Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Experiences to share regarding Liszt's technical exercises?

I just started looking into these and damn are they hard. I've been practicing the the first one so far up to the 3rd finger and it's getting better and easier, but looking further I can see the rest of the exercises are quite challenging.

Anyone here tried them for a significant amount of time? Could you share your experience and any results noticed?

I practiced them selectively for several years when I was a teenager. Definitely there are significant benefits. I'm not sure though that Liszt actually composed them.

Do you recall which ones you practiced?

The first book of Liszt exercises looks a lot like Pischna.
Totally helpful with finger independence, esp. with fingers 4 and 5 and with gaining greater evenness in 16th notes. I have noticed much greater evenness, clarity, and ease in my playing since I started working on Pischna maybe a year ago.
If you still have those one or two fingers that like to stick up when you play, these could be very good for you.
You have to watch out for tension. It can just kill you in exercises like this because they are so long and repetitive. Don't just try to power through the exercise, try to play the exercise in the way you'd like to feel at the piano for the next 50 years. Stop immediately if anything gets tense, and restart more slowly making sure you can get from note to note without tension.
Non-playing fingers should definitely NOT lift up in exercises like this. Keep them limp and maybe in contact with the key tops.

I also noticed a few that look like Dohnanyi's exercises, I will continue experimenting. I tried the first 20 Hanon exercises a while back and I think they help great with accuracy, but these are on another level to help (as indicated) with strength and independence of the fingers due to the dynamic markings.

I've worked on the whole book a while back, and now I just play some selections, almost always the first few books. The first book is undoubtedly the most helpful... The one with scales alternating the hands is surprisingly useful, if you strive for evenness while doing it. There's some interesting stuff for the passing of the thumb too. But Heather already said it all: watch out for tension.

Thanks I was hoping to hear that about the first set. Do you recall which number or book you're referring to about the alternating scales?

Book 3, number 52 and 53.

My experience is basically identical to Francisco's. I worked through the whole book back in my teens, when I still had about 6 hours a day to practice (sometimes more). I didn't have a teacher, but worked very slowly and made sure I was relaxed; I also watched in a mirror to check for joint collapsing or anything else I might miss watching from above.

During that period, my technique improved dramatically, but I stopped after a couple years and never really went back. Sometimes I do a few for a while, but wonder if I'm wasting my time working on pure technique...however, I always do seem to gain more control and even improve in sight-reading and so on, so perhaps it would be worth the investment.

I own the complete unabridged version, which I find incredibly thorough. Some of the latter exercises are pretty impractical (getting into the double note arpeggios and alternating hand sixths, etc...), but if they're studied carefully, they seem to yield good results for all areas of technique.

I'm inspired now to dig them out again...I feel like if one sticks with them consistently, they definitely work!