wisdom, but from what I've seen of them, I very much doubt it.
YMMV
