Octave Glissandi

[R.Q.]

Does anyone here know a safe way to do octave glissandi. I recently murdered my fingers in a performance with one. Please help.

~ Young Virtuoso

[Ktari]

What's an octave glissando? *blinks* never heard of it

on that point, can anyone explain how best to do a regular glissando? I've done that one going down with the right hand on the black keys in jeux d'eau, but that one's like, easier, and I was working on toccata op. 11 by prokofief but never actually did that glissando full out. to be honest, i'm scared of glissandos, after my friend left a trail of blood on the piano playing the same piece... do you just go for it and hope for the best? is there any technique for it?

[R.Q.]

Regular Glissando are touchy but not impossible. Just make a fist only stick your thumb out and use your nail to run down the keys. If you let the keys touch any part of your finger except your thumbnail... Well, it is painful.

Octave Glissando's are just like that except you're supposed to play at the same time - and with the same hand - and octave lower. I can do them, but as you said, I leave a trail of blood!

~ Young Virtuoso

[allchopin]

i believe i have seen this before somewhere, but i can remember where.... i have never used gliss of any kind, but i would say you would tuck your pinky in (like curl it around)  and drag your flattened thumb and the nail of your pinky. are you sure youre not allowed to use the other hand? arrg what music is this! is chopin??

[R.Q.]

No this piece is not by Chopin! He was no barbarian  

Its a modern piece simply called Toccata. written by a former teacher of mine. Great piece... to hear...

Also, I tried your technique and nearly decapitated myself. I'm developing a severe distaste for glissandi of any sort  

Young Virtuoso  

[allchopin]

wussy fingers        

[dj]

i wouldn't exactly say "wussy fingers", allchopin, i know some pianists with super strong fingers who practice the glissandi as little as possible. i personally always scratch my fingers up whenever i do them :-/

[dinosaurtales]

I have been fortunate to have only had to do glissandi going downward with the right hand, but my piano teacher says that you just have to get used to bleeding up the keyboard. Like in Ravel's Alborada del Gracioso, where there are glissandi in thirds.  totally gross.  I'll avoid, thanks!

[pskim]

There is  the notorious octave glissandos in the third movement of Beethoven's Walstein sonata.  I play is as an octave glissando, not the suggested two handed scales by the editor.

I had to practice the gliss for a long time until my hands got used to the octave gliss position.  This is how I do my gliss.

First, reach the octave.  Then bend your thumb in so that when you are sliding down the keys down with your right hand, the nail of your thumb shoud be sliding down the keys, not your skin under your cudicles (spelling?) or you'll have one bloody keyboard.

Your pinky shoud be stretched straight as you glide down the keys and the fingerprint of the finger should touch the keys.

The same method goes for the left hand.

It is not easy to do, especially pianissimo, as Beethoven indicates.  There is also an octave glissando in one of the variations of Brahms' book one of the Paganini variations.

[Irock1ce]

isnt there one in waldstein 3rd movement?....  i mean pp octave glissando..

[Irock1ce]

or was it 1st movement.. or am i just stupid...

[R.Q.]

Pskim: Thanks, your method seems to work best. All the other methods seem want you to use the nail of your pinky as well as thumbnail, but the awkward hand position and ensuing carnage are too much for me! I can play Tocatta quite well your way, and leave no blood.

~ Young Virtuoso  

[BuyBuy]

You guys seem also to forget that the piano Beethoven wrote for had a much lighter action then ours, so that the octave glissandi could be done with less effort and harm.

Now should we try today to attempt the same on our grand pianos ? Depends on the pianist. Some pianists play the octave sliding at the end of the Waldstein 3rd movement just as very fast staccato octaves (you need to be real fast, though, to give an impression of sliding).

[Ktari]

*shudders* Ugh... blood. Don't talk about wussy fingers, talk about wussy pianists, just the thought of blood... *shudders some more*

gah! Will I ever be able to do a glissando? I suppose the adrenaline during a performance would push it, but still... haha what if I just stopped?

Anyway, I have a strange question. Since I am such a wuss (*cough*) is there any way to ~prepare~ to do a glissando? Like... you know those clear paint-on bandaids that are flexible? Anybody have any thoughts on that?

