Harpsichord

[amirawad]

I have a concert with a chamber orchestra , I will play on a harpsichord , I'm pianist. I found that the distance between keys on the Harpsichord are smaller than that of the Piano .
I had problems when playing arppegios , the reaosn is the difference in the distance . How can I overcome this problem ?
Second problem , when playing a key , the key stops to pluck the string and go down  while in piano you press the key and don't feel this stop in the movement of the key downwards . This caused irrugularities of quavers . how can I overcome these 2 problems ?
Thyanks , Amir Awad

[eddie92099]

Play a proper instrument  
Ed

[debussy_lover]

The only way to overcome the problem of smaller keys is to get experience playing on harpsichord.  You're going to have to over-ride your sense of the geography of the keyboard that you've been building for years as a pianist.

As far a getting "even quavers"...  Having had to switch over to harpsichord a couple of times, I would suggest using a very firm attack.  You don't have to worry about dynamics, so you might as well play everything at a "forte" strength.  That way you won't be nearly as aware of the plucking mechanism.

I'm sure harpsichordists would object to using that technique...  But, as a pianist that just needs to play harpsichord every once and a while, I think you can get away with a less-than-ideal approach.

[jeff]

Is the harpsichord you'll be playing on one where the black and white of the keys is inverted? that can be really disorientating for a little while

i agree with debussy_lover about playing "forte" to overcome the stopping/plucking sensation of the keys, but i just wanna add that it'd be a good idea to also have a quick and light finger action (i.e. not pressing hard and deep down into the keybed), so that you hit as few wrong notes as possible, if any

good luck and have fun