Sight-Reading at the Piano: An Acquired Skill

     

     My student wants to play chamber music, but doesn't trust his sight-reading skills. They are in fact, he says, non-existent. He is not a born sight reader, but his ear is good. I've found over the years that most pianists are proficient in one, but not both of these skills. Of course, there are a few who have both skills. We are allowed to dislike these people very much.
      When someone is a good sight-reader, it means they are able to bring the score to life at first look, 

making it sound like the piece. Some pianists, I've noticed, think that sight-reading means being able to read music. If one can read music, of course, one is using the eyes to do so. But poking out notes a few at a time is not what I call sight reading. A good sight reader learns to automatically associate the passage on the page with its location on the keyboard without passing through the intellect. This is the crux of sight reading.
     Now for an about face. There is really no such thing as sight reading, that is if one has at least some experience with notation. By that I mean the

process of reading music fluently can be reduced to simply recognizing a finite (probably?) number of patterns, repeated over and over again in various permutations. I know, this is not really very helpful. There are, however, exercise volumes addressing this very concept, deadly dull, mind-numbing whole pages of patterns to play repeatedly. Never mind. You don't need them.
     But do learn to recognize patterns. Our common practice music is made up largely of 

scales and arpeggios. Look for these. Our music is also largely made up of tertian harmony, so learn to feel shapes of chords and their inversions. This will help with Alberti figures, too. 
     If you want to systematically work to improve your sight-reading skill, here is a plan:

     1. Do it. Every day. Set aside ten minutes of practice time. Really. Every day. I know it is not satisfying to have to do something that seems 

incomplete. Keep scores handy that are much easier than you are capable of actually playing. A hymnal is a good place to start, as hymns are mostly homophonic. Or Anna Magdalena Song Book. Or easier sonatinas or other Classical-era teaching pieces.
     2. Scan. Before beginning, look through the piece. Look for any surprises, i.e., change of key or meter, technical challenges. I do this myself  when someone hands me something I don't know.
     3. Tempo. Decide on a tempo that 

accommodates the quickest note values.
     4. Continue. Begin to play keeping track of the pulses and don't vary. If something goes wrong, don't stop. Go on to the next beat or the next measure. If this happens often, the tempo may be too fast.
     5. Focus. Keep eyes on the page and don't look down. There are many great blind pianists, so we know it is not necessary to look at our hands. Did I say keep eyes on the page? This is important.
     6. Anticipate. As you are already keeping eyes on the page anyway, you might as well look ahead. It doesn't help to continue to stare at what you've just played. This is particularly wise at ends of lines.
     7. Find a partner to read with. This is a good 

way to force yourself to continue. A partner who reads well and is willing to play simpler music with you is ideal. There are also collections of teacher/student four-hand pieces. (I've published some of these myself for just this purpose. Look for them in the column at the right.)
     For this study, it is okay to "sight read" the selection two or three times. And as always, try to see everything—dynamics, articulation—and enjoy the music.
      

Chopin Nocturne in C-Sharp Minor: Leaps of Faith

 

Frederick Chopin

     A student brought in this soulful nocturne, Op. 27, No. 1, the companion to the famous D-flat, No. 2 of the same opus. He observed that it's not as simple as it at first appears. Naturally, I took up my post as devil's advocate and asked what if we knew at a glance what the piece required technically, would it appear simple? This is another way of saying nothing is difficult if you know how, and learning how is, fortunately, the purpose of this blog.

     My student pointed to the leaping left hand in the  three-four section marked appassionato: 

Chopin Nocturne, Op. 27, No. 1
(Click on example to enlarge.)

When leaping, always be sure to notice
 if there's water in the pool. That is, practice the landing.

The first issue to consider is how to group the left-hand triplets. Instead of thinking 10ths, start each group with the thumb and continue thinking octaves. Always when leaping back and forth take care to group notes in such a way as to avoid feeling as if the arm is going in two directions. In speed this can cause a jamming of the forearm, a condition I call lockjaw of the arm (lockarm?) In this case we start with the thumb to 5 and allow the hand to fall back from 5, passively, to the new thumb. In measure 5 of the example, it's possible to take that last left-hand E-flat in the right hand, although not really necessary. Remember, there is a continual broadening (sostenuto). On the downbeat of measure 6, I take the left-hand A-flat with the right hand.

     But wait! There's more! My student had another question. What about the forte section before that? Where the stretto begins? This is another left-hand leaping issue:

Chopin Nocturne Op. 27, No. 1
(Click on example to enlarge.)

Leaping is easy when you have a running
 start,  when you consider how to do it.

