trills

[repeat]

I would like to know the secret behind developing a smooth and fast trill! I have enjoyed playing the piano all my life, and there is a huge repertoire available even for an amateur as myself. But when your tecnique is limited there is one sure givaway, and that is a bad trill! So, anyone out there with a nice trill, what is your secret please?
regards, victor

[Waldszenen]

Wrists loose, wrists even with knuckcles, wrists slightly oscillating. It's all in the wrists.

And trill on any flat surface in your spare time, eg on desks.

[thaicheow]

It is true. The secret is in the wrists.

Just went through my lesson this morning, playing a Mozart sonatas to my teacher. Screw up almost all the thrills. It is just do difficult with Mozart!!

[gruffalo]

yea, i am having big problems in liszt's Jeux d'eau a la villa d'este, not so much the trills, but the tremolos and stuff. i guess trills and tremolos work on the same priniciples, but i really need urgent help on this too.

[Waldszenen]

Tremolos are even more dependent on relaxed wrists and very slight oscillations. In non-piano playing hands the fastest way to move them rapidly is to tense the arms and wrists (i.e. muscle spasms) but in experienced piano playing it's the exact opposite.


Just be patient with trills and tremolos - always use a loose wrist and they'll gradually improve.

[repeat]

Thanks for the advice. But I wish you would elaborate on the subject. What is a loose wrist in this context, and should the wrist oscillate at the same speed as the fingers i.e. the trill?  Can one hope to get adjacent fingers trill up to speed, or should one only trill with fingers 1-3, 2-4 and so on? There are lots of questions on how ot go about practicing for a decent trill, but so far I have not found any good advice on the subject in books on pianoplaying. So, I am eager for more on the subject.

[bearzinthehood]

Depends on the fingers I would say, a fast 2-3 trill should have almost no wrist motion.  Any trill involving the thumb would obviously need more.  Practice a trill as if you would practice any other technique, which would be to only play at a speed at which you have absolute control.

[bennom]

My trills used to suck horse's ass, until I started practising them rythmically. The thing is, that it's usually the other stuff you're playing at the same time as the trill with the left hand for instance, that's messing the whole thing up.
Decide to practice the trill in exact rythm, like 32 or 64. Begin slowly, then increase tempo. After a while, play it more freely. It works for me at least. 

[demented cow]

A couple of people mentioned a tremolo-like action. But what about passages where you are trilling while holding another note down with another finger on the same hand? These are fairly common and one can't facilitate the trill with wrist action in such passages.

I read in a book once that practising the trill requires practising repeated notes with one finger, while holding the other finger down. This makes some sense, because one of the limits with trill speed/evenness is that at least one of the two fingers can't get off the keys fast enough.

There was a recent post in which someone explains how he learnt to do the infamous 4-5 trills; I suppose the principles apply to other fingers to:
www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php/topic,16100.0.html

[gruffalo]

yes, i agree with bennom. my trills only started developing when i started them strictly rhythmically and keeping like that for a while in the piece i was learning, but not for too long. then you start to notice the need for wrist oscillation, looseness and how the tension restricts the blood flow etc.