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
Welcome to our first in a multiple part series on how to approach the Chopin G Minor Ballade. This is an amazing piece of music that exemplifies the manic emotions of Frédéric Chopin swinging from points of incredibly low despair to the heights of ecstasy. Today we are going to discuss some of the middle section because there are a number of techniques that come one after another very quickly.
You are probably familiar with the big heroic middle section that restates the theme and ends with a flurry of octaves.
Let’s start on the descending diminished chord:
The best way to practice this section is to play it slowly and practice getting your fingers in the right place instantly. So, I suggest playing just a few notes at a time and stopping when the hand changes position. For example here:
Play the first few notes and practice getting your hand in the right position above the chord, but don’t play it. Keep playing the passage over and over and stopping until you can get your hand in the right position over the chord in a relaxed manner. You will want to continue doing this for each subsequent group.
If you practice this way you learn to play this passage with much more fluidity and you’ll be ready for each subsequent hand position before you need to play. You need to be able to play each section with ease and this technique is a great way to achieve this.
The next section we are going to discuss will provide a great example of how to be over note groups, in this case, 2 note groups following the bottom notes going up the scale.
You can also practice these 2 notes groups in different rhythms. By practicing in two-note groups, it will force you to come up with a fingering that will accommodate the passage enabling a smooth execution of the passage. After playing this section in two-note groups and getting 100% comfortable with it, breaking it up as it’s written will be almost effortless.
In the next section you can use another technique:
This section is difficult because you have two completely different techniques in each hand. In the right hand, you will want to play fast and light and in the left hand, you will want to delineate the phrasing clearly.
In the right hand, it’s best to practice with the metronome and gradually get your playing up to speed. Start at a slower tempo and continue to play the section until you are absolutely comfortable. When you feel confident in your playing, put the metronome up one notch and practice it again until you are absolutely comfortable. Keep doing this until you are able to play the passage up to speed without issues. As you get faster, concentrate on lightening up your fingers and keep them very close to the keys.
For the left hand, you will want to use a similar technique that we discussed in the first section of this lesson and that is getting your hands over the next set of notes instantly. Keep practicing and stopping before the next group of notes. Practice getting your hands and fingers in the correct position before you play the notes. Keep practicing over and over until your hands and fingers go to the correct notes almost instantly and effortlessly.
Combine the hands once you feel confident with each individually. Remember to keep your right-hand fingers very close to the keys. This section is very tricky because you have two different techniques in each hand. That is why practicing hands separately first is so effective in solving the technical issues.
Stay tuned because next time we will cover the next section of this piece and discuss a new set of techniques. Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729
You have undoubtedly heard atonality in spooky movies and other places where notes clash and you hear strange dissonances. Unlike most melodic music which you can sing along, atonal music can be much more challenging to comprehend.
Western music is based upon major and minor scales that form tonal music which is relatively easy to comprehend. Atonal music is based upon tone rows, where all twelve chromatic notes available are arranged in a random pattern, and the entire piece is built upon that.
If you explore this, you will discover all sorts of unusual sounds and clashing harmonies. We will go into more depth on atonality in future videos and I certainly welcome your comments and suggestions on this subject.
Debussy’s “The Little Shepherd” from his Children’s Corner Suite is one of my favorite pieces. It is simple but very poetic. This question comes from a viewer who wants to know the best way to use the pedal in this piece.
The challenge of the piano is that it doesn’t have the expressiveness on a single note that other instruments have. Or does it? Achieving expressiveness on single notes on the piano is certainly possible if you use the pedals correctly. In this article I’m going to share some secrets on how to achieve this.
The way that a pedal effects the note all depends on when you depress it.
If you depress the pedal before you play the note you will get an echoey sound with a boominess after the initial attack.
If you are striving for a more sustained tone you will want to depress the pedal after the initial attack. This will create a more linear sound which is rounder than pedaling before playing the note as described above.
You can complement this effect with the use of the una corda pedal (soft pedal) which offers a more sustained sound since only 2 of 3 strings are initially hit directly making the attach quieter.
The effects really are subtle and might be hard to hear over your computer unless you have good speakers or headphones. But it truly makes the difference in bringing expressiveness to the music. Try these techniques on your piano and let us know the differences you notice.
The metronome is much maligned by many musicians for its incessant ticking which can be like a form of Chinese water torture! Many teachers are insistent upon using the metronome and students have questioned whether or not they need this ticking box.
The metronome really is one of the two most important tools at your disposal (the other being an audio recorder) and you should be practicing with it regularly – whatever your skill level. Today we are going to discuss three reasons why the metronome is so important as well as some great applications on how to use it.
The first reason why you need the metronome is that nobody has a perfect clock in their brain. When you start to learn a piece of music and you encounter tough sections, you will naturally slow down a bit to compensate for the difficulty. You might think that once you work them out and get things up to speed, there should be no problem. But you may overcompensate and actually play these sections even faster! The only way to be sure is to play with the metronome.
Don’t make the mistake my mother used to make by putting the metronome too fast and trying to keep up with it. She would drive herself crazy with frustration trying to match an impossibly fast speed of the metronome. Find a speed you are comfortable with and work your way up to an appropriate tempo.
The second reason you want to use a metronome is that it provides an essential practice tool for difficult sections of music. Start by playing at a slow speed accurately with comfort. Then, incrementally increase the speed notch by notch gaining confidence at each new tempo until you get the passage mastered up to tempo. This is an indispensable tool for developing a refined technique on your instrument.
The key is to use this technique by zeroing in on specific sections of your music – not the whole piece. It will not take as much time as you think and you will master tough sections of your music much more quickly.
The third reason you want to use a metronome is because it will help you improve as a musician. The pulse is one of the most important aspects of music and developing a consistent beat will make you a better musician. This aids in playing with other musicians with a tight ensemble.
These are three great reasons to use the metronome and I’m sure many of you have more suggestions as well. Please leave us some comments or email me directly Robert@LivingPianos.com
This is a question from one of our viewers. Matt asks, “Is it good to practice Hanon in different keys?”. In Hanon, the first 20 exercises are all in C major and have repeated patterns. It is good to utilize these exercises as a way to build strength – especially for beginning players. Once you can play through them, you are ready to move on to scales and arpeggios.
But what about the idea of practicing these exercises in different keys? I would say that after you have progressed through the exercises as written in C major and moved on to scales and arpeggios, there could be value in revisiting the initial Hanon exercises and play them in different keys.
It’s a beneficial exercise because you will have new hand positions which will help to build strength and comfort negotiating different keys. You will also have to challenge yourself figuring out the notes to play in different keys. While not essential, it could be worth pursuing.
My father Morton Estrin once suggested a radical practice routine to me which is to practice all the major scales using the C major scale fingering! For example, you could play a D flat major scale utilizing the C major scale fingering. It feels very unnatural and it would seem to be crazy to even attempt this. After all, you would never play the D flat major scale with C major scale fingering. So, why even attempt it?
This exercise is extremely beneficial because it allows you to experience a level of discomfort that you will eventually run into when you approach counterpoint and complex fugues. While you play these pieces you will run into sections where you must use some very awkward fingering to negotiate the notes. By challenging and preparing yourself for these eventual passages you will be able to approach them more easily.
Thanks again for joining us. If you have any questions please contact me Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729.
