sight reading: How does it work (in the brain?)

[Derek]

I've been trying to figure out this question in order to help myself find the most efficient way to improve my ability to sight read.

The way I'm currently pushing myself is to harness a large piece of cardboard, the width of the piano keyboard, from my neck as I play. It is held high enough that I can move my hands on the keyboard easily, but it is low enough that.I can see the sheet music easily. So far this seems to be working pretty well.

I think it is working because, a lot of sight reading requires that your hands be able to find intervals and so forth very quickly. If you have to look at the keyboard to find these intervals, you'll lose a lot of time you could have used studying the notes on the page.

Therefore, if every piece I try to learn, I can learn without looking at the keyboard at all, my sight reading should presumably improve by leaps and bounds.

I want to be able to sight read damn near anything. Am I on the right track?

[mdshimazu]

From what you're doing with the hands you have a good idea, but you do still get to see the keyboard some when sight reading. It's important to be able to play without staring at the hands.

For reading the notes there are tons and tons of tricks. I read intervals and entire chords off sheet music by looking at how the notes are spaced and then picking the easiest note to read. This way I read like only a quarter of the notes. That's my main key to good sight reading.

[danny elfboy]

Two important things to say about how sightreading works

First of all finding intervals quickly without looking your hands requires a kinesthetic sense which is the ability to sense the position, location and orientation of your body
Kinethesis us activated by touch mostly
So first of all you must find a way not to play with the tip of the fingers but with the fleshy part of the last phalange. This require you don't play with an high wrist or with an excessively high position
Close your eyes and try to detect the black keys group and then the note before and after each black keys group. Work on your kinethetic sense. Covering your hans isn't going to help with this. Just close your eyes and touch the keys ... do this everyday till you can find whatever you want in the keyobard by your kinestethic sense in a fraction of a secon

The second important aspect of how sight-reading work is that you're not playing what you're looking but you're playing what you're just looked. You reading must always be ahead of your playing. You should soak up information about notes, fingering and rhythm as quickly as possible so you should always read ahead. This requires you never stop to correct mistake. Just keep going until you become better at soaking up visual information from the sheet in the least amount of time

It's also important to remember that your eyes can't read both the staves
Althought the movement is so fast we can't detect it the eyes actually read a sheet from the bottom to the top. So if you consciously try to start reading from the right hand part you'll not become good in sight reading. Always stare at the bass as you become an be concious that although very fast the movement your eyes make is down, up - down, up - down, up ...

[overscore]

You should learn to play pieces you've already memorised with your eyes shut. At first it seems nigh on impossible, but it doesn't take long at all to get the hang of it. It will then seem strange looking at your hands while playing.

I've been learning sightreading for six months. The most important things I've found are:

- being able to spot intervals straight away so that you don't need to consciously name notes.

- being able to identify any note instantly (as fast as you can read the alphabet)

- learning to play without looking directly at your hands. Peripheral vision is okay.

The rest comes intuitively I think. There's no need to consciously search out patterns in the music because our whole being is geared towards seeking out patterns in things. Likewise, there's no need to learn to 'look ahead of what you're playing' - it comes as a natural consequence of being able to read fast enough that you automatically skip ahead through, if anything, boredom.

The real clincher I believe is the material you use. I tried using real music and had reasonable success with baroque pieces, but I had the uneasy feeling that all my learning was random and disorganised. So I've started using Paul Harris's series of sightreading books and all I can say is that they rock. It's so helpful to be spoon fed all the information you need in exactly the right order and at exactly the right pace. These kind of books really are indispensible.

[lichristine]

See a note and play it.

Just really quickly.