Welcome to the second video in my ongoing series covering music theory. Last time we covered the smallest Musical Intervals (both half steps and whole steps). If you haven’t watched that video I highly recommend it as it is really a precursor to this video.
Here are a few quick notes when it comes to major scales:
– Major scales are simply a series of half steps and whole steps.
– All the notes are whole steps except between the 3rd and 4th notes and the 7th and 8th notes (which are half steps).
– They contain 8 notes, wherein the first and the last notes are the same.
– They include all the letter names in order without repeating any. (They are built diatonically.)
– For example, if you have an A-major scale you will have some form of A B C D E F G A.
– C-major scale contains C D E F G A B C.
– All major scales have either sharps or flats; never both (except for C-major which has no sharps or flats.)
On the video attached to this article I demonstrate the structure of the C major scale on the piano keyboard.
Using the rules I outlined above, you can figure out the notes of any major scale; it is actually extremely simple!
Next time we will be discussing relative minor scales – which are a bit more complex. Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729
This can be an uncomfortable situation for both teachers and students. But it’s one that invariably happens. I have personally dealt with many students over the years who have disagreed with me – and if you’re reading you know who you are!
Talented students may actually give you the hardest time as a teacher. They tend to question why they have to do something and while this can be frustrating at times it indicates that the student is thinking and that’s a positive sign. So how do you deal with situations like this?
I studied with my father, Morton Estrin ever since I was a young child until I went away to conservatory after high school. I found myself at the Manhattan School of Music with a phenomenal pianist Constance Keene and from the very first lessons I knew I was going to be challenged. Her ideas of learning and practicing the piano were radically different from my father’s and it presented new ideas for me. My father has very large hands and my hands are quite small. Ms. Keene was a much smaller person than my father. So her way of approaching the piano was different from my father’s and her approach offered me benefits.
If you are paying money for lessons or paying a lot of money to go to a conservatory to study music, it’s essential you at least listen to your teachers. You’ve selected a teacher for a reason. You have to trust what they are telling you and at least try what they are teaching you; even if it goes against everything you think and believe in. It doesn’t hurt to try.
If you are paying money for lessons or paying a lot of money to go to a conservatory to study music, it’s essential you at least listen to your teachers. You’ve selected a teacher for a reason. You have to trust what they are telling you and at least try what they are teaching you; even if it goes against everything you think and believe in. It doesn’t hurt to try.
Once you’ve tried their methods – at least a week – and have time to evaluate the value of the lesson, you might change your mind. As a student, you should be willing to keep an open mind. But you shouldn’t blindly accept anything they tell you. If you truly feel that something they are trying to teaching you is not valuable, then you can simply ask them what the purpose is. Try to keep a level head when you question their lessons as it might not go over well and you don’t want to become combative. However, asking questions can aid in the learning process.
Teaching is not a one-way street. As a student, you need to interact with your teacher and ask questions in order to learn from them. If you don’t understand something, it wont be beneficial for you to just sit there! Great teachers know how to listen to their students and get inside their heads.
Take your teacher’s advice. If time goes on and things aren’t working out then maybe you should consider finding a new teacher. Otherwise, give their ideas a chance to develop before rejecting them.
Thanks again for joining us here at Living Pianos. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions for future videos please contact us directly: info@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729
Today we are going to talk about why it’s crucially important to practice your music thoroughly as opposed to just quickly. You might think if you can practice something quickly it would be a big benefit to you but that’s not always the case.
I am actually someone who is very much in favor of short cuts wherever they can work. I’ve talked about methods in the past such as The Band-Aid Approach to practicing music that is a method in which you focus on the trouble spots of your performance in order to save time. This is not to say that this method isn’t a form of thorough practice; it’s just incredibly efficient focusing 80% of your time on 20% of the music which needs most of the work. I once had a student whose former teacher told them to play an entire piece through at a slow speed with the metronome and then speed it up one notch at a time playing through the entire piece again and again. This is definitely thorough practice but it wastes your time since only sections of the piece may require this kind of approach.
So what do I mean by thorough practice? Sometimes you’ll be learning a new piece and it’s not up to the level you want. You might find yourself jumping into random spots and trying to fix problems – this can be a mistake. Instead of moving on, go to the first spot you have difficulties with and stay focused on it. Stay with this section and keep working on it until you have it absolutely dialed in, perfect and reliable. If you stay with a section until you have it mastered as described above, you will find yourself playing it correctly even after time has elapsed. Even more importantly, the techniques you learn in that section will help you throughout the rest of the piece. There is rarely a piece of music you will encounter that doesn’t contain a repetition of ideas, techniques, harmonies and textures. So, the thorough work you do on one section will translate to other parts of the piece.
As you move through the piece perfecting trouble spots, you will find that your practice becomes incredibly productive. As opposed to just going through the piece and working on random trouble spots, find the origin of your problems, start there and practice it so completely that you can play it accurately with ease.
To recap, work on the difficulties you encounter early in a piece of music and you will be rewarded later in your practice. Thorough practice is what will make you a more accomplished musician. It is so gratifying to perfect a small part of a piece and continue on that path than to plow your way through without refining your work.