This one is a little harder to describe in words without demonstrating, but I'll try. Notice that most of each measure lies more or less under the hand, if we also shape to the wider intervals as they occur. These notes may be considered a group. The octave represents a separate voice and lies outside of the group of triplets. The technique is a combination of a leap from the octave by means of a pluck, or springing action, and a slight rotation toward the thumb. That is, the 5th finger is like a hinge from which the 3rd finger rotates toward its landing place on the F-double sharp. The feeling is of 5 moving to 3. Once the hand is balanced with 3 on its note, it plays the neighboring notes in succession before opening to accommodate the ever widening intervals played by the thumb. Take care that the hand doesn't remain in an open position.

     The last left-hand note in measure one sends the hand to the following octave by means of a pluck and a rotation. This time 3 is the hinge, which allows the hand to open to the left and land on the octave. The feeling is 3 moving to thumb. Give the octave a little time. By that I mean go to it as if you plan to stay on it, which of course you won't. 

Bumpy Scales on the Piano

     A student writes: "I have noticed that if (during practice) scales or runs begin to feel a bit uneven or bumpy, this can often be corrected by playing the scale or run up and down four octaves at a moderate tempo while randomly stopping momentarily just before playing a particular note (i.e. stopping short and then continuing without any preconceived pattern in mind). The “stopped” finger (the one that would play next) is held back from playing for a quarter-note rest, and then I continue on for a few more notes before stopping again with another finger, etc.

     My best guess is that the sudden stopping of a finger and then releasing it has the effect of contracting and then releasing opposing muscles that I was allowing to tense up.  This random-stoppage approach seems to add something to the rag-doll relaxation-and-shake-out approach to creeping tension."

     Without seeing what he is doing, it is difficult to diagnose the unevenness of his scales. What he describes as a remedy strikes me as arbitrary and perhaps less reasonable than examining underlying causes. 
     

     Usually "bumpiness" is the result of a misunderstanding of how the thumb works in crossing. When anticipating a thumb crossing, allow the thumb to hang—yes, hang—behind the next finger. It should hang more or less behind the finger that is playing. Also, he should allow the forearm to move at an angle behind the playing finger in the direction of the music. This puts the playing apparatus in a perfect position to play the thumb rotationally. 

     But first, he should make sure that he is really completing each note of the scale before going on to the next. This is an opportunity to review basic forearm rotation. If the weight of the forearm is really transferred to each note as if walking, and if his fingers are each "at rest" at the bottom of the key, evenness should come easily. Feel the rotation a little exaggerated at first, but then in speed don't think of it at all. I know, this is what confuses a lot of people. In speed we rely more on shaping and the "memory" of the sensation of completing each note.

     There are video demos under the iDemo tab above. For more on this and other topics have a look at:

                         Piano Technique Demystified

Alerting All Piano Teachers: Playing the Piano is Easy and Doesn't Hurt

  

  Years ago when I first began my university career, I accidentally made waves in the local piano teachers community. One afternoon after a concert, a group of local teachers surrounded me, yes surrounded me, accusing me of not "believing in" scales. Yes, the attack smacked of religious fervor. Somehow the discussion with my students of the use and

importance of scales in the development of pianistic facility had morphed into a sacrilege. Practicing scales routinely for the development of technique is a waste of time, I preached. It's true, like it or not. 

    However, it is essential that pianists know all of the major and melodic minor scales and can play them in a well-coordinated manner for four octaves at a moderately quick tempo. This is a study of keyboard harmony, learning the topography of the keyboard and coordinating thumb-crossings. Once learned and well worked-in, technical studies—even scales—should be extracted from the music itself. Scales that occur in repertoire rarely present in the same way we practice them routinely. No amount of scale practice will prepare a student for a Mozart sonata or a Chopin étude.

 

    I think this dogma about scales comes from the notion that pianists have to suffer the painful indignity of mind-numbing boredom, you know, of the sort that comes from mindless rote (the names Czerny and Hanon come to mind). But I also think that too often we have in the back of our minds "no pain, no gain." This is a reference to physical pain. I remember thinking that if my hands weren't tired after practice, I hadn't practiced enough. (But I was just an undergraduate and didn't yet know any better.) I once knew a very distinguished pianist on the faculty of a major university who declared that she practiced until all of the wrong muscles were tired so that the correct ones could take over. Well, I didn't believe her. But she figured out something because she could play all of the Op. 10 Études of Chopin in concert.

 

  I once remarked to a cellist friend that I thought that if an instrument is really mastered technically, it should feel easy. She was having none of it. "If it were easy, anyone could do it." (What's wrong with that?) Well, I thought, when we observe an accomplished artist perform, do we come away thinking, wow, he looked like he was working hard and having a difficult time?

    My violinist friend studied with the great Nathan Milstein. She is herself a remarkably accomplished performer. Yet, in a lesson with the master she fluffed a cadenza passage. The maestro demonstrated, after which he stated, "It's easy when you know how." Truer words were never spoken and you, gentle reader, will be glad to know that I've finally arrived at my point.

