Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum The Super-Special Random Unsolicited Advice Thread!!!

I have been working on a Chopin etude (Op10,3) for over a year now and I am still only half way through

But the plus side is once I master it, no piece of music will hold any fears for me.

Beautiful melody line, and some thunderous runs in the middle. I like 'thunderous' -- not sure my wife does though

So another bit of unsolicted advice. Play the pieces you really, really like -- it keeps you going when the times get tough.

I agree, bruceee. I envy your ability at being able to even consider playing a Chopin etude. I'm still working on his preludes (the easier ones) and waltzes and mazurkas and now a new nocturne (from our study group).

As much as I long for all that "thunder" (there is a lot in the Db prelude,) I am finding that his smaller pieces are precious jewels in their simple beauty and elegance.

So, I might never get to the "etude" point, but Chopin wrote so much and all of it has something to offer everyone.

Kathleen

We've lost the numbering here, but that's ok.

* With a new score, if the measures are not numbered, sit down and write the measure-number above the first measure in each line for the whole piece. This will help you later when you want to make practice sections for yourself.

* Practice/work on the hard parts first. This was said above, but it bears repeating!

* Regarding working on small sections, or difficult sections, to flesh out Kathleen's point, make sure you always play a "link" section. If you're working on measures 5 through 12, your starting point should be either measure 4, or the last half of 4, and your ending point should be measure 13 or the first half of 13. When you play measures 1 through 4, you should play through to measure 5. And when you working on meausure 13 on, you should start with measure 12. This way, you're always playing overlapping sections, and those link sections will allow you play through smoothly when you put the whole thing together.

* Make a mental map of the score, or the layout of the music (for example: intro, theme 1, theme 2, theme 1 with variations, ending) Use your mental map to help you memorize.

* Practice starting anywhere, any note in the piece and being able to play through to the end. If you're performing it and you get really lost, this will help you get back into the music. Or, if "any note" is too much, make sure you can start in on any section.

From Bernhard:

Practice no more than 20 minutes at a stretch on a particular task. More than that and the brain becomes dull and non-receptive.

Rest 5 minutes between tasks.

Practice a particular task no more than once per day. Your mind/body will not learn more than what it learned in the first session for that day. It needs sleep to absorb the information.

There's a LOT more over in the PianoStreet student's forum. Just do a search and start reading all of Bernhard's posts. He's a genius at teaching the piano!

Pay attention to your pedaling. It's very easy to get wrapped up in a difficult passage and just jam the damper pedal down and leave it there. Frequent pedaling is an important key to playing cleanly.

Record your playing. Many times we aren't really listening as we play, the recording doesn't lie! You will be able to hear how <s> horrible </s> great you are and where there might be problems you need to address. Recording also helps you learn to perform for others, because the red dot becomes your audience!

Sing a lot.

And sing when you practice. Sing the different parts of the piece while you play the other parts.

Oh, Bernard, good point! I forgot about that one. That reminds me of a similar piece of advice:

* When practicing, especially something that's rhythmically challenging for you, count outloud. There's something very different about counting outloud verses counting silently in your head.

1 and 2 and 1-e-an-a 2 and 1-trip-let 2 and 1-e-an-a 2 etc ... sound familiar ShiroKuro??

btw...beautiful job on the posts, luv'd em

A REAL EYE OPENER the first time. After my first recording I asked myself...'self? people like to listen to that?? what, are they deaf?"

When learning a somewhat easy (ha) version of Rhapsody in Blue, I add to sing out "APP-le, applesauce, applesauce" in the quirky section. With a stress of the first syllabel of apple. But it helped. Sometimes it's Mis si sip pi. And personal favorite is " You owe me mon ey."

Kathleen

Hmmm....if I were to add my singing along with my not so good piano playing anybody within ear shot would be running for the exits screaming!!

Break the sections into A , B, C , and mark it.
Most of the times a section will repeat itself and you realize that there is less to memorize than first thought.

Peter

Practise away from the piano - in your head. If ever a peaceful moment pops up in your busy life, spend a few moments going through your piece - try and see the notes or melody at least; hear the piece as you want it to sound (dynamics, rhythm etc); when you get to stopping points, pause to visualize where that is in the score as a marker for focus hands on practise; in your mind's eye, watch your hands on the keys.

Sounds weird, but I swear it's helpful (especially when insomnia plagues). Intellectualizing the music seems to aid integration and coordination once back at the keyboard.

There's a pile of great unsolicited advice on this thread. Good reading!

Cheers/IS

Work out your fingering to begin with. Write it in and stick to it.

Amen to that!

p.s. Hey, IvorySpeaks, you're in the practice log but you didn't identify with a chicks or dude team. If you're a chick, why not go back to the login page and sign up for a team? We could use your minutes. (If you're a dude, forget you saw this post... )

Amen to that one. The most significant problems I've had over the past year are a result of intentionally changing the fingering I'd used without issue on a couple of things played well for years where I thought the new fingering would be more technically correct than my originally adopted intuitive fingering. The result of changing that fingering is that I seldom get *either* form right now and I'm back drilling on pieces I long ago thought "finished".

Oh, are we talking about fingering? My favorite subject! I'll restate Frycek's and ChickGrand's point and then add my own, because I think all three of these need to be internalized together.

* Write your fingering in and play it the same way every time.

* Don't change your fingering if it's working

* Don't be afraid to change your fingering if it isn't working. Not working could include: frequent random mistakes that don't seem to go away; non-random mistakes (i.e. same place, same mistake) that don't go away; an inability to get up to your desired tempo.

[LOL MonicaKern - I will amend my log to reflect chickism. Just don't expect massive minutes. Cheers/IS]

Has anyone mentioned backwards practising? Starting at the end and working back to specific arbitrary trigger points - or in the case of Bach, 4 measures at a time? Each time play through to the end. We so often play from the beginning over and over while trying to get to the end that the first half gets really polished and the second half lags along. Backward practise fixes this syndrome and benefits memory work.