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You may have seen my video, Band-Aid Approach to Practicing Music. In that video I covered how to fix problem spots in your music. However, some viewers had questions on how to connect those sections once they are ironed out. I thought this would be the perfect subject to create a follow up.

To demonstrate I am using the Clementi Sonatani Opus 36 no 1. This is a good example because there is a little section in the beginning that leads into a much more complicated passage. I have had a lot of students over the years who have had trouble with this particular section.

I would suggest, as I did in the Band-Aid approach video, to play the music until you reach a problem spot. Instead of going back to the beginning each time, focus on the problem area until it is corrected and you can play it reliably. Play it slower at first, then work up a notch at a time with the metronome until you get it up to speed and feel confident in your ability to play the section.

With this particular piece you could first play the thirds in the right hand together instead of separately as written. After you feel confident put your hands together while still playing with thirds in the right hand. Once you are secure with the passage you can break up the music as written and work it up to speed striving for accuracy and effortlessness in your playing.

While you have corrected the problem area, you will discover that it’s difficult to play the passage in context accurately. Your mind and body is not used to playing it correctly when the passage comes and you’ll continue to have the same problem approaching this section. So how do you fix this?

I recommend starting right before the section you just fixed – not at the beginning of the piece. You can play a few bars before the section you corrected, then pause slightly right before you play the problem spot; just to remind yourself that you have reached the section. You can practice and mentally prepare yourself to approach it correctly. As you practice, you can shorten the pause before the corrected passage making it shorter and shorter until eventually there is no pause at all and you’re playing it as written. Eventually you will not have a pause in the music anymore but your mind will remember once you reach that section and you will be mentally prepared for it.

After you have done this try going back to the beginning. Is it smooth yet? Probably not. You might have to go back and play a little bit before the section you just practiced and work your way back to the start of the piece adding more music each time. Keep doing this until you can connect the sections of music without problems. It might take some time but once you do this you’ll be much more confident and able to play these problem sections without issues. It’s worth spending time to get this right.

I hope this helps and I encourage your comments and thoughts on this subject. Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin, Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729.

How to Connect Sections of Music on the Piano

You may have seen my video, Band-Aid Approach to Practicing Music. In that video I covered how to fix problem spots in your music. However, some viewers had questions on how to connect those sections once they are ironed out. I thought this would be

How do you get a good sound when you’re playing the piano loudly? This really is much tougher than you might think. If you have ever been around someone who is banging on the keys of a piano you know the sound can be incredibly harsh. Even the most glorious of instruments can sound horrible when played incorrectly. So what’s the secret?

The first thing is learning what not to do. You must be aware the piano is incredibly sensitive to how you approach the keys. If you merely slap the keys, you’re going to get a harsh sound. A piano is not like most instruments. Most instruments have a direct access to the production of sound – especially when it comes to woodwind or brass instruments as well as string instruments. The tone you get out of a piano relies on how you approach the keys.

The proper method is to caress the keys; like a masseuse (with deep energy) it will create a beautiful and warm sound. How do you achieve this? The secret to getting a good tone is to always strike from the surface of the keys. If you strike from above, you will get a harsh sound.

A lot of times you will see pianist throwing their hands up and down and it looks like they are banging on the keys; it’s all an illusion. This is purely for show. If you look at a great pianist, like Arthur Rubinstein playing the Ritual Fire Dance, he would throw his hands up and down as part of the performance but when it came to actually playing the piano, he would strike from the surface of the keys.

The best method is to simply place your hands on the keys and then drop all the arm weight and pressure directly to the bottom of the keyboard all at once. Try this at home. Put your hands over the keys, don’t press them down at all, and then drop all the pressure and weight at the same time – you will produce a clear and beautiful sound no matter how much energy you exert on the piano.

The exception to this is rapid staccato chords or octaves in which the wrists are called into play for a combination of speed and power.

I hope this technique is helpful for creating rich, fortissimo piano playing for you!
Thanks for joining me, Robert Estrin. Please feel free to contact me about any piano questions at all:

Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729

How to Play Loud on the Piano! Piano Lessons

How do you get a good sound when you’re playing the piano loudly? This really is much tougher than you might think. If you have ever been around someone who is banging on the keys of a piano you know the sound can be incredibly harsh. Even the most

Welcome back to our continuing series of piano exercises. Today we will be focusing on developing your octave technique.

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

The Best Piano Exercises (Part 4) – Octaves

Welcome back to our continuing series of piano exercises. Today we will be focusing on developing your octave technique. I remember growing up as a kid and watching my father Morton Estrin mortonestrin.com and being enthralled by the way he played oc

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

Can You Teach Your Kids How to Play Music?

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

This is an excellent question and it’s something that many people wonder about but might be afraid to ask.

You might think that so much is dependent on the right hand that there might be some truth to this. Although, I have people ask me all the time about whether or not it would be easier to play piano if they were left handed because they have so much more trouble with the left hand. So what is the answer?

When it comes to playing the piano, you have to ambidextrous because both hands have an equally important responsibility. It is true that more of the melody is played in the right hand, but the left hand has more outstretched positions. So each hand has their own unique set of challenges and whether or not you favor one hand over the other will not change much.

So the simple answer is no. It’s not harder to play the piano left handed or right handed. They both present unique sets of challenges that can only be overcome by practicing.

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

Is it Harder to Play the Piano Left Handed?

This is an excellent question and it’s something that many people wonder about but might be afraid to ask. You might think that so much is dependent on the right hand that there might be some truth to this. Although, I have people ask me all the ti

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

How to Play Ornamentation on the Piano – Piano Techniques

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