Piano and Music Videos

This is a thorough exploration about pedaling on the piano which I produced a number of years ago. This is a longer format production I hope you will enjoy!

How To Practice the Piano

3 Part Series

There are 3 separate skills in learning to play the piano:

• Memorizing

• Sight Reading

• Improvising

You can become quite proficient in one or two of these skills and be completely deficient in others. It is necessary to take a unique approach to develop each of these skills. The biggest mistake you can make is to not be clear as to which skill you are working on!

5 Steps To Memorizing Music

Sight-read through the piece once or twice. (First Day Only)

Begin To Practice: TAKE A SMALL SECTION AT A TIME.

A. Right Hand Alone Figure out:

1. Notes

2. Rhythm-Count out loud

3. Fingering

4. Phrasing

5. Expression

Play many times until memorized.

B. Left Hand Alone Figure out:

1. Notes

2. Rhythm-Count out loud

3. Fingering

4. Phrasing

5. Expression

Play many times until memorized.

C. Hands Together Slowly at First:

Play many times until memorized.

D. Go on to the next small section and learn it the same way.

E. As each section is mastered, connect from the beginning

When you hear your favorite singer, you know who it is instantly by the voice. Even listening to wind players and string players, you often can identify the player by the tone. What about piano? Can you tell who is playing just from the sound they get? The answer is, yes, sometimes.

The secret to getting a great tone out of a piano (or a more pleasing tone out of a lesser instrument) is to support the tone like a singer or wind player supports the phrase with the breath using the diaphragm. String players utilize the bow for a smooth line and spend years developing a technique to get a beautiful sound. So what is the analog to the breath on the piano?

A phrase generally has a rise and fall, just like a breath. If you were to calculate each note of a phrase played on the piano to make each note successively louder to the peak then each note softer than the next to the end of the phrase, you would end up with a very calculated type of playing! The secret is to use a constant weight of the arm which grows to the top of the phrase and diminishes to the end of the phrase. The fingers support the weight and transfers the weight smoothly from note to note. So you exert downward pressure on the key not just on the attack, but throughout the length of the note. This enables you to get a smooth line by using the weight of the arm as the constant like the breath of a singer.

When playing large chords loudly, you can get a beautiful sound by playing from the surface of the keys. If you strike from above with the arms, this creates a slapping sound which is harsh and ugly. By staying in contact with the key and releasing energy to the bottom of the key bed with strength, you will get a beautiful sound no matter how much energy you expend. Try this in these 2 different methods and listen to the difference in the sound. You will be amazed.

Welcome to Part 2 in our series on the Chopin G minor Ballade. In Part 1 we discussed how the middle section of this piece requires you to switch your techniques rapidly. We are going to cover the next section which doesn’t get any easier. I’ll provide some tips on how to approach this section and practice techniques that will help you master it.

Let’s discuss this first section:

With the right hand, you have a very quick passage that requires a lot of finger work. As I’ve recommended in the past lesson, try taking the passage slowly and working your way up to speed. Start at a comfortable speed and practice with the metronome. Once you have the section down without any issues turn the metronome speed up one notch and start again. Repeat this process until you have the section up to speed. Make sure that you delineate all notes clearly.

Let’s focus now on the left-hand, which has this particular rhythm:

It’s very snappy and precise and you want to bring out the rhythm of this particular section against the fast passage in the right hand. As always I recommend slow practice but in this particular section, I recommend exaggerating the rhythm. Instead of playing the eighth notes as written, play them as sixteenth notes.

So right here, for example, you can wait an extra sixteenth rest and play the following note as a sixteenth note instead of an eighth note as written. Now why would you want to play the rhythm wrong and not as written? Well, this is only for your slow practice. When the piece gets up to full speed sometimes the eighth notes can sound limp and you want to accentuate the snappy rhythm of these notes. The best way to do this is to wait and play these as sixteenth notes instead of in your slow practice. Once you get this section up to speed, you will be prepared to play these notes quickly enough; you will notice the difference in your playing.

Let’s go on to the next section in this piece:

This section is best practiced by playing two-note groups together in the right hand. Once you start to get comfortable in your slow practice you can break up these chords and play the notes as written. Why should you practice this section in chords? Because you can train your fingers to be in the right position before you have to play the notes. Doing this will greatly benefit your finger positions and allow you to be much more comfortable when playing up to tempo.