Piano and Music Videos

I remember growing up as a kid and watching my father Morton Estrin mortonestrin.com and being enthralled by the way he played octaves – I wanted to develop my technique to play like him and my other inspiration, Vladimir Horowitz. At the time my hands were simply too small to achieve the results I wanted but I kept practicing.

My hands even as a full grown adult never became very large. I’ve struggled my whole life developing strength in order to play octaves and large chords well. Today I’m going to share a few tips for how to improve your strength and octave technique.

If you can’t reach an octave I’m afraid this lesson wont be much help to you. You might grow into it over time. The good news is that if you can reach an octave at all, this lesson will help you develop stronger, faster octaves!

The secret to this technique, and octaves in general, is the hand position. The key is to develop an arch between your pinky and thumb equalizing the strength of your weaker pinky to your stronger thumb. Your other fingers should be up and out of the way. If you have time to watch the video included with this article it shows an excellent visual representation of this technique. The goal of this position is to generate an equal amount of force between the thumb and pinky finger – which will help greatly in developing strength to play octaves.

For octave technique you will want to rely on the arms to place the hands over the keys, not for any up-down motion. All up-down motion should come from the wrist. I have explained this technique a number of times before and it’s explained in detail in the video included with this article.

To perform the exercise, set your metronome to 60 and then play a C major scale at one note to the beat in octaves and play the notes only from your wrist using the arms to guide your hands over the correct keys. This might seem like an easy exercise but it must be done correctly in order to be effective.

As you progress through the exercise and feel more confident you can play two times on each note for each beat. As you become comfortable, add one extra note each to each beat until you reach your limit. As you play faster, be sure to keep your hands closer to the keys and lighten up to help increase your speed.

Play through this exercise every day and you will develop brilliant octaves!

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

For me this is a loaded question. My sister and I were taught piano by our father Morton Estrin, so you might assume that I would simply say, “Yes.”, and move on. The answer though is not that simple.

It certainly worked in my family but there are lots of other cases where this simply doesn’t work. When I was growing up my father had a very busy career recording, performing and teaching. He would have no time during the week to give us lessons. Instead, every Sunday after we would eat brunch he would give us our lessons. My sister and I would always fight for who got their lesson first but no matter what we would always have our lessons for an hour each.

When I was growing up I would think about this method with a little bit of jealousy. After all, this was my father, why would he treat me like every one of his other students? In hindsight I realize that this is the secret to success; treating your children like every other student!

It might sound contradictory but if you treat your children differently and special in any way it becomes very difficult to maintain. There could be exceptions like homeschooling your children which is a circumstance in which you have complete control over their learning and schedule. If you are proficient in music then this could potentially be beneficial. For most parents however, a single lesson once a week for an hour should do just fine.

I’m sad to say that I didn’t actually follow this advice with my own children. I did not schedule out a time every week to give them lessons. Instead, we simply had lessons when we had time and that would often mean cancellations and random scheduling that would result in fewer lessons than if we had simply scheduled it out beforehand. As a result of this, my children are accomplished on other instruments – they are both very proficient on piano but it’s not their primary instrument.

Another aspect to my father’s teachings that was unique was the way he handled time between lessons. My mother would always be the one to make sure we practiced and to watch over our musical routines. My father would be completely uninvolved after the lesson – again treating us like we were his students and nothing more when it came to music. This is smart because if he was listening to us all the time and watching over us it could create a conflict in our development; it would also take up a lot of his time. I highly recommend this method for teaching your own children and if I had to do it all over again with my kids I would follow a similar format. I welcome your input on this topic and thanks again for watching – I’m Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com

Thanks for reading. If you have any piano questions or suggestions for videos please contact me directly: Robert@LivingPianos.com

Here is a great reference sheet from our friends at Virtual Sheet Music

This is an excellent topic. In fact, there are entire books written on the subject! Ornamentation is used in many period styles of music but the Baroque era is specifically known for its ornamentation in architecture, art, as well as music. That’s why in the video example above I am using the first section of the Sarabande movement of the 5th French Suite of Johann Sebastian Bach.

You’ve probably seen Baroque music with squiggly lines written above the notes. There are many idea how to interpret them. The problem is that over the course of decades and even centuries, perceptions change. In fact, ideas about ornamentation continues evolving over time. So, how do you approach ornamentation?

If you listen to a number of different artists playing the same piece, you will notice that there are dramatically different executions of trills, turns, mordants and other ornaments. This is because ornamentation offers a degree of free license of creativity; To a large degree it’s up to you what to play.

In the video above you can hear the difference ornamentation makes in a musical section of Bach. The section I chose repeats. So I play it the first time with no ornamentation. The second time you will hear one approach to Baroque ornamentation. Thanks for joining me, Robert Estrin – Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-37296

Welcome to my second part in a series offering tips for the Chopin Preludes. Last time we covered Prelude No. 4 in E minor. This lesson I will be exploring the Prelude No. 6 in B minor.

In the last lesson we discussed how to bring out the melody in the right hand by achieving a true legato utilizing a constant weight of the arm. Today’s lesson is similar but reversed; in this prelude the melody is in the left hand!

This lesson will require you to incorporate the weight of the left arm primarily in order to create a lush and fluid sound while bringing out the melody. When it comes to playing a string or a wind instrument, there is a natural progression of ups and downs. Whether it’s the continuity of the breath or the draw of a bow, the music must always be going somewhere, either growing or dying away. This is possible to achieve on the piano by increasing and decreasing the weight of the arms.

Rather than relying on calculated movements to get louder and softer, use the weight of your arms to recreate the sensation of breathing or using a bow. When you play a note, press into the key and make yourself believe that it’s going to sustain the note like a wind or string player does. You might be surprised at the results you achieve. In the video accompanying this article I demonstrate this technique.

As with any music you are performing, using the pedal as a crutch to cover up sloppy playing should never be an option. If you intend to learn this piece correctly and make it sing, you will need to achieve a true legato in both hands without the use of the pedal. Because of this, you will want to practice, learn and memorize this piece without using the pedal at first. Later when you feel confident in the sound you produce, you can add the pedal to create an even richer sound.

Another practice method (that we also discussed last time) is holding out the chords wherever possible. Instead of playing all the chords as written, hold the repeated chords out instead of replaying them – so you can get a sense of the best fingering when switching between chords. You will find ways to maneuver your fingers and hands in ways that will connect the notes much better and create a seamless sound. It’s always a great idea to reduce your music to chords first – this way you can get a better idea of the fingering while gaining a better understanding of the harmonies.

Thanks again for joining me. If you would like more information about this piece or any others, we are currently in the midst of producing some thorough tutorials instead of just these helpful pointers. If you would like to be notified about these lessons please send me an email requesting more information at Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729

Thanks again for joining me. If you would like more information about this piece or any others, we are currently in the midst of producing some thorough tutorials instead of just these helpful pointers. If you would like to be notified about these lessons please send me an email requesting more information at Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729