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This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. Today’s subject is playing the piano to the room. What is meant by that? The room you’re playing in can be as important to the sound and the approach to the keyboard as the piano you’re playing! I remember, for example, in high school there was a seven-foot Baldwin semi-concert grand piano that was kept to the side of the stage in an incredibly echoey room. It was almost deafening playing in there! I practiced there whenever I had a chance. Then it would come on stage with the curtains closed. It was a completely different sound and I had to approach the keyboard differently in order to project the sound properly. Then when the curtains were open, I could hear the sound project into the hall. It was a fairly live hall. So, it was important not to use too much pedal. Otherwise, the sound could get muddy. In fact, you may have to adjust the tempo you play your music to suit the acoustics of the hall. A hall that is very reverberant can get muddy and you may have to take more time in order for the audience to hear things clearly.

Playing to the room is something that all instrumentalists have to deal with.

So, as pianists, we have a double whammy. We have to adjust to the piano, and we have to adjust to the room! But any other musician, whether they play violin, flute, trumpet, clarinet as well as singers have to figure out how to play to the room, to project a sound, and to reach the last row in the audience.

It is necessary to create the appropriate sound for each specific space.

Certainly, if you’re playing in a living room, you don’t want to blow people out of there with too much volume! So you want to temper your sound to match the room, always using your ears. Practicing isn’t about just molding one performance. It’s about being in excellent shape on your instrument so you can instantly create the right sound for that specific piano and room at that moment.

Thanks so much for the great questions! I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store

949-244-3729
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How to Play Piano to the Room

This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. Today’s subject is playing the piano to the room. What is meant by that? The room you’re playing in can be as important to the sound and the approach to the keyboard as the piano you’re pla

Hello this is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is, “Is there muscle memory when playing the piano?” This is a great question and I’m going to ask a question of all of you right now. Tell me if this rings true. Have you ever had a piece you’ve played a million times and you find yourself playing the piece and instead of “spacing out” you find yourself “spacing in”? You realize that you weren’t thinking about what you were playing at all! Maybe you were thinking about what you were going to do later. Yet, your fingers keep going. You wonder how that could possibly happen. Indeed, there is a high degree of tactile memory playing the piano.

If you’ve ever watched a toddler getting up for the first time trying to walk, you’ll see them discovering the whole process. They are concentrating and you can see in their faces that they are focusing on how to stand and put one foot in front of the other. For the next few weeks and months, you’ll see how they get more and more comfortable and acclimated to walking. When you or I go out, we can be thinking about anything when we are walking. We don’t have to think about walking at all. Indeed there is muscle memory at work here! Obviously playing the piano is much more complex than walking, depending upon what music you are playing. Yet, if you play a piece many times:

Your fingers will keep on going all by themselves without you even thinking about it!

Is this a good thing? Yes and no. While on one hand, it is not something you want to rely upon too heavily, without a degree of muscle memory, it would be virtually impossible for a pianist to get through an hour and a half recital playing on a high level if they couldn’t free-wheel some of the time. Being able to allow the music to continue when performing even when there are inevitable distractions is essential. If your fingers wouldn’t keep going and there was silence, it would be a complete disaster!

It is good that we have muscle or tactile memory. However, you can’t depend upon muscle memory entirely. Think about this. Most music you play goes from section to section with repeats of different sections. You must know where you are in the form. You have to have that part of your brain looking down on the rest of you lovingly making sure you don’t take a wrong turn. One of the best ways to accomplish this is by practicing away from the piano where you don’t have the benefit of tactile memory. If you can play your music by just thinking it through in your head, you really know the score well.

Your muscle memory in conjunction with your cognition of the score in depth is invaluable for securing your performance.

Yes, there is muscle memory at work when playing the piano. Thank goodness there is! But remember, you can’t depend upon it all the time. Practice away from the piano. You can practice with your score, going as far as you can, and when you find a hazy part, refer back to the score. You might have to move your fingers when playing away from the keyboard just to be able to do this at first. It is an extremely valuable skill so that you don’t fall into the trap of taking a wrong turn in a sonata (for example) and finding yourself either leaving out 2/3s of the work or going all the way back to the beginning and having no idea how to handle the situation. This is where muscle memory can play tricks on you. You can depend upon it to a certain extent while reinforcing intentional understanding of the music.

Thanks for the great questions! Again, I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Is there Muscle Memory in Piano?

Hello this is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is, “Is there muscle memory when playing the piano?” This is a great question and I’m going to ask a question of all of you right now. Tell me if this rings true. Have you ever

Welcome to LivingPianos.com I am Robert Estrin and I am so pleased to have a return visit from pianist and novelist Jack Kohl. Today we are going to discuss, “Can You Play the Piano with 4 Hands?” Truth be told, I can’t, at least not by myself! However, there is a whole genre of 4 hand piano music. You are going to get a taste of it today and there is a wealth of literature as well as people who specialize in collaborative piano. My sister is a member of the Double Digit Piano Duo and we have also played 4-hand piano music together. The other related genre is 2 piano music. Jack has played 2 pianos some, and I have played 2 pianos as well. In fact, my sister and I played a 2 piano concert together a few months ago! We also did some 4 hand piano music as well. They are markedly different experiences. What makes playing two pianos different from performing 4 hand music? What are the special challenges of 4 hand piano music?

