What you think of CC Chang' s Book "The Foundamentals of piano practice?

[tsagari]

Hi
Someone in the forum mentioned somewhere Chang's book. I download it and although I have not finish reading it I personaly like it. However since I am not a professional pianist or teacher I would like to know if I can take seriously his practice methods.

[prins]

I am also just an amateur, but I learnt the Fantaisie Impromptu which I did not think I ever could, following his instructions exactly.
I like his book also but do not have the self discipline to practice like that all the time.

[db05]

Sure, take it seriously. Take in all you can. The method is not for everyone (nothing is) and it leaves out some important information (everything does). I think it is wrong to have one single book, whether it's Chang or WTC, and say it is THE Bible of piano-playing. Or any book for that matter. You know the Bible has a lot of holes and contradictions also... 

I want to reread it when I feel ready to tackle any of the pieces mentioned (maybe Fur Elise or Invention No. 1) and follow the directions, see what works and what doesn't. Aside from Chang, I also read Bree's book about the Leschetizky method and several posts from Sir bernhard. As a beginner, I've pretty much absorbed all I can and I ABSOLUTELY NEED to apply what I've learned so far before rereading or researching new material.

What I've learned and applied so far:
- use parallel sets to learn technical exercises and pieces
- avoid non-musical playing and Hanon as much as you can
- listen to recordings (hopefully you have several), think about them, and enjoy them lol
- I need a real piano to pracitce on, so I got one. Not good quality though, and I know it accounts for some of my technical problems. Still a big leap from pracitcing on a Casio keyboard.

Woudn't hurt to try it.

[guendola]

Changs book is not a manual for piano operation but it is a valuable compilation on how challenges can be addressed. It is not complete and some methods won't work on individual pianists.

But I think this book is not good for beginners because some parts might be misleading when not fully understood.

[shingo]

I think Chang's book is a good resource, even moreso due to it's free avaliablitya sign of genuine passion and interest in what he is writing about. For these reasons I feel it is well worth a read.

However, I found in the end that my regime at the time of starting to read was pretty good as I had always been told to practice HS at first and then put together. Some of the PPI tips are worth noting etc but it is very easy to get bogged down in trying to find some magical formula for Piano progress with a lot of over analysis which in places left me doubting my own ability in some basic areas.

I would suggest reading the book and taking what you want but don't get hung up on it to the extent that it becomes detrimental to your practicing as you try to follow it to the letter.

[db05]

I have to add, a lot of Sir bernhard's ideas agree/ complement with Dr. Chang. As for beginners and confusing parts... reading bernhard's posts have been the missing link for me. More in depth (imo) and, thank goodness, easier to understand!

Try the links here: (WARNING: long threads, not for the faint of heart)
https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php/topic,30911.msg358347.html#msg358347

CC means CC. Chang, yes he was a member of this forum and didn't come back.

[tsagari]

I have to add, a lot of Sir bernhard's ideas agree/ complement with Dr. Chang. As for beginners and confusing parts... reading bernhard's posts have been the missing link for me. More in depth (imo) and, thank goodness, easier to understand!

I totally agree with you

[db05]

I just found that the old FoPP site (aol) is down. I did the search to find the other sites and they're in my thread in the Anything But board.

But what is THIS??
https://contentspiano.blogspot.com/
There is a 3rd chapter I've never seen before or anywhere else in my search. I can't confirm if this is the real deal, if there's a new edition.

[scottmcc]

I read Dr Chang's book and found it interesting, but also had a few very specific criticisms.

First off, writing style and mechanics: This book read like a series of compiled message board posts, as opposed to a coherent book.  It is repetitive and/or rambling in all the wrong places but fails to flesh out some of the important details in places and really feels like it is in drastic need of an editor, or at least someone to read it with the red pen in hand.  I admire that it is self-published in many respects, but it could certainly be improved by a careful, thoughtful overhaul.  If it were up to me, the book would begin by introducing a standard practice routine for a day, then it would break each aspect of that down and analyze each facet, then finally conclude by reexamining that day's practice, in light of what was discussed above.  I think that with good editing, the book could be about 1/3 the length.

