This video looks at a middle ground between 'practising' a piece on piano and 'sight reading' it. Reading for most of us - especially classical pianists - is an essential skill. Can the same be said of Sight Reading?
We are frequently told that Sight Reading is an 'essential skill' for any pianist. However, for something to be 'essential', then by definition it is something that we will need to do - perhaps even frequently! However, in 45+ years of playing piano, the only occasions I have ever needed to play a piece of music 'on sight' with zero time to practice it has been when taking exams! Thus, I guess when taking exams, it is an 'essential skill', however, if we're not taking exams, why do we need to do it?
I first spoke about this some time ago. Indeed, I believe that one reason sight reading is something worth investing some time into every day is that it helps improve our ability to 'read' music. Just in the same way that when we were learning to read as children, those who spent more time doing it tended to be much better at it!
• Piano Practice: Why we...
However, sometimes, I think it also pays to inject a little realism into proceedings. Whilst we might rarely or even never need to actually 'sight read', there are likely to be occasions when we need to learn a piece of music relatively quickly. So quickly that we don't really have time to develop our memory of it and need to rely on the dots in front of us.
The technique I'd like to discuss I have nicknamed Sight Studies. I'm calling them this because it is half way between actually 'learning' a piece of music properly and 'sight reading' it. The basic principle is that we'll take no more than 20 minutes (you might prefer to use 30 minutes or an hour depending on your available time) to take a piece that we have never played and bring it up to a 'reasonable' performance standard.
I've used part of Mozart's Sonata Facile (K545) as an example given it's a piece that the vast majority of people I'm sure will recognize and, therefore, find it easier to follow the ideas than with a piece of music that is totally unknown. It's then simply a case of applying these same principles to any piece of your choosing.
To easily skip around the video, here are the chapter markers:
00:00 Sight Studies - an addition to Sight Reading Practice
01:11 What is a Sight Study?
02:07 Start by Analysing? (Think First)
04:45 Simplify any difficulties
07:34 Effective Use of Limited Time to Practice
09:09 Start by Playing?
It is worth pointing out that the very same skills we need to develop for Sight Reading are equally necessary to successfully do Sight Studies.
With that in mind, I invite you to check out my PlayList on 'Chords', which are perhaps the biggest bang for your buck when it comes to getting better at reading music.
• Mastering Chords
Another very helpful strategy that is also touched upon in this video is that of Pattern Recognition.
• Piano Sight Reading Tr...
You'll find a couple of articles on my website discussing sight reading. The first, on why I think it is a good idea:
tommyspianocorner.com/the-hid...
... then a second recounting the results after 200 hours of doing it daily:
tommyspianocorner.com/celebra...
For the best source of actionable Practice Advice (including lots of resources on how to improve your sight reading), check out the Practising the Piano Online Academy. Currently, you are able to get 14 day FREE trial to the Online Academy by clicking on the link below:
www.informance.biz/online-aca...
EQUIPMENT:
Full details of all equipment used are available on my blog at the address below:
tommyspianocorner.com/youtube...
Filmed on an iPhone 13 Pro - using the Filmic Pro app
Piano Audio captured on a Zoom F6 using a matched pair of Rode NT5 microphones (see my review of the F6 here : • Record Piano | 5 Reas... )
Voiceover captured on a Rode SmartLav microphone plugged into an iPhone 6S
Video editing done using Lumafusion
Audio editing done using Garageband (voiceover) and Cubase LE Elements (piano).
SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: / tommyspianocorner
Twitter: @tommyspianocor1
EMAIL:
tommy@tommyspianocorner.com
Негізгі бет Музыка Sight Studies | A Supercharged Addition to Sight Reading Practice
Пікірлер: 4