Tag Archives: living pianos

Productive Tip for Practicing the Piano: the 80/20 Rule

Hi, I’m Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com. Thanks so much for joining me. The question today is how the 80/20 rule applies to the piano. How it applies may surprise you!

So, what is the 80/20 rule? You may have heard this before. The 80/20 rule is, for example, in the piano, how spending 80% of your time on 20% of the score will benefit your practice. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say the 80/20 rule doesn’t apply to the piano exactly. Because I would say it’s more like 90/10!

Really, you’ll learn a piece of music and then spend 90% of your time on 10% of the piece.

There’s just a very small amount that really requires almost all of your time and effort. Of course there is great temptation to always go back to the beginning and play the parts you know, because it’s fun and you want to work on those parts to make them better and better. There’s no end to how well you can play something.

But really laser focusing on the small sections, sometimes spending 98% of your practice time on 2% of the music is necessary. Other days you can have a more fluid type of practice where you’re covering more substantial parts of your piece. Particularly when you’re getting ready for performance, you want to be able to get the sense of playing complete pieces, playing half a program, then playing the whole program is how to prepare for a concert. But certainly in the formative parts of learning music, you want to focus your attention on the parts that need refinement to be productive. I see so many people who spend hours and hours at the piano and don’t seem to accomplish what they are after and this is one way to increase your productivity tremendously. So, in your practice, don’t just keep going through the things you can already play well, even though you can always refine further.

Put your attention where it’s needed early on.

You may feel like you’ll never get through the piece if you spend so much time on a small section. Maybe it’s a four or eight measure phrase, and you’re thinking, my gosh, if I spend an hour or an hour and a half on this, I’m never going to get through the piece! Here’s the epiphany you will have. Spend that time on the front end on some of those hard sections and you will be rewarded because you’ll find that almost all pieces of music have repeats of different themes and technical challenges. And by delving into those sections head-on, you’re going to be able to accomplish so much more as you go further with the learning of the piece.

So yes, the 80/20 rule applies and maybe even it’s even more extreme than that. I’d love to hear from all of you how you feel this applies to your practice and keep the questions coming in. I’m so pleased to have so many subscribers! If you haven’t subscribed yet, you’re welcome to! There’s even more content on my Patreon page. Again, I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPIanos.com , Your Online Piano Resource. Thanks again for joining me.

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Should You Learn Your Music by Ear?

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s subject is about when to listen to recordings of music you are learning. I know a lot of students like to listen to a bunch of recordings of a piece to get familiar with it before they start learning it. Then as they’re learning they keep listening and listening. Maybe they find one performance they particularly like and just listen to it incessantly. Naturally, they’re going to imitate that performance. There are two reasons why I don’t recommend doing this. Listening to performances to see what music you’re interested in learning is great. Of course listening to music is enjoyable and valuable. However, when you want to learn a piece of music, you don’t want to be highly influenced by any one particular interpretation. Also, you want to challenge yourself to see if you can learn something from the written page and see what you come up with. Naturally, there are styles of music where learning by ear is the best approach when the sheet music is incidental to the original performance or recording.

When I start working on a piece, I don’t listen to any recordings at all!

I learn the whole piece until I have it on performance level. At that point I’ve carved out a concept of how to play that piece. That’s when I first listen to recordings. That way when I listen to those recordings, they don’t overly influence me. I get a different take, but I come to my own conclusions about the music, and I think you should do the same thing. This method really helps you to understand how to decipher rhythms, phrasing, expression, not to mention the notes of the music, and to come to an idea of what tempo you like.

Give yourself the opportunity to find your own way.

If after you’ve learned a piece of music you listen to half a dozen recordings and everybody plays it way faster or slower than you do, you might rethink what you’re doing. Maybe there’s some validity to the common wisdom. Maybe there isn’t though. Have you ever heard Glen Gould recordings where he plays tempos that are drastically different from other people? Sometimes that can be enlightening. So, go with your convictions! But the only way to have convictions is to not be influenced before you learn something. So. don’t depend upon recordings to help you learn pieces by ear because you’ll never be able to express your true inclinations of the music if you never give yourself an opportunity to explore them. I hope this is helpful for you!

I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
You can join the Living Pianos Patreon to unlock access to exclusive videos and original music! www.patreon.com/robertestrin

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Do You Have to Analyze a Piece of Music in Order to Memorize It?

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s subject is about whether you have to analyze a piece of music in order to memorize it. It’s interesting, because in some ways I think that you have to memorize a piece to analyze it! But do you have to analyze a piece at all to memorize it? There are aspects of the composition you certainly need to understand such as the time signature, the key signature, things of that nature. The truth of the matter is, when you’re learning a piece of music you’re absorbing the sound, and you’re absorbing the tactile feel of it. You’re developing a deep understanding of the composition. You should know whether you’re in a transition to a second subject or recapitulation, or a stretto in a fugue. These are all interesting things to observe. But it’s not essential that you understand the inner workings of a composition before learning it.

I think it’s somewhat impossible to delve into a piece and have a deep understanding of what makes it tick without committing it to memory.

If you’re learning a sonata movement you certainly want to understand where the exposition ends and where your themes are. And once you’ve memorized it you can go back and figure things out so you don’t take a wrong turn. You might find that you go to the exposition when you should be in the recapitulation or vice versa. So, some analysis is really important for memorization. But to a large extent, just like you can learn to sing a song without necessarily thinking about the pitches or the rhythms, you just sing it because you can hear it. A lot of music can be approached that way.

Having the intellect to back it up is really important.

