What do we know about what happens neurologically and biologically when we practise?

One thing that happens is repeated use of the same motion will develope muscle memory or proprioception. A muscle learning it position in space in simple terms. Like kicking a ball or shooting a basketball, when you do it, it just feels right, or wrong.
 
K. Anders Ericsson, the researcher whose work spawned the 10,000 hour rule, tried to correct the misconceptions of his work up until his death. I think you've intuitively picked up on some of those misconceptions; there's a whole theoretical framework that understandably gets overlooked when non-scientists get a hold of journal articles.

Quality of practice factors in to the equation, and as you described, there is a whole process of learning to integrate feedback and cognitively simplifying what are complex mental tasks.

yeah...quality is often times overlooked for quantity in everything in our lives!!

So much time is wasted on non-productive practice. I have to reinforce this with my middle school and high school students all of the time!

It isn't how much, it is what you do with the time
 
Well I’m going from memory Mighty Joker- I know it takes time but not sure how long so my long term memory may be off ROFL. Also neuroscience changes so my old info may not be accurate with new info. I’ve searched drumming snd music related peer-reviewed articles but can’t remember much about it. I’m always researching something so I jump around a lot. I’ll start reading up on it - along with boron from another thread
 
Well I’m going from memory - I know it takes time but not sure how long so my long term memory may be off ROFL. Also neuroscience changes so my old info may not be accurate with new info. I’ve searched drumming snd music related peer-reviewed articles but can’t remember much about it. I’m always researching something so I jump around a lot.

Well keep me informed. I'm fascinated by it all.
 
The book Peak is apparently the actual research that Gladwell was reading to come up with his jive. It's good to understand how people learn, and make sure you're not doing or teaching anything grossly unproductive or counterproductive. I can't get that interested. The world doesn't need more high performers, it needs more artists-- people doing something personal, that they are masters of, for better reasons than just a will to triumph. Or expert craftsmen, at least. Hell, music loving hobbyists. They're all totally different from this high performing thing.
 
Cool so it takes about two weeks for a long-term memory to "mature" but part is instantaneous. Actually at lot has changed since I've read last-so I was correct by pure chance LOL. Here is an article , about an excellent study and explaining the study-https://news.mit.edu/2017/neuroscientists-identify-brain-circuit-necessary-memory-formation-0406. It is a Science article so you have to be a subscriber, but here is free one with data. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5493329/
 
There are a couple of good books how your brain works while listening to music.
That itself is something every musician should be aware of and i can recommend at least two of the ones I know.
What practicing a musical instrument does to your brain is not as widely researched as one could wish for and Ericsson writes about violin students in his book „Peak", but since he is only interested in high achievers, it isn’t really relevant for musicians who work in a field where instrumental technique is a very personal thing.
One player needs a lot of dexterity, another one not at all.
But I recently found a book by Jonathan D Harnum that was quite interesting.
It’s called The Practice of Practice and it deals with musicians from very different musics and how they practice.
He goes into the brain thing as well, but most of his information about that seems to come from other books, like Ericsson. But even just the interviews and the outlook of very different performers on how they achieve what needs to be done is worth the read.
 
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By the way those books on how your brain works on music are: This is your brain on music by Daniel J. Levitin
And
"
The Music Instinct: How music works, and why we can't do without it“ by Philip Ball
There’s also another book by Robert Jourdain: "Music, the Brain, and Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination"
As far as I remember I liked the one from Ball the most, but it has been years since I read them.
(they were
actually really dusty when I just picked them from the book shelf; maybe I should read them again)
 
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