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As a result of the ABF recital #23 I've been advised (and I want to) to learn more about pedalling.

I don't actually know what I'm doing with the pedal ha ha, all I know is that the right pedal creates like an echo/loudness. I use it most the way through songs, and release it only really when I hear it's too much. I've never used the other one lol.

Cebukid, advised starting some classical stuff. I have started a few classical pieces already, but use the pedal in the same way as with the other stuff I play. Any tips/advice here would be great!

Wayne, Your right Pedal is not "echo/loudness" but is "sustain" it will let the strings ring untill you take your foot off it.. Normally, when you are not using it, as soon as you take your finger off a key the damper for that note will damp the string stopping it ringing out further.

your left pedal is the soft pedal, and without looking in your particular piano may work in a number of ways,, It may move the hammers closer to the strings so they dont hit as hard and therefore causes a quieter strike, OR your left pedal may operate a felt bar that goes between the hammers and the strings, again causing a quieter strike, you will need to open your pianos lid to see what is happening when you use the left pedal , and then it will be clear.

My personal opinion is that unless indicated on the music you should stay away from the pedal, especially if you haven't learnt much about it yet - I think it's easier to learn smooth fingering this way as with the pedal it's harder to tell whether or not you are doing this well.
Apart from when it's marked on the music, another situation when you might want to use it is when you can't reach a note without having to lift off from the previous note. On the first note, press it down, then as soon as you've touched the next note, lift it so that the first note doesn't sound longer than it should.
I hope that this helps! Sorry if I haven't explained very clearly, just ask if you want me to clear something up

Inky, I'm self taught and don't read sheet music that much, I play mostly by ear, or using sheet music as a guide to playing songs in my own way. Maybe you would get a clearer picture of where I'm going wrong, if you wouldn't mind watching the video I submitted to the ABF recital. Thanx

missed your post rossy, 2 ticks

Wayne, I'm probably not the best person to give pedaling advice, as I over-pedal tremendously. But here's my general strategy:

1.) Pedal with chord changes.
2.) I usually try to pedal right after hitting the keys, rather than simultaneously.
3.) If playing a trill or quickly alternating keys that are right next to each other, I usually try to hold off on the pedal, so the articulation is clear and it doesn't create dissonance.

I think Inky is right when it comes to much classical music (hi, Inky! welcome to the forum ), but for modern/new age stuff, pedalling is rarely indicated in the sheet music but is *definitely* needed.

Rossy

Wayne, one of the most difficult things to do on the piano (and I still work on to this day), is trying to accomplish the same effect as the pedal by doing finger legato.

The problem with the pedal is that it's indiscriminate, like a weapon of mass destruction. Pedal works only when all the notes being held down belong to the same harmony (or same chord -- to be just a little simplistic).

The skill to develop is to hold on to the notes longer with your fingers. Develop the skill to create intentional overlaps between notes so there's no moment that there's nothing playing (unless you intend it). It changes the way you move your fingers and hands, like a laziness to the movement.

This is the better answer than to overuse the damper/sustain pedal. You will notice too that professionals sound different and the sound cannot be explained with pedal. The reason is that they know to use less of it.

I use very little pedal myself BTW.

Thnx for the vid BenPiano, and thnx guys for the advice, I'm gonna carry on looking into this!

Ooh, I see. I mostly played classical stuff from sheet music, so in that case someone else is probably more apt to help you, but I'll try my best to try and give a little advice.

~ To get a good pedalling technique, try slow practise switching between two chords.
Play the first chord, put the pedal down, and keep it there. Move your fingers to the next chord position and then press the keys and lift the pedal simultaneously. You can then put the pedal down again ready to change to the next chord. Ideally the sound shouldn't be echoey or louder as you hear at the moment, but at the same time you shouldn't hear a break between the chords.
However, I believe it is generally fine to keep the pedal down when playing the same chord repeatedly but this depends on the sound you want to make... it's only a small difference (on my piano at least, maybe there isn't usually any difference to be heard?) but is something to take into consideration when learning the song and deciding what would be more appropriate for that piece

~ What you want to avoid is the "muddy" sound that comes from over pedalling, which can make the melody get drowned or lost in the sound of previous notes. For now I'd advise trying to change at least every time the chord changes. It'll be a matter of personal preference of how often and where you change, but some changes will be a lot more beneficial to the clarity of the piece. You could try taking a small section of the song and pedalling in different places, whilst recording it, so that you can decide which is your favourite sound.

((edit: Thanks Monica ))

Ah Wayne, your "soft" pedal is moving the hammers closer to the strings, so making their travel shorter, in essence, this means even if you hit the keys with the same amount of force because the hammers "throw" is shortened , the momentum is restricted, making a quieter hit.

Some old straight strung uprights slide a piece of felt attatched to a bar inbetween the strings and hammers, so essentially, the hammer is still traveliing the same distance and with as much force but the felt "mutes" the sound, if you are ever in a position to compare just these two different systems side by side, it's worth doing for interest value..

