The Ugly Game

One small practice game I often use with students is something I call the “Ugly Game.”

The name is intentionally a little silly.

The point is not to make the passage beautiful right away. In fact, beauty is not the first goal of the game.

The goal is to play a small passage correctly several times in a row, at a tempo where the student can actually notice what is happening. It may sound slow. It may sound plain. It may not sound impressive at all.

That is why I call it ugly.

But underneath that plain surface, something important is being built.

The student is learning that a passage is not secure just because it worked once. One correct attempt can be luck. Two correct attempts may still be fragile. But when the hands, ears, and mind can return to the same path several times, something begins to settle.

The passage becomes less mysterious.

The body starts to remember the route.
The ear starts to recognize what should happen next.
The mind becomes less panicked.
The student begins to understand that confidence is not a feeling we wait for. It is something built through repeated, reliable experience.

This is one of the ideas I have been writing about in my piano-practice book.

I am not interested in perfection for the sake of perfection. That can easily become rigid, anxious, or discouraging.

What interests me is something quieter: how real learning becomes dependable.

A student does not need to play everything beautifully right away. But they do need to learn how to build a path they can find again.

Sometimes that path begins with something very plain.

Sometimes it even begins with something a little ugly.