Repetition is not practice

I have been learning music (Hindustani classical vocal) for about 1.5 years now. I have *no* innate talent for it, just a very strong desire to learn. Ever since I started learning, I have become a much better "listener" of the genre (which otherwise fell into the category of "elevator" music -- playing in the background, but not really meant to be focused on).

I've been practicing ever since I started learning, diligently at times (everyday), sporadically at others. Of late, I have been trying what Peter Norvig calls deliberative practice: "not just doing it again and again, but challenging yourself with a task that is just beyond your current ability, trying it, analyzing your performance while and after doing it, and correcting any mistakes. Then repeat. And repeat again." I find that it makes a HUGE difference to improvement v/s just mechanically repeating it all, all the while hoping to get better at what I don't know well.

I've had two teachers in this two year long journey. My earlier teacher was keen to cover ground -- he taught a new "raag" every two classes. As a result my music book quickly filled with "swar" and "lakshan" geets of many raags. In order to achieve this, he was happy to play notes on the harmonium to support my untrained voice.

My current teacher focuses on technique. Three months down the line learning with him, I am still doing various notation sequences with the first "basic" raag, at different "speeds". We started with the basic simple sequence, and are slowly moving on to more complex ones, but no new raags yet (and not for a while as far as I can see).  My music book is not yet two pages filled. Also, he does not believe in providing support to the voice by way of playing notes on a harmonium (other than initially or when I falter). As a result, I have been acquiring what he calls "sur ka gyaan".

The former approach was much easier on me as a student and I enjoyed it while it lasted. The latter approach makes many more demands of me as a student; I find it challenging and see that I am gaining "depth" of knowledge v/s skimming over the breadth of it. It is in this latter approach that "deliberative practice" pays dividends!