Playing forte in the RH and piano in the LH

[prometheus]

This may sound stupid but how do I do this? I have a melody in the RH and chords in the LH but since I play three notes in the LH and only one in the RH the melody gets clouded by the chords.

The same problem with playing legato in the RH and staccato in the LH.

Anyone?

[xvimbi]

This is not stupid at all! That is what is called hand independence, and it's tough. One way to go about it is to learn each hand separately (HS) to perfection. This way, one hand won't be able to affect the other. Then, when you put hands together (HT), you play both hands as if the other didn't exist. Ideally, that should work, but our brains a usually a bit sluggish.

Therefore, also try the following approach: take a left hand chord and play it a few times with the loudness that you want. Then add a single note in the right hand. Only repeat the chord in the LH and the note in the RH. Concentrate on keeping the loudness of the chord constant, but vary the loudness of the melody note - deliberatly, not accidentally until you have perfect control over this simplest of building blocks. Keep building your piece, note by note if necessary. When you feel comfortable, you can expand and also vary the loudness of the chord. Finally, vary the loudness of single notes within the chord.

Another good one is playing staccato in one hand, while playing legato in the other

Hope that helps.

[prometheus]

The problem is, I can't do it at all. Of cours I tried doing this but when I start concentrating on keeping the lext hand soft the right hand does the same. So then I focus on the right hand and it plays the correct loudness. But then the left hand follows.

I also tried doing them seperate for a while and then together. But it seems really hard for me.

[xvimbi]

This is hard for everyone. Perhaps you are expecting too much too quickly. Keep at it, and you will get better over time. The fact that you realize that there is something wrong with the dynamics is already half of the solution. Many people don't realize that in the first place. So, give yourself time and learn to accept that, this early in the game, pieces will not come out perfectly, for even to play the simplest Bach Prelude perfectly, one must have perfect technique. However, even without perfect technique, one can still get stunning results.

[ako]

Are these repeated triads in the LH? The technique to keep them soft is to keep your fingers on the keys instead of lifting for each triad. Push to the bottom of the keys then come up almost all the way but not 100% then depress the keys again for the second triad and make sure it sounds. It takes slow practice to get the tone and motion right.  I hope it helps.

[ludwig]

good ideas, I agree that practicing slowly is the key, and also breaking the exercise up, for example only play one note in the left hand with the right hand melody note, ie the bass note of the triad (chord), then gradually add in another note of the triad (middle note) and so on....when you have one chord right and one melody note right, apply the whole process to the rest of the bar (btw, what piece are you looking at?) This is all a game about patience and concentration....

Another thing you could do your scales like this too, when the fingers are in similar motion, perhaps you don't need to worry about the notes so much, so play one hand pp and one ff, then reverse...

Also, try to sing the melodic line when you have trouble hearing it because the cloudiness... Sometimes hand independence is also mental rather than physical, imagine you can hear the melody more clearly by singing it when you play hands together, eventually you will want to bring out the melody and stop singing (or not :p)

Sometimes though, it is good to not play everything slow when you're doing hand independence, (like when you do 3 against 2 triplet practice), for example, the scales I suggested or simple arpeggios etc in similar motion, you could try this with normal tempo and repeat the scale over, because in this case, it is about figuring out what sound you want from experience, however, it is different with pieces because your hands will not be in similar motion, they will be playing different notes so you'll have to worry about these factors....

Goodluck

[lostinidlewonder]

If you cant do it make the RH ffffffffffffffffffff and the Lh pppppppppppppppp

This severe contrast eventually is controlled to what you require. This is what I make students who play something too loud or soft in an actual piece, Ill ask them to overexaggerate their loudness or softness, then later on it resolves itself to a more controlled sound as required.

[Waldszenen]

One method I used is simply to have both hands on your lap, press the RH down firmly while not pressing the LH at all. Do this a few times, then gradually apply small pressure to the LH while still pressing down hard with the RH.


Doing this with the LH is effective too when the melody is in the LH.