All posts by Robert Estrin

Advanced Memorization Techniques for Piano

I have a video I made quite a while ago about How to Memorize Music which describes a technique I learned from my father Morton Estrin. www.MortonEstrin.com One of the first things I ever learned as a child sitting down at the piano was how to memorize.

My original technique includes a very simple process of taking one hand at a time with very small phrases. You practice each hand until memorized and then combine the two hands until it’s smooth and memorized. Once you have completed that, you move on to the next phrase connecting phrases as you learn them until you complete the piece. This is a system that has worked phenomenally not just for me, my father, and my sister, but all of our piano students and their students over many years!

This technique holds up for nearly any style or type of music but in some cases the music can become so complex that it can become incredibly difficult to memorize. The system may be inadequate when you have music that presents a middle voice that is distributed between the two hands such as in a Bach Fugue or a Scriabin Etude. It becomes very difficult to learn only one hand at a time in this situation. Luckily, there are some techniques you can use to work through these challenges.

In the case of the middle voice, try practicing only the middle voice (using both hands). The important thing is to get through each individual phrase and do your best to combine them. It may be incredibly difficult to combine the phrases and you might find yourself struggling to do this. The best thing is to keep working: learn a phrase, learn the next phrase, and then try your best to power through them. Even if you can’t combine them in a fluid way, don’t stop; just keep advancing through the phrases of music. This might sound counterintuitive to the process I described earlier, but if you wait until the phrases are smoothly connected, you limit how much you can learn in one sitting. Then when you practice the next day you can combine phrases to get a more fluid connection. You still may not be able to connect all the phrases, but you can break it down in the following manner (or something similar depending upon the context):

Day one: Learn 2 measure phrases and connect each 2 measure phrase to the adjacent phrase.

Day two: Learn 4 measure phrases.

Day three: Connect all the phrases!

You can continue working in this manner in each successive section of the piece.

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

Do You Hit the Fallboard on Your Piano?

Do pianists hit the fallboard when they play the piano? Whenever I bring this up, almost anyone I know who plays the piano says they don’t hit the fallboard when playing. Yet, if you go to a music conservatory or look at a serious pianist’s piano, the fallboard will be compromised and have scratch marks. My father’s pianos were both gouged out to the wood across almost the entire fallboard! You might wonder how this happens.

My father had large hands. So, it’s somewhat expected that his hands would hit the fallboard from time to time. I have rather small hands. Yet, every piano I practice on shows signs of wear on the fallboard and we have to constantly refresh the finish on our fallboards to remove scratch marks.

What happens when you’re playing is that although you are not thinking about hitting the fallboard, it’s right there and even though you may not realize it, you’re actually hitting it all the time! If you were to put a slow-motion camera right by the fallboard, you would indeed see that you are hitting the fallboard!

If you have a piano with a satin finish, in particular, take a close look and you’ll see lines where your fingers are indeed coming in contact with the fallboard surface. If you practice a great deal over many years, you eventually will get down to the raw wood which I’ve seen many times from concert pianist’s pianos.

So the answer to this question is a resounding, “Yes”, you do hit the fallboard when you play. Hope you have enjoyed this – Robert@LivingPianos.com.

Do Pianists Need to Sing?

Is it necessary for pianists to sing? This sounds like a crazy question at first, but there is a lot of validity to this. Consider this: piano majors at conservatories and universities around the country, almost all of them sing in the chorus. (Sometimes they play an instrument in the orchestra if they play a second instrument.) In studying music theory, sight-singing is an intrinsic skill for pianists. I’ve had several videos on sight-singing because I consider it to be a beneficial skill for pianists.

Think about this: the piano and singing are about as diametrically opposed instruments that exist in the world. How so? The human voice is the most natural instrument. It’s the only instrument that everyone has and everybody has tried out. It was the first instrument, and for millenia was the only musical instrument. Eventually, people started banging on things and blowing through things. Even then, most music is evocative of the human voice.

What’s so unique about the human voice more than any other instrument is that you absolutely have to hear the notes you’re singing in order to produce the pitches. With the piano, you may have no idea of what a note is going to sound like. Yet, the pitch comes out anyway! However, it’s really important to hear what you’re playing. How do you quantify what you’re hearing? After all, a teacher can make corrections and you can do all the right fingering. You might play a note perfect performance but not really hear what you’re doing. Many pianists rely upon tactile memory.

This is not only dangerous but it is also not very gratifying. You must hear what you’re playing. This is really important in performance when inevitably you get off-track. It will happen. It doesn’t matter who you are and how experienced you are. At some point you will get off track and find your fingers over the wrong keys. You must make it sound right in order to get back on track. If you can’t hear it you’re pretty much done for if you’re doing it only by feel. That’s where singing comes in because if you can sing your music, you can play by ear until you get back on on track.

If you never sing, how do you know that you’re actually hearing what you’re playing? Singing is a tremendous tool. Likewise, singers need to study the piano. It’s a really important to play an instrument that can play more than one note at a time. An organ or guitar can also aid in this. Something where you can hear the underlying harmonic structure because after all, you can’t sing more than one note at a time! So singers must study the piano and pianists must sing. Does this mean you have to be a professional singer? Of course not. If you’ve heard me sing on some of my videos, you can attest to that! The fact of the matter is, I sing constantly as a way of hearing music. For me I love sight-singing with syllables because I can figure out the notes I’m hearing. It quantifies pitches.

I strongly recommend singing your music. One technique if you have music that has counterpoint where you have interweaving lines is to try singing one of the lines while you’re playing. Then try singing a different line. You will learn immeasurable amounts about your music. By singing, you’ll understand in a way you never will from only playing your music on the piano. So the answer to this question is a resounding “Yes”, singing is necessary to develop as a pianist.

