Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today, I’m going to show you how to start anywhere in your music. To have effective practice, you must be able to start anywhere. Let’s say you’re playing a piece of music. You mess up somewhere, and you keep starting at the beginning. Maybe the next time you get it, but you haven’t really solved the underlying weakness that caused that problem in the first place.
Being able to start where the correction is made is vital.
You want to be able to start where the correction is made, but sometimes it’s really hard to even find that place. I want to demonstrate this with a piece that’s difficult to start in the middle because it’s counterpoint. I’m going to use Bach’s Invention No. 1 in C major. Watch the video to see the demonstration! This piece does divide itself into some macro-sections that I can articulate for you. Suppose you have an issue in the middle of a section. So you decide to just start the whole section again. Whether you get it again or not, it doesn’t really matter because you still have the same odds moving forward of getting it or not getting it. Just finding the exact place is a big challenge! You must read your score and identify where it is. Now you know where to start, but you can’t start there. It seems totally foreign.
The reason it’s hard to start in the middle of a section is that you don’t know what fingering to use.
When you’re starting in the middle, it’s hard to figure out what fingering to use. So here’s the tip. Go back to a place you can start from. When you get to where the issue is, stop and pay close attention to what fingers are on what notes in each hand. Then you lock it in, and you can start from there. Now you can make the correction and get it solidified by playing through the passage a number of times. Then you go back to the beginning of that macro section and connect it several times until it is smooth.
To recap: Step one is: Find where the correction is. Step two: Go back to a place you can start from before that place. Step three: Lock in what fingers you use to start in that measure or phrase so you can effectively start there. Without this method, you get there, and it’s almost like you’re reading the music for the first time! It seems totally unfamiliar. Have you ever had that experience where you almost feel like you don’t even know the piece when you try to start in the middle? Your fingers know where to go, but you can’t solve the underlying weakness because you can’t start right at that particular spot. Well, now I’m giving you the tools to start from anywhere in any piece!
This is the way to have effective, productive practice!
Zero in on the places that need work and start from there. Solve those issues first, then correct them with the whole macro section. Try this in your practice! I guarantee that you will have a boost in productivity like you’ve never seen before! Let us know how it works for you in the comments here at LivingPianos.com and on YouTube! Thanks again for joining me, Robert Estrin, here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
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6 thoughts on “How to Start From Anywhere in Your Music”
This is a really valuable lesson. Thank you so much.
I am going to put this concept in my practicing.
Also, I am going to do it by learning
the Bach Invention in C Major that you play in this video,
I should have seen this important practice tool years ago,
but unfortunately I didn’t.
Thank you so much!
Glad this helps! The Bach Inventions are pieces that are particularly difficult to start in the middle (as most counterpoint is). So that could be a good choice for you to try out this technique.
Thank you Robert for the very good tip for students .
Breakdown the errors and start again with no errors.
I think it is really handy and is actually a life lesson too.
Students must become involv ed and looking at the harmony or bass notes are helpful too.Your Bach invention is a very good example for co-ordination betweeen the hands and teaches students also the love for imitation in Bach’s Boroque style.
It’s remarkable what is possible with just two lines of music in the hands of a Bach!
Very helpful. Few people, even little kids, have ample time to keep playing through the entire piece over and over. So everyone should learn to zero in on difficult sections. And doing so may help during performance.
Not only that, but by studying the correction, the problem is solved rather than just hoping it comes out the next time.