[RiskyP]

If I understand the definition of a glissndo correctly, (sliding a finger along the keys upward or downward) then I honestly don't understand what your guys' problem is with a one-finger glissando or one-hand octave glissando?! They seem to be the easiest things to do on a keyboard... you say your fingers get bloody?! OMG, how is that even possible? Are your fingernails getting stuck on the side of the keys?

I tried allchopin's method of a one-hand octave glissando (it makes sense) and it works absolutely fine. Ascending you simply curl your pinky inward and use the nail to touch the keys and flatten your thumb and use the bottom of it (kinda hard not to have 2 notes depressed at the same time tough) and the other way around for descending.  

...is this topic a joke that I am not getting?! I have only taken a very basic college intro course to classical piano and the very first thing we learned was how to play a glissando!  

[Hmoll]

Pskim's description of octave gliss. is the best.

Anyone reading this thread should be advised to take suggestions about how to play octave glissandos from someone who actually played them in the context of a piece of music - i.e. pskim, who has played the Waldstein.

The only thing I would add are two suggestions. 1) you can "work up" to an octave gliss by first practicing a smaller interval, a fifth or sixth for ex. After that interval is comfortable, try a larger interval 6th, 7th, and finally octave. You will notice that your 5th finger flattens out more as you spread out to an octave.
2) Don't try to play it to the bottom of the key bed. Try to find the point where the note sounds, and use that point as the "level" for the gliss.

Finally, to correct youngvirtuoso about "regular glissandos" - I assume he means single note gliss. - you do not always play them with your thumb. The rule is as follows: if the gliss moves away from your body: ie right hand starting on middle C and moving higher, or left hand starting on middle C and moving lower - you turn your hand over and play the gliss with the nail(s) of your third and second fingers - if you can control it with just your third finger nail, that's fine, otherwise use your second and third finger nails.
For single note glissandos moving toward your body - right hand starting high and going towards middle C, or left hand starting low and moving toward middle C, for example - you use your thumb nail.

[R.Q.]

Hmoll: Good idea about working up to the octave gliss. And as I said, Pskim's fingering is the only one that works for me. About the single note gliss, I play them the way you say - just made a momentary mistake explaing to Ktari.

Thanks for the advice everyone,

Young Virtuoso

[allchopin]

hey wait a minute why's pksim gettin all the credit- read my reply!! its what he said except reversed for ascending!
anyway, when a single note gliss ends on an octave, do you go up to the higher note then hit the octave, or the lower one? and how would you cleanly go about hitting this octave?

[R.Q.]

Maybe I could help you if you made that clearer...

[allchopin]

ok theres a normal gliss, ending in an octave. how far do you continue the gliss up before you hit the octave to end it? do you gliss up to the lower note of the octave, then hit the octave, or continue past the lower note and hit the octave when you reach the higher note of the octave (i cant make it much clearer thatn that w/o importing a picture....)

btw, you are all gliss-babies: i have tried the tuck-the-finger-under-and-go method every way and no harm is ever done. in fact it doesnt even hurt. Im wiht RiskyP, it works beautifully! unless your keys' actions are leadened and there are crevasses between the keys inches wide, there really shouldnt be a problem.  but i do have big hands, maybe that has something to do with it.

[R.Q.]

I always go to the highest note.

And by the way, go do a single note gliss and let something other than your fingernail touch the keys. Then go the Doctor.

~ Young Virtuoso

[Ktari]

Highest note ^^ then do a cute little flip and hit the octave

I have a question for you, allchopin... (a strange one) how long are your nails?

... maybe I'm being dramatic, but I have a really hard time keeping on my nails, which are almost 1 cm long -is this a problem?

hehe, maybe i should just shut up and admit i AM a gliss-baby

[allchopin]

are u kidding? i could do a gliss with my face (but i wont... :-/)  i dont see how your fingers could touch tho, but its really not a big deal. The only importance of the nail is to cath most of the flack when doing the gliss- if your finger touches and rips off, then your keys are most likely in need of some cleaning (not smooth enough).

[dj]

hey what about a black note gliss? is there a way 2 do those without destroying your hands? i can do the white note ones fine (never tried an octave one though) but i always cut up my fingers on black note ones.