Next, lack of diagrams:  it would really help to have the passages of music referenced in the book printed in line with the text, so that the reader can understand what is being discussed.  The whole piece doesn't need to be there, just the specific bars.

Next, overdependence on acronyms:  A good book can get by without using acronyms much at all, and is much easier to read.  Some are inevitable, but any time that one feels they are repeating a word too much, their first instinct should be to rephrase, second to get a thesaurus, and finally to use a standard acronym.  Making up acronyms should be avoided, as it is confusing at best.

A side point, semi-medical advice:  Dr Chang is not a physician, and should not speak on medical matters as though he is.  Much of his section on health is simply incorrect.

Next, the anti-Hanon bent:  fine, you don't like Hanon, and there certainly are limitations to it.  But, you espouse frequent playing of scales and arpeggios, which are also known as exercises 39-43 of Hanon.  I'm confused.  We can argue endlessly about the value or lack thereof in doing exercises, but we should be honest about it.

Furthermore, the rigidity of the method:  the Chang means of practicing is but one of many approaches, and likely to work for certain people, but not everyone.  There are many ways of learning any task, and while some are probably better than others in general, they may not work equally well across the board because of different learning styles.  Additionally, different styles of music may call for different practice routines--the obvious difference would be classical vs jazz, but more subtle differences could be based on your performance goals--are you playing for personal pleasure, as background music in a bar, or at a concert hall?  Each of them are vastly different standards, and if you practice in the same way you won't be as efficient.  Further examples:  for me, it is most efficient to practice with separate hands only until I get the basic gist of a passage, and then to combine, especially for pieces with heavy involvement of both hands or heavy syncopations.  For really tough passages, I end up spending a lot of time on the more difficult hand, but I try to get my hands together relatively quickly.  A great example of where this helps me is in passages with the melody being carried partly by both hands, or passages where the two hands run into each other--playing them separately is actually injurious.

On a related note, linear learning, math, etc: There is a lot of discussion about how quickly one can learn a piece, how many minutes it should take to do a certain task, etc, and really, this is an oversimplification at best.  Some things come more quickly than expected, others take longer, and applying a rigid equation to learning speed is in general counterproductive.  Sometimes we hit not just a "speed wall," but a big fat learning wall.  Sometimes we make rapid progress overnight, and other times we plateau. 

Final criticism for now:  self praise and testimonials.  I'm pretty sure the "review" of the book was written by Dr Chang, and that's just something you're not supposed to do.  You're supposed to pay someone from a minor newspaper or magazine to write an effusive blurb. 

Ok, I've criticized enough.  I actually agree with the majority of the compliments to the book earlier in the thread, and overall I think it is a noble effort to improve people's piano practice time.

[db05]

I read Dr Chang's book and found it interesting, but also had a few very specific criticisms.
...

I've always thought of the book as a work in progress, but just went when I saw the almost completely unrelated 3rd chapter. I don't think Dr. Chang is planning to finish/ polish the book actually, just leave it as a big compilation of tips and data and what-have-you. 

Final criticism for now:  self praise and testimonials.  I'm pretty sure the "review" of the book was written by Dr Chang, and that's just something you're not supposed to do.  You're supposed to pay someone from a minor newspaper or magazine to write an effusive blurb. 

I saw the "review" and went LOL as well. About the other reviews, I can't quite agree with his criticism of other books, and I wonder if he's actually read those.

What is amazing is that the testimonials are definitely true, I can't help but think I missed something that these people understood and applied.

[shingo]

On a related note, linear learning, math, etc: There is a lot of discussion about how quickly one can learn a piece, how many minutes it should take to do a certain task, etc, and really, this is an oversimplification at best.  Some things come more quickly than expected, others take longer, and applying a rigid equation to learning speed is in general counterproductive.  Sometimes we hit not just a "speed wall," but a big fat learning wall.  Sometimes we make rapid progress overnight, and other times we plateau.

