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I try to keep going. I found awhile back that when I stopped and revisited a measure where I had made an error, I sort of train myself to make the error and go back. Don't know if that makes any sense, but it's almost as if I were practicing the error into my performance of the piece. Sort of musically stuttering. So instead, I play through to whatever subset I had intended to cover in the first place, then go back if the error was a particularly egregious one.

One of the unintended benefits of this is that errors don't throw me off track quite as badly as they once did. OTOH, I find I very rarely play an error-free version of something, even if I know it very well.

AWTPP: I think I've seen myself doing that as well - playing the same mistake, backing up and playing it right; then moving on. I'm going to try harder to just keep going. It's something I know I should do anyway; but I need to make more of a concious effort.

-Nancy

This sounds, to me, as though you spend the days actually becoming better at playing the piece. When I waste my practice time, I mean the process of repeatedly restarting from the very beginning and hoping to make it to the end without any error. This process relies on mostly LUCK as opposed to ability. It's frustrating because it is hard, for me, to break this habit. One absurd effect of this is that I generally become much more skilled/familiar with the first 1/2 of the piece and less so with the second 1/2 for obvious reasons...

I'm glad someone else here experiences this. That is the exact essence of "my issue".

For all you Book 2 newbies, how did you find the "Bridal Chorus from 'Lohengrin'"?"

To you advanced Book Twoers: Was this song a bear? I guess the complexity even goes up from there, huh?!?

Anyway, its a challenge for me!

Angelojf. Bridal Chorus is a bear. I finally gave myself a pass on it. Its harder than it looks to play smoothly. It took me twice as long as I thought it would take. Now I am working in Guantamera. Its just as bad.

Hi JF,

Thanks for the positive thoughts and encouragements. I definitely appreciate it and it's good to know that I'm heading in the right directions.

Yes, I recognized that it's quite a difficult piece and that I didn't have a perfect recording, but I wanted to share it anyway. Shall have to tame this beast as well. Listening to yours and AWTPP's recordings of it has helped me tremendously. Many thanks to you both.

BTW, I love your customized version of "Come Back To Sorrento". Definitely a beautiful song and performance. I learned so much from your write ups, especially about "Parallel Keys".

Thanks again and best regards,

Key Notes

Hi Waltz,

Both A & B for me, depending on wether it's a minor or major mistake.

What I’ve been doing is when I first learn a song, if I found that I’ve been consistently stumbling or slowed down at a certain point, I would stop and work on just those particular measures or phrases until I felt that I’ve gotten them up to speed and under my fingers pretty well, before starting back from the beginning again. Then from here I would continued to work on each stumbling blocks, and string them together as I go along.

For the songs that I’ve already learned and can play them pretty well, if I made a minor mistake, I would continue to play right through them until the end. But sometimes if my mistakes are major enough, I would go back to just the beginning of that particular measure or phrase and continue to play from there until the end instead of going all the way back to the beginning of the song.

This process of starting at mid-points or at problem areas of a song forces me to practice and sharpen my note reading skills, so that I can quickly identify them at any given point instead of relying only on playing by intervals or muscle memories. In addition, it also helps to prevent exactly what you’ve already aptly pointed out, that if we kept going back to the beginning every time we make a mistake, we would only get better at playing just the beginning part of the song instead of the rest of the more difficult areas.






Umm...kind of a sensitive subject here but “Waste”, in my humble opinion and point of view, is another adjective that belongs in the realm of relatives.

I would like to believe that none of the efforts that I’ve put into whatever I’ve selected to do, regardless of my rates of improvements, is a waste of my resources or time. Of course we each have to write our own happy mediums and fulfilling recipes.

Cheers and happy playing to you.

Key Notes

Hi Angelojf,

Cute grumbling smiley you have there. Although I'm definitely not an "advanced Book Twoer" since I'm still near the beginning of the book myself, but since I've already passed that song, I thought that I should give my input. I found that this song was fairly easy to learn, but the levels of difficulties for the subsequent pieces escalated rather quickly, for me at least.

But never fear, if you can play book one's "Amazing Grace" that well, you can definitely attack anything, well... the pieces that I've encountered so far anyway.

Regards,

Key Notes

Quick update here... after about two weeks, I am nearing recordability (what, that's not a word? it should be...) on the Mexican Hat Dance. Maybe this weekend some time.

I can play it at about 2/3 tempo, but over time, should get that up to, um, speed.