[jeff]

how about this, for one note glissandi - use the palm of your hand (the part near your wrist, or the part on the pinky-finger-side of your hand). as long as you have a flat piece of your shirt covering the part you gliss with, it shouldn't hurt and should be smooth and easy. if the top/bottom notes are important you could hit them with a finger or two. and this way also eliminates the clicking sound you get when you use your nail.
this probably wouldn't work as well for every glissandi, it just depends on what effect you're trying to produce. like, in beethoven, any glissando you do might have to be fairly even and note-specific,  but this method would probably work well at the end of the prokofiev tocatta.

and for octave glissandi (again, depending on the desired effect), you could just use your forearm, as long as you're wearing a long-sleeved shirt

[R.Q.]

I tried the forearm thing, slipped, and turned Prokofiev's Toccata into a threnody. Besides, you lose buttons off your shirt that way  

Allchopin, your fingernails must be very large or your piano very small.

~ Young Virtuoso

[allchopin]

omg youre just making excuses now- i always keep my nails clipped (after getting one caught in a crack during revolutionary) and all piano keys are standard size. I say just stiffen your fingers and just play it like a robot who feels nothing, just buckle down and go!  

[eddie92099]

A black note gliss? - there is a one in Bartok's sonata for two pianos and percussion which one american pianist used his wallet to play! On some moden pianos octave gliss' are impossible - Charles Rosen was once playing Beethoven's First and Fourth piano concertos in one evening and wanted a different piano for each piece because of the octave gliss in the first concerto! The hardest ones are definitely in Alborado del Gracioso though - there is a cheat but it does not sound the same (simply playing the initial and final chords while limiting to a single gliss).
Ed

[allchopin]

why is this such a big deal? are their piano keys really sticky or something, and hard to slide the fingers on?  I can do double octave glissandi without a problem- i just tuck the lead finger in and keep my hand stiff.  and single glissandos are even easier!

[BuyBuy]

Black notes glissandi are not too hard. There is one in Debussy last prelude, "Feux d'Artifices".

You need to use the flat of your fingers (not the nails, unless you have suicide in mind) and slide it smoothly and quickly.

[Beethoven87]

I'm not sure why, but I have never had any problems doing glissandos...  the only time I ever wounded my self playing piano was I hadn't cut my nails in a long time, and I was doing (for the fun of it) interlocking octactaves (like RH bottom octave note the same as left hand top, alternating REALLY fast).  I was doing a weird sort of chromatic thing and my right hand thumb nail caught my left hand thumb and nearly cut the knucke to the bone!!  Any way, for glissandi (I am doing the Waldstein third movement), I use pskim's method...  Works great!  Meybe it's cause I have ennumerable callouses from guitar...

[NetherMagic]

my Petrof upright has really really, and I mean really tight actions so I can't do glissandos on that one, but on finer grands like Steinways or Yamahas or like Yamaha uprights with -normal- action tightness, i can do them without much difficulty

btw I dunt get what you guys are talking about hitting the highest note?  If you were to play from a very low C to a C in the treble part, how would you stop and make it so that you still hear the high C very clearly at the end without making a fudge of noise?  That's the only problem I'm getting

[eddie92099]

For me, to stop on a particular note I just focus my eyes on that note when I am playing the glissando, and can stop on it when going at any speed,
Ed

[willster]

If you are really struggling with doing an octave glissando with one hand then you can use two hands. If you are ascending you would use your rh 3rd finger and lh thumb, and descending you would use rh thumb and lh 3rd finger. It is quite well known for pianists to bleed doing them particularly in demanding pieces. If you are trying to hit the top octave having achieved your glissando - where rubato permits - you can take time to achieve the octave (eg in islamay).

It is essentially down to preference how you play glissandi but they ARE easier if you just go for it and ignore the pain. Many pianos have terribly heavy actions and are therefore almost impossible to achieve a satisfactory glissando on. You should have no problem on a good piano however.

[thracozaag]

 Soft glissandos (like the ones in the end of Ondine), you can execute by tilting the hand and using the tops of the nails.  Takes some practice to find the right angle, but the sound is right.  Louder glissandos will require you to use less of the nail.  

Octave glissandos depend a lof on the piano.  One trick I've used is to lick my pinkie (no kidding) provided you have to time (like in the last movement of the Waldstein).  A former teacher of mine swears he witnessed Serkin stick his finger up his nose before doing them.  

[jakester]

Hahahahaha! sticks his finger up his nose huh.. no wonder he stinks. LOL j/k.