I completely agree with this. Whilst it may be a good indication of the time you may be able to 'save' by using his proposed method, during application you can only be dissapointed never excited or encourgaed by the time in which you accomplish something, primarily beacuse the speed of learning is so central to the books theme i.e. the general, 1000 times faster calculations.

[lostinidlewonder]

First off, writing style and mechanics: This book read like a series of compiled message board posts, as opposed to a coherent book.  It is repetitive and/or rambling in all the wrong places but fails to flesh out some of the important details in places and really feels like it is in drastic need of an editor, or at least someone to read it with the red pen in hand.  I admire that it is self-published in many respects, but it could certainly be improved by a careful, thoughtful overhaul.  If it were up to me, the book would begin by introducing a standard practice routine for a day, then it would break each aspect of that down and analyze each facet, then finally conclude by reexamining that day's practice, in light of what was discussed above.  I think that with good editing, the book could be about 1/3 the length.

The first thing that hits me is the density of the words per page and the lack of spaces in between paragraphs, this makes reading more of a task. I would notice that an editor would delete a lot of subjective and ambiguous statements throughout the book which are not explored with evidence or reflected with actual pianistic experimentation guidance.

I find the book takes inventory of many musical concepts (the contents page is informative) but the actual descriptions of each topic is not so detailed and rather generalized in most cases. For people who have no idea of the existence of certain piano concepts Chang might introduce them to the realization of their existence but they will not guide them with an understanding so much so that they can become autodidactic at their piano learning. This is what real teachers instill in their students imo.

Some issues which are enormous (such as memory, relaxation etc) you could write over 100 pages on each however many of these are written in less than a few pages and often merely tries to build definition and some ways it can be used rather than explore an actual method to improve, develop or use it at multiple levels of piano ability. When discussing memory for instance we will have to present the reader with many examples of memory in action in actual sheet music to fully map out in detail ways in which we can memorize our music, I would say 100 sheet music extracts is still too few to fully map out how memory works in piano music.

Next, lack of diagrams:  it would really help to have the passages of music referenced in the book printed in line with the text, so that the reader can understand what is being discussed.  The whole piece doesn't need to be there, just the specific bars.

Diagrams in a technical book are essential and the lack of it really hurts the ability to understand Chang's book. Much more importantly there should be hundreds of snippets of actual pieces and discussion on how to tackle them should be explored with regard to the musical concept at hand.

On a related note, linear learning, math, etc: There is a lot of discussion about how quickly one can learn a piece, how many minutes it should take to do a certain task, etc, and really, this is an oversimplification at best.  Some things come more quickly than expected, others take longer, and applying a rigid equation to learning speed is in general counterproductive.  Sometimes we hit not just a "speed wall," but a big fat learning wall.  Sometimes we make rapid progress overnight, and other times we plateau.  

As a professional pianist you have no excuses to take extra time to learn a piece that is demanded from you in performance. So in that case you have to be able to estimate and time manage your work so that you can deliver what is required. We cannot say, "Oh it will solve itself in time" we must work until our problems are solved, and often we will be able to estimate how long it will take.



I like reading piano books so I have to say I enjoyed reading Chang's book. That it is offered on the internet for free is very nice of him as well and people who are less fortunate can at least read about piano issues. However like most books, peoples ability to interpret them vary, thus we must be careful how we understand concepts of a book, do we really know what it is talking about? A great book allows you to be certain of issues and Chang's book hits on certainties as well however it has many descriptions which are generalized which to me are vague and open to misinterpretation.