You raise an interesting question though Wayne, because if you are not going strictly off sheet music as to when to pedal, then you will be peddeling by "ear" and feel of the music (right pedal)

And by "Feel" (left or soft pedal) and by feel I mean feeling inside you, as well as feel of the keys.

Mrs R says: she noticed my feet one day and just watched them when I was playing a piece I had composed, she said afterwards, how do you know when to do that?

I honestly could not answer, and that didnt make her happy, because she is a very practical person, and likes to know direct and correct answers to questions. I thought and thought and thought, and then tried to analyise the situation, by playing peddeling and thinking about why I was peddeling and when...
I couldn't, it would appear in my case it is done on feel for what is happening at the timewithin the context of the played music....

Experiment Wayne, listen to the piano as you do so, feel the piano as you do so.

Yes - this is the behavior on uprights. But Grand pianos operate completely differently. On a grand, the soft pedal moves the hammers sideways and may hit less strings (instead of 3). This changes the tone of the piano, but not necessarily volume.

im tryna learn more myself cause im actually getting a digital piano with pedals finally getting rid of this crappy usb midi controller. but yea its a beautiful thing. at my lessons i found it hard for me to coordinate it since i am not used to it

cheers guy's I got enough to think about and try for now, thnx to everyone.

Oh yeah, welcome to ABF Inky

Just a point about "classical music" and pedaling. Many composers do not explicitly indicate pedaling in their music. Editions that are prepared for student use often have editorial suggestions added, but many good performance editions have no pedal indications at all. This does not mean to skip pedaling. Rather, it means that pedaling is so individualized that most performers need to work it out for themselves. Even when pedaling is indicated in a score, you often need to develop your own approach depending on the musical style of the piece, the sound you want and, often, the room you're playing in plus the nature of the instrument you're playing on.

Bottom line, pedaling is important in most music, particularly since the Baroque era, but it's often not marked or consists only of editorial suggestions. Learning when and how to pedal is just part of the training.

Hi Wayne,

This has come up on some other threads before and there was a reference to a free online book

A Pedal Method for the Piano, by Albert F. Venino which I found useful.

The pedal is one of the few ways a pianist can change the sound of a note so I don't think that you want to give up on it, just learn to use it better. Overuse of the pedal is bad because the notes get smeared but when used tastefully it can add a lot, especially on slower pieces. I know that I overuse the pedal myself but I couldn't imagine not using it at all, when I started to use the pedal more in my playing I found that I got compliments about how much I had improved. My philosophy ( which I am sure does not represent the opinion of most piano teachers ) is to use as much pedal as much as I can before it starts to sound like there is too much pedal. Lifting your foot off the pedal at the right time is the hardest part of pedaling but is I think the key to tasteful pedaling.

Wayne, pedaling was a big problem for me too, and sometimes we get the impression that the sustain pedal makes a piece sound "elegant and majestic."

My "Entertainer" version that I posted here over a year ago was over-pedaled, but at the time, it sounded "right" to me. Several people both here and YouTube pointed out to me that it was muddy, and then it kind of "clicked" after that. Now I can't stand that version....lol.

As i've matured, my ear now knows when to pedal and when not to. My ragtime pedaling is much better than before (classical and romantic is a different story)...

Here's a piece (from last year's recital) that I pedaled generously, but gracefully....it's hard to explain, but I pedaled this on the "OOM" part and let go of the sustain on the "PAH" part (of the OOM-PAH bass cleff notes)...that's as technical as I can get here..lol.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6nbEnP194E&feature=channel_video_title

Für Elise is highly recommended to practice pedaling technique because it does give pedaling notes on the score. The pedal here will blend the appreggios nicely. It's not that hard either (roughly a grade 4 piece), and I know you can technically hand this. I'd love to hear you play this!

PS-I'm starting my foray into the Bach inventions.... are you supposed to pedal the inventions!!??

Jazzwee, not entirely correct, this is the operation on SOMEgrands. Others work differently, some move all the keys on the keybed to one side, Steinway employ this modus operandi, and I find it hideously disconcerting.

BUt not all grands do that, I played on a stunning collard and collard grand from the 1900's in a local museum, and what that did was to lower all the keys in the keybed, so they couldnt be depressed as far, thus limiting their travel....

Unfortunately, as the piano was in a museum, and the Lid was shut, I could not ascertain how this was affected..in terms of mechanical connection to the pedal.

What I can say, was it felt much more natural than having keys shift sideways, which is like moving the goalposts to me!

However, I accept that this is not true una corda, but saying that, I would bet money that the majority of folks cannot tell the diference aurally between true una corda as per hammers hitting one (or two) strings instead of two and three,
And hammers hitting strings very gently.

From my experience, no matter if the pedal should be used in the specific piece, you should always be able to play it without a pedal. Of course, it won't sound as good, but using the pedal from the very beginning of the learning process can be bad for your technique. At least it's bad for mine - I have a habit of just using pedal instead of sticking to the right note lengths etc. - in a pedal-using piece it sounds the same, but it's quite hard for me to play a piece where the pedal shouldn't be used.