Try listening to the Beethoven Sonata Opus 6 for 4 hands. It is played with one piano with two pianists. You’ll be able to get a taste for what 4 hand music is like with this wonderful piece of music. There are also great compositions for 4 hand piano by Schumann, Mozart, Debussy and others.

I’m sure most instrumentalists would be thrilled if they had as much music in their solo repertoire as there is for 4 hand piano!

There are some challenges pianists face working collaboratively. The secondo player who sits on the left side of the bench handles the pedaling. The primo player who sits at the treble end of the keyboard has to make sure the secondo pianist pedals appropriately for them. You really have to work as a team. Sometimes in four-hand piano music, the hands are actually intersecting. The hands will be nesting between one another.

There are some places where you have to work out getting out of each other’s way. Sometimes you may have to lift off very quickly to get out of the way so that you don’t collide!

Beyond that, there is another aspect that is fundamental to collaborative piano and that is the balance you create. You have to think of your duo as being one big pianist. Normally as a pianist, you are bringing out the melody on the very top as well as the bass on the bottom of the keyboard. But, if you are on the top with a 4-hand piano piece, if you play the bass loud, you’re actually playing an inner voice loud! Likewise, when the secondo is playing, if they bring out their melody with their right hand, that is also an inner voice, not the melody. It just steps over everything.

The secondo player must lighten up their right hand and the primo must play their left hand delicately in order to sound like one pianist creating a beautiful balance. Together, you become one instrument.

There is so much to 4 hand piano music. I want to thank Jack for coming here today and if you haven’t read any of his novels they are pretty amazing. “Bone Over Ivory” has just been released. It is a great read, not too long, and I think it is something you’ll really enjoy. He brings to his literature love and a deep understanding of piano because he is a very accomplished pianist and has done quite a bit of piano performing before he centered his career in creative writing. He has degrees in solo piano performance. Rather than getting knocked out of that world, not being a competition type of pianist with the “fastest fingers in the West”, he decided he wanted to stay in piano by becoming a generalist. He has experience playing in theater pits as well as accompanying. The metaphorical implications of all of that have never been wasted on him. He keeps a journal and writes down observations about piano playing. He has written three novels and “Bone Over Ivory” is a book of essays you can enjoy.

http://www.jacksonkohl.com

Thanks for joining us here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Can You Play Piano With 4 Hands?

Welcome to LivingPianos.com I am Robert Estrin and I am so pleased to have a return visit from pianist and novelist Jack Kohl. Today we are going to discuss, “Can You Play the Piano with 4 Hands?” Truth be told, I can’t, at least not by myself!

This is LivingPianos.com and I’m Robert Estrin with a really interesting subject today: Fast Versus Loud Piano Playing. Some of you may be thinking that I’m talking about contest winning pianists. Some of them play faster than anybody, some play louder than anyone. Often times, that is sadly what it comes down to in competitions because when you have dozens of pianists who all play at such a high level, how do you quantify who is the best? Artistic expression is such a personal opinion after all. This article is not about any of that.

Today’s subject is about how oftentimes students will confuse fast and loud! I was just teaching Clementi Sonatina Opus 36 No. 1 to a student, and wouldn’t you know it, at the point when the music gets louder in the first movement, he started speeding up his playing! It is such a natural tendency. I talked to him about it and he said, “When the music gets exciting and louder you just want to play faster!” This piece starts out forte, then comes down to piano, and then when it crescendos there is such a temptation to get faster.


What is the Secret to Avoiding this Problem?

As with so many rhythm problems, solutions come down to working with the metronome. Have the metronome ticking so you can keep an absolutely precise speed. You will be able to play more evenly and not succumb to the excitement of getting faster when it gets louder.

By maintaining tempo when you get louder you will serve the music better. This is something you have to train yourself to do. It is not a natural thing. You will naturally want to rush the parts that get louder. The metronome is such a handy tool to measure your music until you have it really locked in and you can maintain tempo without the metronome ticking. Interestingly, by avoiding rushing the louder parts, the music is more exciting instead of feeling frantic.

That’s the long and short of loud vs fast. They are two different concepts that you should not confuse in your music. Occasionally they do coincide and that’s fine. But if they don’t, maintain the integrity of your tempo and you will be richly rewarded with a more satisfying musical performance. Thanks so much for joining me, Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Fast Versus Loud Piano Playing

This is LivingPianos.com and I’m Robert Estrin with a really interesting subject today: Fast Versus Loud Piano Playing. Some of you may be thinking that I’m talking about contest winning pianists. Some of them play faster than anybody, some play

Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a great question. When do you use the soft pedal on the piano? The una corda pedal is the left pedal on grand and baby grand pianos. It is an amazing device for expressive playing because it changes the tone. Those of you who practice on upright pianos, the left pedal does not do what it is supposed to do.