[rachfan]

I have over 30 well-known books on piano performance in my home library and have read all of them more than once.  Those that I would rate as an "A" would include Berman, Notes from the Pianist's Bench; Schenker, The Art of Performance; Neuhaus, The Art of Piano Playing, and Barns (Editor) The Russian Piano School as examples.  Relative to those, I would rate Chuan Chang's book, Fundamentals of Piano Practice, an "F".  Although he has a PhD in Physics, he is neither a performing artist nor a pedagogue, yet presumes to write an authoritative book on practicing the piano!  He learned the little he knows about the piano vicariously, mostly by observing his two daughters taking lessons from Yvonne Combe, once a pupil of Debussy, but neither a significant artist nor memorable teacher of piano. Chang's background as a physicist simply does not qualify him to be authoring a book on practice methods for piano performance.  Although I have a Doctorate in Business Administration (DBA), it would be preposterous for me to sit down and write a book on Physics!  To make matters worse, Chang's book is organized in a chaotic way which makes it very tedious to read. Had he engaged a capable editor, that person could have at least made a dreadful book more inviting and readable. Most of the few ideas that do make sense did not originate in Chang's thinking.   I have yet to hear of an important artist or pedagogue endorsing this book.  The "testimonials" in the book are mostly anonymous which speaks volumes.  My advice would be to stay away, or read this book at your own peril.  

In addition to the books I mentioned above, far better choices would be Bernstein, With Your Own Two Hands, Newman, The Pianist's Problems, or Sandor, On Piano Playing to name just a few.  

[lostinidlewonder]

Rachfan those books you suggested are like the pianist Bible, maybe a bit unfair to compare it to something that is a free online resource But I would certainly hope that readers of Chang have read at least some of what Rachfan suggests (especially Bernstein With your own two hands probably one of the most important books).

[rachfan]

Hi lost,

I agree, the Seymour Bernstein book, With Your Own Two Hands, is very informative  helpful.  What the free Chang book demonstrates once again is that free isn't always best.

[scottmcc]

rachfan, thank you for the references, I'm going to purchase copies of them shortly!  I hadn't read any of them.

any other good books you would suggest?

[rachfan]

Hi Scott,

Yes--

Foldes, Keys to the Keyboard (as a brief introduction)
Kochevitsky, The Art of Piano Playing
Banowitz, The Pianist's Guide to Pedaling
Hofmann, Piano Playing
Lhevinne, Basic Principles of Pianoforte Playing
Slenzynska, Music at Your Fingertips
Gieseking/Leimer, Piano Technique
Bree, Leschetizky Method
Friskin, The Principles of Pianoforte Practice
Gat, The Technique of Piano Playing (Ignore all chapters concerning anatomy--professors of anatomy have found it to be replete with errors, but the other chapters are filled with sound and helpful insights.)

For a good and entertaining book written by an amateur pianist who studied with an excellent teacher I'd recommend the one below.  Although it has some fine pointers, the book is not so much to be studied, rather simply enjoyed:

Cooke, Playing the Piano for Pleasure

[mousekowski]

I like Chang. He says that when you practice, it is important to keep below the threshold at which you lose detail. Slow practice results in post-practice improvement. Playing for fun and performing can result in fast play deterioration. As a middle-aged amateur pianist with no formal training (I didn't go to a conservatiore), it makes a lot of sense.

Can anyone explain the stuff about not putting you thumb under when playing fast scale passages? Chang suggests jumping from one hand position to another, but when I try this, it seems to require a small upward hand movement, which breaks up the flow and wastes time.

[rachfan]

Yes, do NOT think about it and visualize it as avoiding passing the thumb under the palm and changing hand position when the thumb needs to execute a note.  Rather think about it as keeping the thumb parallel to the index finger (or to that side of the hand) at all times when the hand is closed with fingers close together (obviously not in open position with the fingers spread apart).  With that visualization the thumb will will take care of itself as you play an ascending scale, for example.  The thumb needs to be prepared to be timely to take its notes.  With this method the third finger does not tarry as long as was the case when it acted as a pivot while passing the thumb under.  In keeping the thumb parallel to the side of the hand, the third finger moves more promptly to get out of the way of the thumb as the hand ascends the keyboard.

You can find a much more detailed description of this technique in Sandor's book "On Piano Playing".