Thanks again for joining us here at Living Pianos. If you have any questions or comments about this video or any other subject please contact us directly: Info@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729
A musical repertoire is one of the most important things a musician has. A repertoire is a demonstration of your accomplishments and provides the foundation for you as a musician, so it’s important to have music that you can play at any time which defines you. It’s important that you select pieces to add to your permanent repertoire, think of it like a resume for a job.
You can study an instrument for many years and if you only work on the pieces you’re currently studying you will eventually forget your old pieces you have learned and have a limited amount of music you can play. Let’s be realistic though, if you tried to keep every piece you’ve ever played fresh in your mind it would be an insurmountable task – just imagine trying to practice every piece you’ve ever learned every day; it’s impossible!
So how do you build a good repertoire and maintain it over the course of your lifetime?
Practice the pieces you want to maintain in your repertoire. Play through these pieces on a periodic basis. (It doesn’t require practicing at every session.) Try to keep these pieces fresh in your mind and never too far away from performance level.
Refer back to the original score. This is something that many people might not consider but it’s essential. Over time, no matter how often you revisit your pieces, mistakes and inaccuracies will creep in. By going back and referring to the score you can ensure that you are playing the pieces correctly and as originally intended. You might be surprised when you go back and revisit the score and play slowly with the score that you will see things you never noticed before. This helps you not only to maintain your repertoire but to master it.
Re-study pieces you really enjoy. It’s always personally rewarding to go back over a piece you particularly love and re-learn it by studying the score carefully and getting everything you can out of it. The pieces you re-learn and study again and again will become a part of your permanent memory and form a very strong part of your repertoire.
Thanks so much for joining us here at Living Pianos. If you have any questions or comments about this subject or any other subject please contact us directly: (949) 244-3729 or email: Info@LivingPianos.com
One of the most important parts of developing as a musician is being able to read music and being able to read it quickly. Memorizing the notes on the staff is an integral part of progressing musically and I’m going to share a few tips that will make this easier for you.
There are many ways people go about learning notes and the most popular seems to be the acronym approach. You’ve probably heard the one for the lines from the treble clef from bottom to top:
Fine Does Boy Good Every
The spaces are pretty easy, they spell the word FACE (again bottom to top):
E C A F
The bass clef lines are::
Always Fine Do Boys Good
And the bass clef spaces are:
Grass Eat Cows All
But what about the ledger lines once you go above or below the staff? You can see that this system breaks down very quickly. It gets incredibly complicated to refer to these acronyms on the spot; it’s just not practical.
Fortunately there is a much easier way to learn your notes without using acronyms. It involves simply learning the first seven letters of the alphabet:
G F E D C B A
If you can learn to say these letters frontwards and backwards quickly you are on your way to reading notes. That’s it! This applies to both the treble and the bass clef. You can start with middle C:
The reason for this is that middle C is in the middle between the treble and bass clefs. So, it’s easy to locate. From here you simply go either up or down through the alphabet. If you are counting up you simply go from C to D to E to F to G and when you reach G you simply go back to the first letter of the alphabet, A and start over again. The same applies for going down. Once you reach A you continue with the last letter of the musical alphabet, G and count down through the alphabet note by note. You only have to use seven letters and if you familiarize yourself with them you will no longer have any problems figuring out notes.
If you’re concerned about going backwards, memorize the low space A in the bass clef. That way it’s very easy to simply count up through the alphabet from there. If you keep practicing this and familiarize yourself with this technique you will find it much easier to read notes than using the acronym method.
Never resort to writing in your notes! I have a video explaining why you shouldn’t write your notes in the music and I suggest watching that if this is something you are tempted to do. If you keep with this method above you will have no need to write your notes in the score because soon enough you will be able to read music fluently.
I know this is a topic that might have some piano teachers in a panic at the suggestion of having students play their music too fast. Generally in performance and even in practice, playing your music too fast can be destructive. What I’m suggesting in this video is just one method of practicing your music – and something you would never use in a performance setting. It is a technique which used sparingly may provide insights into approaching your music.
You may have a piece you’ve learned and can’t get beyond a fundamental level of performance. I’ve found that sometimes playing a piece faster than written can open up new approaches and even new techniques you never thought to try. For example, if you’re playing a fast piece, playing it even faster will force you to lighten up your technique in order to accommodate the speed. Then when you come back to the normal tempo, you will find that you have more facility and comfort than before.
Even in slow movements this can be a beneficial technique. For example, in the Mozart K332 Sonata, the second movement is gorgeous and lyrical. Playing faster can provide insights into the direction of the musical line which you may not realize playing at the appropriate tempo. Sometimes you might find yourself getting bogged down and the music sounds choppy and lacking a fluid line. By practicing this movement faster than written, you’re almost guaranteed to approach it with a more fluid line. Try this and then go back to the written tempo and incorporate what you experienced playing at the faster tempo. You can sense the larger note values instead of each sixteenth note. You may be pleased with the results!
This is certainly not a technique I would recommend on a regular basis. However, it is something to try when you hit a wall with the progress of a new piece. I also have a video about the benefits of practicing your music slowly that is intrinsic to effective piano practice and something virtually all great pianists do on a regular basis.
Thanks again for joining us here at Living Pianos. If you have any questions about this topic or any others, please contact us at: Info@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729
