Piano Lessons- Music Theory Lessons

Many people, instead of getting closer to perfection are going two steps backward, one step forward when they tune. If you don’t do it enough, you’re degrading the experience you have when you’re playing your piano. The trick is to get ahead of the curve. If you can put the time in on the front end on your piano and put the time necessary to get it to a point of stability, each time you bring your tuner in you can get closer to the theoretical perfect piano. There it is, the perfect piano! I hope your piano is as close to perfection as possible and thanks for joining us! This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. info@livingpianos.com

Last week we covered the different sizes of grand pianos, this week we will be talking about the different sizes of upright pianos. This is definitely one of the most common questions I receive and this article will break it down for you.

The shortest of all the upright pianos are called Spinet Pianos. These pianos are not only distinctive because of their short size but they actually have a completely different type of action. The pianos are so short they can’t fit the regular type of upright actions so it contains what’s called a drop action (also referred to as an indirect blow action). Basically, the piano has a shorter key length than a regular vertical piano.

When you get up to about 38” to 40” tall you have what are called console pianos. These pianos also have a direct blow action but are a little bit taller than a spinet piano.

A little bit taller than the console pianos (above 40”) you have what is called a studio upright piano.

A much rarer type of upright piano for today’s standards is anything above 50” – sometimes even around 56” or more – you have full-size upright pianos. These models are not as popular in our modern era but there are many of older instruments this size or larger.

As with grand pianos, size will matter in how the instrument sounds: the larger the upright piano; the louder the sound. Larger uprights also will have better actions than spinets but they will never replicate the feel of a grand style action.

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com

Welcome to another part in my ongoing series featuring tips for Schumann’s iconic “Scenes from Childhood”. In part 1 of the series I talked about how this collection of pieces is a perfect choice of repertoire for intermediate to advanced students. Each piece has a distinct sound and feels to it so it gives students a wide range of music to learn as well as experience great composition.

Today I will be showing some tips for “Traumerei” which is a very classic piece of piano repertoire but also very elusive. This piece can really be overlooked by many students who don’t really understand the music in its full sense. There is a beautiful melody but it can be very difficult to know when to pedal. There is also a certain amount of freedom to how you can approach the piece as well.

Even though the piece requires the pedal, it’s always best to practice without the pedal. You should ideally be able to connect as much as possible together with only your hands before employing any pedaling. This is not an easy task and you will find it’s incredibly difficult to string much together with just your hands but this will help you understand where the pedal is actually needed.

The key to this piece is to bring out the singing melody – almost as if it were a vocal part. Every note should be smooth and distinct. By connecting as many notes as you can with your hands will allow you to get the desired effect – then adding the pedal will enhance the music.

The piece has a real ethereal quality to it. The piece has a very interesting composition and it really takes a mature student to grasp many of the finer aspects of the music. You should really do yourself a favor and watch various performances and listen to various recordings of this piece. It’s incredible to see how different performances can be for such a seemingly simple piece of music.

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com

Another thing to keep in mind with Baroque music is the ornamentation involved. You might notice a bunch of ornamentation markings sprinkled around Baroque scores and there are countless ways to interpret these. Ornamentation includes things like trills, mordants, turns and other techniques that are used to embellish your music beyond what’s written on the page. Here is a video I produced about how to play trills on the piano. These are improvisational elements in the music that allow you to embellish and enhance the music in your own way. The notes are not written out – there are only indications of ornamentation.

Thanks again for joining me and I look forward to sharing our next era in this series of videos, the romantic period. Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729

What is a Major Scale?

How Many Musical Scales Are There?

What is a Relative Minor Scale?

What is a Chromatic Scale?

What are Pentatonic Scales?

What are Whole Tone Scales?

So let’s get back to the topic at hand. Why is it a good idea to sometimes have E sharp instead of F or C flat instead of B written in your music?

Let’s say for example you had a piece in C-sharp major:

As you can see, it has all the same letters as a C major scale and we happen to have an E# in there as well instead of F. It would look pretty weird on paper if the notes were C# D# F F# G# A# B# C# wouldn’t it? In cases like the one above it is much easier to decipher the notes if they are written diatonically.

Let’s examine this same topic when it comes to chords. Chords are built on the interval of 3rds (for more information you can see our video: What is a Chord?). To put it in simple terms, chords are built upon the interval of a 3rd which are two letters apart – all lines or all spaces. So for example, here is a C major chord:

So if you had a C# major chord it would look like this:

And the same principle applies as the one above. It’s much easier to comprehend the chord written with an E# rather than an F. It makes more sense and is more digestible on the page. It is instantly recognizable as a chord.

Hopefully this clarifies the concept of why E sharps and C flats are (and other accidentals which are white keys) are easier to read than their enharmonic equivalent spellings.

Thanks again for joining us here at Living Pianos, if you have any questions or comments please feel free to contact us directly: info@LivingPianos.com or (949) 244-3729.

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729