Hope this helps! Again, this is Robert@LivingPianos.com.

Why is Bach’s Italian Concerto Called a Concerto?

Why is Bach’s Italian Concerto referred to as a concerto? This is a really good question. A concerto is generally a solo instrument or small group of soloists along with a larger ensemble and almost every concerto you encounter meets this definition. Yet, Bach’s Italian Concerto is a solo keyboard work! So, how can this possibly be considered a concerto? The reason for this is that it is written with the Italian style of a concerto grosso and the way Bach achieves this is by doing something he rarely did in any of his keyboard music which is, he wrote in dynamics in the entire three movements every single note; in the right hand and the left hand. Either they’re both forte or they’re both piano or one or the other is forte. This is what achieves the feeling of a concerto of the larger group and the smaller group.

The entire concerto was built upon the juxtaposition of the sound of a solo group against the entire group and it gives the feeling of an Italian concerto. It’s so fascinating to realize two things about Bach. One is that there is a tremendous amount of music that we’ll never know because he was undiscovered until years after his death. There’s an old wives tale that many of his scores ended up being used to wrap fish. I don’t know if this is true, but we do know that he wrote a lot of music that we have never gotten to hear and probably never will. The other thing about Bach is that he lived in Leipzig, Germany and did very little travelling, yet he wrote a magnificent Italian concerto, a set of beautiful English suites as well as French suites. How is it possible that he wrote all this music? After all, there was no recording back then. Being in a major city, any time any artists from other places would come to visit, he made a point of listening to many different styles of music. Being the genius that he was, he could assimilate those styles and could write some of the greatest Italian, French and English music as well as his native German music,

So that’s a bit of a lesson on Bach’s Italian Concerto for you. I hope this has been helpful! Again, this is Robert@LivingPianos.com

Secrets of Phrasing: How to Approach Two Note Slurs on the Piano

Today’s show is, “Secrets of Phrasing: How to Approach Two Note Slurs on the Piano”. There are two aspects of phrasing. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but there are two distinct meanings. One meaning of phrasing is how you approach music in terms of musical units, a phrase being a musical sentence. The other meaning is the way in which notes are connected or detached. Two notes slurs are a classic example of phrasing. Last time we talked a bit about staccatos and how they are approached from the wrist.

Two note slurs are essentially one note connecting to the next note. Even if the second is not written to be played staccato, it still is played staccato in most musical contexts. Since staccato is simply not connecting notes, and a slur is connecting notes, if you have a two note slur, you essentially play, long-short for the two notes. The slurred note is long, the staccato note is short.

How do you approach such a thing? Staccatos are created by using the wrists creating a crisp sound, particularly with fast music. Slower tempo staccato is a completely different subject which I’ll cover in a future video. When you have two note slurs, you go down for the first note and up for the second note with the wrist. That is what creates the two note slur. When approaching staccatos, sometimes it can be difficult to identify the wrists separate from the arms. It is very important that you understand when you’re using the wrists and when you’re using the arms since the sound is extremely different. There is certainly a place for arms in piano playing, but with quick, snappy staccatos or two note slurs, the arms are too heavy and cumbersome in order to execute the phrasing in a musically pleasing way.

To sum up, the secret to approaching two note slurs is utilizing the wrists in order to accommodate the staccato. You go down for the slurred note and up for the second note of the slur which by its very nature is detached which is synonymous with staccato. I hope this has been helpful! Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com

How to Relax While Playing a Musical Instrument

We’ve touched on this topic a few times but we’ve never dedicated an entire video to the concept of relaxing while playing your musical instrument. There are a number of reasons why this is an important subject and we are going to cover a wide range of aspects as well as some tips in this article and accompanying video.

Above all, being relaxed and comfortable at your instrument will allow you to play better technically. Over time if you develop good habits while playing, you will be able to perform longer and at a higher level while avoiding injury. Playing with tension over a long period of time can eventually lead to damage. More than that, you will have a more beautiful tone when you approach your instrument in a relaxed manner.

Building strength over time by playing and practicing a great deal will allow you to be more relaxed at your instrument. For example, with weak fingers at the piano, it is a challenge to play for long periods of time and you will find yourself contorting your body to accommodate difficult passages. This idea holds true for other instruments as well.

You must take your time to set yourself comfortably at your instrument. Sitting in exactly the right position, having the instrument in the right place, or adjusting your embouchure on a wind instrument appropriately before you play a note is vital.

When you first approach your instrument there are a few things you can do to mentally and physically relax yourself. I personally like to just take a moment and relax my body, take a deep breath and put myself in a very comfortable state. If there is a large audience in front of you, you will probably be a bit tense and nervous. Sitting down and relaxing for a moment and putting yourself into the right mindset will help you immensely.

While you’re actually performing you will want to take every opportunity you can to consciously relax. You can’t shift your focus from the performance, but taking a small breather whenever you can will keep you fresh during the performance. Athletes constantly find moments during games when they relax their minds and bodies or else they would never make it through an entire game. The same is true for musicians.

During a recent trip to New York to celebrate the 90th birthday of my piano teacher from years ago, Madam Ruth Slenczynska, we spoke about how she often makes her hands go limp between phrases as time allows during a performance. This is a way for her to relax and prepare herself for the next passage. At 90 years of age, she is still performing all around the world; so I believe she is on to something!

If you’re playing a violin you can let the instrument rest on your chest during rests as opposed to keeping it in position on your shoulder through the entire performance. When playing a wind instrument, you can let the air out of your lungs and relax your diaphragm for a moment. These “mini-vacations” during a performance can go a long way to keeping you healthy and relaxed in your musical life.

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