We all know the importance of practice to improve the repertoire and build good motor skills. The two parts of good practice is the quality of the practice and the duration of practice. We often have this question about how much practice is needed. I always request my students to practice at least 20 minutes a day. But what about the famous and virtuoso guitar players, how much practice they did during their formative years? I have done some research on this, watching different interviews, reading different articles and came out with these numbers. To my best of knowledge, these come from authentic sources and are reliable.
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Steve Vai: During high school, he used to practice 9-15 hours a day. Unlike many other rock musicians, he was very good at reading and writing staff notation, knew how to play many different instruments, extremely good at music theory classes and knew how to write scores for an entire orchestra. It is also well documented that his parents supported him unconditionally from a very early age in his musical journey.
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Slash: He is a prolific BMX rider and used to practice around 12 hours a day during his pre Guns and Roses days.
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Jimi Hendrix: It is known that Jimi Hendrix used to feel very nervous without a guitar in his hand and would pick it up soon after waking up in the morning. There are even stories that he used to go to sleep with his guitar laying next to the bed. No real number on how many hours of practice he did, but based on these stories, it is possible that he practiced around 14-16 hours a day.
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Zakk Wylde: In an interview he admitted that he used to practice roughly 14 hours a day during the time he was in high school.
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Yngwie Malmsteen: In his own words, “Initially, it was insane – basically, all waking hours. I would sacrifice everything. I wouldn’t go to school. Then when I was a teenager, they had to drag me to parties and stuff like that because I was extremely dedicated, to the point of insanity I think.”