Octave gliss depends on 2 things - the piano as many of you have mentioned, and the fact that your hand is large enough to do it. The waldstein gliss is actually rather easy, except for the fact that it has to be extremely even, and rather slow. fast and loud gliss are no problem. Just take it for granted that you'll at times leave a bloody trail down (not alway). In fact, octave glisses should not leave blood at all, because you shouldn't be scraping any part of the soft skin above your nails (if you are, then you're tilting your thumb too much.)

For a downward moving octave gliss, lick your pinky (if you have time), or make sure you have sweaty hands and have the thumb at a slightly higher angle and the pinky and a more horizontal one. Also remember easy does it, don't try to force it down or it'll actually be harder. Upward octave glisses are similar, except that you should lick your thumb. It really helps.

Jakester

[jinfiesto]

Psh. You are all gliss babies. You can do black key gliss on your nails, its not that bad. Try to come at the keys almost flat and you'll be ok. It should feel like you're skipping across the tops of the keys. For octave gliss, curl the thumb in for descending and curl in the pinky for ascending. Ascending is kind of hard. Descending isn't really hard at all. of course, if you're a pansy, then you could do the gliss with something else.

[hempnall]

Is playing too much glissando good for the piano itself? I was told off when I was young for doing it - but maybe the person was just being over protective of their piano.

[pianochick93]

This talk of blood and ripping fingers off and decapitation is scaring me off of Glissandos. The only time I have tried then was with my fingertips and going slow...it hurt, and I havn't tried ever since, I might give these methods a try though. They make sense.

[lostinidlewonder]

I've had to play nasty glissando's and always practied them on an electric keyboard before I transfer my fingers to a real piano. You can always divide a double note gliss into its single note counterparts, practice them seperately then together. I am to make the feeling of playing the single note the same when I add the second.

Octave gliss can hurt because you can't turn the hand palm up as you do with other smaller interval double note gliss. The thumb is easy to play but the 4th or 5th (or 2nd/3rd for the giant hand freaks) that you use has to contrort so that you are not sliding with the pad of your finger but the edge (left edge with Rh, right edge with Lh if going down the keyboard. WHen going up the keyboard you must bend at the knucle closest to the finger tip that leads the gliss),  this is tricky to do with the palm down but with practice you can make it feel easy. I've seen people do it with the pads of their fingers too, but that personally hurts me too much.

[dan101]

If your hand is simply to small, you may have to play a rapid scale with both hands separated by an octave, as done by some pianists at the end of the Waldstein Sonata (Beethoven).  If not, substitute the glissando for a single note one.

Octave glissandos depend on whether you have a big enough hand to angle your thumb properly. Good luck!

[mike_lang]

A former teacher of mine was forced (by Fleisher, I think, but may be wrong) to attach wet paper towels to his pinky and thumb - this was for Mephisto - in order to build callouses.  As painful as that likely was then, octave glisses are a walk in the park for him now.

Michael

[thoven_liszt]

Are you per chance working on the third movement of the Waldstein? If so, the L.H. glissando up is pretty straightforward if you tuck in your thumb. For the right hand glissando you can separate it into two, one for each hand. Some pianists even take the glissando in one hand and play a scale for the other. Take a look at Nelson Freire's video of the sonata on Youtube for ideas. 

[perfect_pitch]

Although this topic was started almost 7 years ago... it's still odd to see people having trouble with the octave glissandi.

I only knew about them a year ago when I came across the Stravinsky Petrushka arrangement and Brahms Paganini Variations... both of which I have to bloody well play.

[evansmiley]

anyone have any ideas for a black key octave gliss ( here's some example of horowitz and rosenthal playing a double octave gliss on the black keys...it's just at the very end )

[perfect_pitch]

Technically it's not a glissando... it's just a whole heap of black note octaves played as fast as you can (generally). It's not a glissando.

[biscuitroxy12]

Technically it's not a glissando... it's just a whole heap of black note octaves played as fast as you can (generally). It's not a glissando.

Halfway agreed.

[perfect_pitch]

Halfway agreed.

Halfway??? Why halfway?

[furtwaengler]

There is not that kind of power in an octave glissando. Listen to it again...every note is firmly attacked. It is just as perfect pitch said, really fast octaves.

[birba]

Horowitz plays octaves. Very fast octaves.
Rosenthal plays glissandi, which I don't particularly like, personally.