As I said, you can take a wrong turn. You might not quite understand something, and once you delve into the score it will make more sense to you and make it easier to remember. So analyze important aspects of the piece you’re working on, but then get to work memorizing the way I’ve described, small chunk by small chunk, connecting as you go. Starting with hands separately, one phrase at a time. I have videos on this subject which you can explore at LivingPianos.com/blog. Analyzing is to your benefit, certainly, but you’re going to understand a piece much better after you learn it! And you will be able to analyze it on a much deeper level after you memorize it. I hope this is helpful for you!

I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
You can join the Living Pianos Patreon to unlock access to exclusive videos and original music! www.patreon.com/robertestrin

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Are You Playing the Piano Too Fast?

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s subject is about how to establish a slower tempo in your piano practice and performance. This is vital in order to cement a solid performance. You might think that there is nothing to it. But I can tell you from teaching for many years that when students encounter a problem and they are instructed to play slower, most of the time they play at exactly the same tempo! So how do you actually establish a slower tempo?

Slow down your counting!

First, find what tempo you’re actually playing. Count along as you play. Once you can play at that tempo, continue counting without playing. Then you can go slower by saying, “one” then wait for just a moment, then say, “two” and continue at that new rate. By taking a moment after you say the first number, then continuing at that rate, that is the simplest way to establish a slower tempo. (You can also utilize a metronome to accomplish the same thing.) Then, play at that new tempo. For practicing, it’s an essential technique. Because being able to slow down to a workable tempo to think through sections that you’re working on is important for solidifying your music.

Solidifying tempo in a performance is vital for having a successful performance.

This technique is equally important in performance. When you play a performance, you’re naturally going to get excited. The adrenaline flows and if you’re not careful, you might take too fast a tempo. So, always lock in your tempo by thinking of the music and counting at that tempo. Then go back and slow it down by delaying after the first count and continuing at that new rate. Then imagine the music at that rate to make sure that it’s the right tempo. I hope this is helpful for your practice and your performance!

I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
You can join the Living Pianos Patreon to unlock access to exclusive videos and original music! www.patreon.com/robertestrin

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Should You Give Up When Practicing the Piano?

This is LivingPianos.com and I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s subject is about how to know when to move on in your practice. Sometimes it’s hard to know when to stay with things to solve a problem and when to say, “Enough is enough. I will revisit this later on.” The crux of productive practice is knowing the point of diminishing returns. It can be very easy to give up on learning a difficult passage and say, “Oh, this is just too hard. I’m going to try this again tomorrow.” But, there are many things you can do first before coming to that point. If you can’t get something, slow it down. If you still can’t get it, try hands separately, and revisit the score. There are so many options! Try breaking things down into chords. Take smaller sections and piece the sections together. There are a myriad of things you can try.

You don’t have to stop memorizing just because you can’t get everything together.

The method I use and teach for memorizing music is to take small sections at a time memorizing each hand separately first. Then put your hands together and get a small section memorized. Then go back and connect the sections going back to the beginning. But, sometimes you can’t go back to the beginning. Sometimes you can just go back to the previous phrase and piece together every other phrase. So, you have the first four measures, then you connect them to the next four measures. Then when you connect the next four measures, maybe you can’t go all the way back to the beginning, but you at least connect to the previous four measures. That is one thing you can do to plow through. That’s an example of working past the point of diminishing returns. The next day you can get fluid on the longer sections, and get everything put together. So the general rule is: try to simplify and break things down to digestible chunks.

Eventually, you’re going to come to a point where you’re not making progress.

When you get to a point where you’re not making progress on a technical or musical challenge, and you’ve already tried metronome speeds, you’ve tried taking little sections at a time, you’ve tried different articulations, different phrasing, you’ve tried hands playing separately, you’ve tried everything, and you’ve made some improvement. But it’s not nearly where you want it to be. That might be a good time to work on something else. Then tomorrow, when you’re fresh, you start a notch under the tempo you were playing the day before. Sometimes just sleeping on it will foster growth in your music! You’ll be pleasantly surprised to find that the thing you’d been struggling with the day before now comes much more easily to you. Because when you first learn something, it’s never secure immediately.

Music grows naturally with time as you reinforce your memory and refine your playing.

That’s the lesson for today. I hope this is helpful for you. It is absolutely essential to have productive practice so you know when to move on and when to keep plowing through. And generally speaking, when you run into problems, first, try to simplify by either slowing down, sectionalizing, or playing hands separately, so you’re still making progress. But when you’ve built things to a point and you can’t get any further, move on and don’t feel badly about it. Tomorrow’s another practice day!

I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
Please feel free to contact me with any piano related questions for future videos!

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Magic in the Studio After Dark

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today I have a really interesting presentation for you. What happens in a studio after dark? This week we’ve been putting together two whole new studios here. Late last night I walked over to the piano and it sounded so beautiful in my studio I just started recording.

I didn’t even turn the lights on!

I think you’re going to appreciate what I played. Interestingly, this idea of doing things after hours in a recording studio is nothing new. Studio time used to be very expensive, and even today to get a good room with good acoustics and a good piano is tough. A lot of times bands or musicians come in after hours when everything is quiet and dark, and it can be a very inspiring time to make music which you can hear for yourself.

That’s a little bit of what can happen after the studio is closed. You can’t choose when you will be inspired. So, a lot of these things can just go by the wayside and nobody ever gets to experience them because no one’s there. But the beautiful thing about a studio is that you can record! So that’s what I’m going to do for you with my new studios and loyal audience of subscribers, for which I am so grateful! You can join the Living Pianos Patreon to get even more! I figure this is the time to share my music with all of you. I hope you enjoy it!

I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
Please feel free to contact me with any piano related questions for future videos!

Robert@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729