[quote=Key Notes][quote=Waltz]I have a question for everyone out there and here: When you are practicing a piece you've learned (by learned I mean have the capacity to play fluently), what do you do when you make a simple error while playing (missed note etc)? Do you: A. Keep going B. Go back to the error and replay the mistake correctly, then keep going. C. Go back to the beginning and replay. I'm very curious and I would like to hear from everyone. . .[/quote] Hi Waltz, Both A & B for me, depending on wether it's a minor or major mistake. What I’ve been doing is when I first learn a song, if I found that I’ve been consistently stumbling or slowed down at a certain point, I would stop and work on just those particular measures or phrases until I felt that I’ve gotten them up to speed and under my fingers pretty well, before starting back from the beginning again. Then from here I would continued to work on each stumbling blocks, and string them together as I go along. For the songs that I’ve already learned and can play them pretty well, if I made a minor mistake, I would continue to play right through them until the end. But sometimes if my mistakes are major enough, I would go back to just the beginning of that particular measure or phrase and continue to play from there until the end instead of going all the way back to the beginning of the song. This process of starting at mid-points or at problem areas of a song forces me to practice and sharpen my note reading skills, so that I can quickly identify them at any given point instead of relying only on playing by intervals or muscle memories. In addition, it also helps to prevent exactly what you’ve already aptly pointed out, that if we kept going back to the beginning every time we make a mistake, we would only get better at playing just the beginning part of the song instead of the rest of the more difficult areas. [quote=Waltz]Yea, that's what I meant, for minor errors. . . This is the habit I'm trying (difficulty) to break. I adore the feeling of running through an entire piece flawlessly, but the odds of it happening in any one run (depending on the length of the score) aren't very high. This is especially true of pieces with damn repeats (Ballin' the Jack comes to mind immediately) I feel that I waste much precious practice time "redoing" the same areas over and over in an attempt to play

Congrats. That was a great piece, difficult, fun, but very challenging. I played it for quite a while after I "passed it". Undone has a phenomenal recording on page 1.

I am having a problem with Canon in D where I don't know how I can turn the page while I'm playing! I end up holding the last notes on the 2nd page, while I reach up and try to quickly flip the page to the next one. I don't have a page turner that will sit with me while I practice.

I keep meaning to copy the last two pages so I can set them all out next to each other, no page turning necessary, but for longer songs how do you deal with this during practice?

Hava Nagila was a 4 pager as well. During practice, I would piece it together without caring if I had to pause for the page turn. This was the one piece on which I was less strict. It took me so long to learn, however, that I unintentionally memorized much of it. In my "youtube video", I had the book opened to the first two pages, the last two pages were played completely from memory. . .

Canon in D tough?

Here is my recording of Deep River:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNK8LG5w8ss

I didn't record 6th Symphony Theme or Fascination, mainly because I didn't have the time, but also because I didn't particularly care for either of them, they were all right, just not favorites. . . Deep River was a change of pace, and different, so I definitely wanted to grab a recording of it. I don't know what happened to my post at the top of the page... I suppose just disregard it.

For the Americans on A#2, our big day's coming tomorrow, happy 4th to all,

W

"I took piano lessons as a child (from 9 to 11). Recently, when my daughter started taking lessons, I caught the bug. My wife took a semester of piano from the local community college 9 years ago, and they used Alfred All in One Book 1. She decided she wasn't all that interested after one semester, so didn't continue. I opened up her copy of Alfred last month and started learning from the beginning. I quickly discovered this book is a lot of fun!"

That's my intro in the Book 1 thread. I just started book 2 last night starting from the beginning, Down the Valley. I got through Guantanamera, so tonight, I'll start to work on Overture.

I'll hang out here a while; looks like book 2 will be just as fun as book 1, I hope.

I don't actually think this version of Canon in D is too tough - it's got a lot of pattern to it; so my mathematical mind likes that. It did take me a week or so to understand all the patterns in it; and from then on practicing them slowly and making sure I have my timing fairly consistent. I'm still a little rough on the 4th page; my transition between each line on that page isn't very smooth. That and I need to work on the dynamics a bit more - keep the 'p' sections softer.

I like to read the music as I play as I sometimes space out and don't remember if I just played a particular line as they are all quite close to the previous one, just changing a little bit. I'll copy the pages at some point so I can get rid of thta huge pause between page two and three.

I, as well, like a piece with some patterns in it. I actually passed Loch Lomond today, I only have three more pieces until Canon in D. I have only just begun to learn "Love's Greeting", but it seems fairly tough. If you do scan the first two pages of Canon in D, could you post them here or somewhere? I would like to have them as well, but I don't have a scanner. . .

4evrBeginR:

Welcome, and yes, it is fun. For me, I really liked Overture, it was one of the first things that souned, to me, like I was playing piano. Guantanamera took me a while.

Keep it up.

When I started Guantanamera, I had no idea what I was playing on first pass. Then then on the third pass, suddenly I realize what the rhythm needed to be, then it was like "oh". Not my favorite either.

Overture was tricky first couple of pass then I realize what to do with my hands. It forced me to put my LH over my RH with LH slightly forward. I don't have a teacher, but it seemed that was the way to deal with it. I also like the mixed staccato/legato; quite fun.