What does “una corda” mean?

Una corda translates from Italian as “one string”. What does this mean? Originally, pianos had two strings for each key. By depressing the una corda pedal, the hammers would only strike one of the two strings giving a softer, delicate tone. Modern pianos have three strings for each note through most of the piano. So, depressing the una corda pedal makes two of the strings hit directly. Depending on how the piano is voiced, it may even hit all three strings with softer parts of the felt of the hammer.

The fundamental thing about soft pedals is that every piano is different.

Think about this: on one piano the hammers may strike two of the strings. On another piano, the hammers may strike all three strings, but a little off-axis. The grooved part of the hammer with the hardened felt does not hit the strings. So, you get a more delicate tone. I’m telling you all this so that you understand how different the impact is on depressing the soft pedal on different pianos.

The answer to the question is: it depends not just upon the music, the performance you are after, or the acoustics of the room, but on the specific piano and the way its soft pedal affects the tone. Naturally, a great deal has to do with how you approach the piano with your hands. In some pianos I’ve played, every time you put the soft pedal down it creates a drastic tonal change.

On other pianos, you depress the una corda pedal and you don’t even notice any difference at all!

On this type of piano, you might use the pedal very liberally. On such a piano, if you want a little change of color, you might as well push the soft pedal just to make it easier to play softly.

Perhaps you’ve worked out all of the places you want to use the soft pedal. Then, as soon as you start playing with the soft pedal, the tone gets swallowed up completely. You may find that you are not going to use the soft pedal except very sparingly, in the most delicate sections on a piano like this.

That’s the long and short of it:

When playing a performance, it’s so important to have an opportunity to try the piano beforehand. Not just for the soft pedal, but all the pedals. It is remarkable how different the pedals respond on various pianos! I would go so far as to say that in trying out a piano for a recital, an audition, or just to play for someone, checking out the pedals is probably the most important thing because they vary more than any other aspect of each piano.

I hope this has been helpful for you. Again, I’m Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com

949-244-3729

Secrets of the Soft Pedal on Pianos

Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a great question. When do you use the soft pedal on the piano? The una corda pedal is the left pedal on grand and baby grand pianos. It is an amazing device for expressive playing

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano

This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is “How do you play hands together on the piano?” This is a big subject. After all, playing hands together is what the piano is all about! You might wonder, particularly if you are a wind player or if you play almost any other instrument that plays one note at a time, how piano players play different parts in each of their hands. This is something that makes the piano unique. It’s what the instrument is all about. In fact, all keyboard instruments have this in common. So what is the secret? How do people do this? Even doing something like tapping your head and rubbing your tummy can be confusing for most people! The intricacy of the parts for each hand in piano music can present enormous challenges. You might wonder, how do you approach such a thing? There is an answer!

Of course, the more you practice, spending months or even years at the piano, it becomes more natural for you to be able to play independent parts at the same time. You may even develop the ability to read at sight new music that requires independence of the hands. But that usually takes a very long time to develop for most people. How can you do it right from the get-go?

I’ve been teaching piano for many years and I always introduce playing hands together from lesson one.

Otherwise, it would be like learning to ride a bike with one leg. It misses the whole point! How do you teach how to play the hands together? Even though it seems counter-intuitive, it’s by practicing hands separately. I don’t mean practicing incessantly hands separately. I mean that each phrase you work on, you practice each hand separately first. If you want to learn a new piece, rather than putting the hands together from the start, you break things down. Initially, you may read through the piece hands together a couple times just to get acquainted. Then, you should get to work and and start learning the piece. You should learn a very small section of each hand first while observing all the details.

Anytime you have music that can be broken down into chords, learn it in chords first.

By learning the chords, you are going to find the best fingering. It’s also easier since you only have a few chords to learn instead of so many separate notes. Once you have that learned, then you learn the other hand. Then you put the hands together and get it learned. Finally, you break up the chords and play the music as written.

When learning, you should also avoid using the pedal most of the time. The last step is adding the pedal. By working hands separately, each little phrase at a time and then putting them together, you have the benefit of breaking things down to size so you can master each section. You also can really digest a score and have all of the details learned because you focus on one phrase of music at a time. There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of details in each phrase of music. How can this be? Each note has a duration and rhythm. Each note has a fingering. Each note has a phrasing and an expression. So, there are five aspects to each note. There’s only so much you can assimilate at a time!

That’s why learning small chunks of music a phrase at a time hands separately is such a powerful practice technique.

That’s the secret. You hear people playing intricate pieces of music that you want to play, and you wonder how it is possible to learn so much music with your hands doing dramatically different things. The accompanying video shows you how to achieve this with music that is relatively simple. But the same principle applies to learning any piece of music. That’s the secret to playing hands together on the piano. I hope you’ve enjoyed this here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store. I’m Robert Estrin.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is “How do you play hands together on the piano?” This is a big subject. After all, playing hands together is what the piano is all abou