VC Artist Ray Chen on How Many Hours it Takes to Master the Violin

Violinist Ray Chen puts the Malcolm Gladwell 10,000 hours theory to test on his years of violin practice.

Author Malcolm Gladwell once said '‘in order to attain mastery over something, you have to practice 10,000 hours.’' How true is this statement? Do you share the same sentiments?

Violinist Ray Chen puts the Gladwell theory to test on his 20+ years of violin practice.

Ray Chen talks about How Many Hours it Takes to Master playing the Violin

I get this question a lot, so here's an average estimate from when I began violin as a 4 year old.

So let's do some math:

(MPD = minutes per day & hrs = hours)

Age 4: 15 MPD x 365 = 91.25 hrs (Hey 15 minutes a day is long when you're 4 years old!)

Age 5: 20 MPD x 365 = 121.6 hrs

Age 6: 30 MPD = 182.5 hrs

Age 7: 30 MPD = 182.5 hrs

Age 8: 45 MPD = 273.75 hrs

Age 9: 60 MPD (1 hr) = 365 hrs

Age 10: 90 MPD (1.5 hrs) = 547.5 hrs

Age 11: 120 MPD (2 hrs) = 730 hrs

Age 12: (2 hrs) = 730 hrs

Age 13 (3 hrs) = 1,095 hrs

Age 14 (3.5 hrs) = 1,277.5 hrs

Age 15 to 18 (4 hrs) 5,840 hrs

At this point I’ve reached 11,436.6 hours so according to Mr Gladwell, I've technically “mastered” the violin. Yeah right.

Age 19 (5 hrs) 1,825

Age 20 (5 hrs) 1,825

Age 21 (3 hrs) 1,095

Age 22 onwards = Graduated school, no longer a student. Need to work as well as practice? Forget it.

–Ray

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