    Forget about scales (once learned). Toss out exercises (Czerny, et. al.). Practice scales and technique in the pieces you want to play. And here's what I mean by practice: First, locate the difficulty; second, solve the technical issue not by repeating it by rote, but rather by analyzing what physical movements (and fingering) are required; third, only then begin working-in the solution. Reject mindless rote. If a passage doesn't feel easy, it hasn't been solved. If the hand feels stretched, find another solution (redivide between the hands?). If there is pain, stop what you're doing and rethink the passage. Don't try to play through pain or fatigue. If you observe these suggestions, you will know how and it will be easy.

            The Pianist's guide to Practical Technique

           The Pianist's Guide to Practical Scales and Arpeggios

                         Piano Technique Demystified

    

Piano Fingering for Efficiency: The Long and Short of It

                                                                                                                                                                      

My student complained of difficulty with a left-hand leap. There was indeed a leap from an octave to a first-inversion triad. On examination, though, we discovered that the difficulty was not so much the leap, but rather the choice of fingering.

    Because of his smallish hand, my student opted to place the fifth finger of his left hand on F-sharp and his third finger on A, making the chord feel smaller. This in and of itself is not necessarily inefficient, though it does feel a bit cramped. In the context of a leap, though, trying to land with the longer finger (3) in between those two black

mountains can be problematic. In addition, the shorter finger (5) when played on a short key (black), pulls the hand in toward the fallboard, an extra movement. I suggested playing the chord with 4-2 instead of 5-3. This puts two longer fingers of similar lengths on one black key and one white key, a more comfortable position. The second finger on a white key will be slightly curved in order to avoid going in among the black keys.  Using 3-2-1 on the chord can feel even better in a larger hand.  These fingerings also avoid the movement in the direction of "in." (BTW This is not too large a span for his hand.)

    With this adjustment of the fingering, the leap becomes a lateral movement and not a diagonal. I feel the fifth-finger D propel me to the chord rotationally. (See discussions of rotation apropos of leaps elsewhere in these pages.)

   

Bach's English Suite in A Minor: Oh No, Three Voices

      My student brought the prelude to Bach's A 

J.S. Bach

Minor English Suite, which he played quite fluently and with excellent understanding of the style. He knows not to accept "just okay" technically, because he knows complete ease is possible. So, he asked me about measure nineteen, where the bass note is held while the tenor rambles about in the same hand. Although he could play the notes so that they sounded just fine, he felt constricted. Clever lad that he is, he asked about the rotation.

Bach A Minor English Suite, M 19 Prelude, Rotation

     Remember, forearm rotation is only an underlying tool. The concept sometimes confuses and confounds the uninitiated, especially absent an in-person demonstration. In this case, feeling the difference between single and double rotation can help to unlock the hand where it feels constricted. Admittedly, this example is a somewhat small point, but working in the rotation here can have a profound result elsewhere.
     Notice the angled arrows in the example. The angle indicates the direction from which the finger strikes the key. Since the fifth finger remains in place, the rotation can't be very exaggerated. This is fine, because we always want tiny movements for speed anyway. Where there are consecutive arrows in the same direction, the movement is called a double rotation, rotating both to and from a note. When the music changes direction with each note, the movement is called single rotation. This is what most pianists think of when forearm rotation is mentioned; it is what occurs in an Alberti bass figure or a trill. (For more on forearm rotation and other issues, see Piano Technique Demystified: Insights into Problem Solving.)
     What happens here, then, in measure nineteen, is a release of tension in the left hand, slight though it may be, by allowing the rotation its freedom. The result is an avoidance of finger isolation.

There's more to it than spinning.

      It turned out, though, that there was also a coordination issue in my student's approach. We pianists learn from day one to spin a musical line beautifully to the right. This is good. But what if we have two or more lines that crave spinning beautifully to the right. What then?
     Ah. I'm glad you asked. We have to ween ourselves from the horizontal and consider the vertical. That is, what happens at points (as in counterpoints) where the voices come together. Here, if there is a coordination issue, we have to feel the combined downs, the "verticalness" as indicate by the doubled-headed arrows in the example.

Bach A Minor English Suite, M 19 Prelude, Verticalness

          Practice stopping on each eighth and notice which two fingers are partnered. Feel the down into the keys in each hand. My teacher used to say, 
"Dear, the piano is down. We only come up in order to go down again." Say the finger numbers numbers aloud. Notice how the pairs change. I know it seems silly, but do it. It works. (For more on coordination in contrapuntal music, see Demystifying Bach at the Piano: Problem Solving in the Inventions and Sinfonias.)