Studying sight reading with Bach chorales

[yuc4h]

I've bee studying sight reading with bach 4-part chorales (along with some easy pieces) for some time now. I soon realized that it is more efficient to study it by using a metronome. I've made steady progress and my reading speed has improved a lot. I have also noticed that there are (at least) 2 ways of improving the reading speed by using these and a metronome.

1) Staying within a comfortable metronome range where you can read the piece through without making mistakes.

2) Forcing it by adding something like +10 to the "comfortable mark". Doing that you can't always read everything and make some mistakes but it appears to be good workout.

So I'm asking your opinion which is the correct way to get the results faster? Any better ideas on how to practice sight reading by using these or something else?

[thierry13]

Another idea to train sight reading would be trying to read scores. Smaller ones (with less staves), or simpler ones (a lot of staves), then going further to bigger and more complicated ones.

[quantum]

Depends what your goal is with sight reading.  If you were actually accompanying a Bach chorale, you will realize quite quickly the shortcomings of following a metronome.  When sight reading chorales for performance (something many accompanists do), the goal is a steady rhythm and awareness of breathing.  Steady rhythm does not equal metronomic precision.  A strong rhythmic grounding is preferred over wrong notes, or missed notes. 

You could think of sight reading as similar to a portable CD player.  Back in the days, CD players didn't have buffers and every time the player received a bump the music would skip.  Buffers were then introduced which stored a set amount of music into memory before it was played.  The idea being that if the CD player received a shock, the music could be played back from the buffer until the stress to the player had been relieved.  The more music the buffer could store, the less likely a skip would occur.  Same can be said with sight reading.  You need to buffer several bars of music into your head before you play them.  Your eyes are ahead reading at a different place than you are actually playing. 


For sight reading exercises one could isolate things to work on.  Two of the ones I would use are priority to rhythmic stablity - where keeping up with the music is more important than correct notes.  Also priority to note accuracy - where one attempts to play every note correctly at expense of tempo. 

[popdog]

2) Forcing it by adding something like +10 to the "comfortable mark". Doing that you can't always read everything and make some mistakes but it appears to be good workout.

This is good because, as you say, you can't quite keep up and so you are forced to leave notes that you can't get to and try to reduce what you play to the essentials.  I think I might have to get a copy of the Bach chorales, because I'm running out of sightreading material.  

Another thing I do is to print off a few pages of a string quartet, and I just read a few systems a day... anymore and I get a head ache.  But I will start using the metronome more, thanks for reminding me.  

You should also do a search of this forum, there's a fair bit about sight reading on here.  

You could think of sight reading as similar to a portable CD player.  Back in the days, CD players didn't have buffers and every time the player received a bump the music would skip.  Buffers were then introduced which stored a set amount of music into memory before it was played.  The idea being that if the CD player received a shock, the music could be played back from the buffer until the stress to the player had been relieved.  The more music the buffer could store, the less likely a skip would occur.  Same can be said with sight reading.  You need to buffer several bars of music into your head before you play them.  Your eyes are ahead reading at a different place than you are actually playing. 

Good analogy quantum. 

[yuc4h]

I know that the main coal is to read ahead and that requires your reading speed to be faster than the tempo. Do I have to actively force myself to read ahead or does it come naturally when you can read fast enough?

[quantum]

You don't need to read faster than tempo.  If you think about it, once you start ahead and maintain roughly the same reading speed as the music tempo you will for the most part be ahead.  Reading too much faster than playing tempo would result in getting increasingly further in distance from your playing spot. 

Often times reading can be at variable speeds depending on the complexity of the music.  A lot of times one could intake note data as blocks of info instead of a steady string.  This is ok as long as one reads ahead. 

What you need to also do is read efficiently.  There is no need to read repetitive figures - read one then count the repetitions.  Which looks easier:
s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s
or
s 16 times


Learn to recognize patterns of common chords, scales, intervals. 

If you see a 4 note chord where all notes are on lines and spaced a third apart, you don't need to read every note.  Read one note, calculate the others by spacing in thirds, then finally apply the key signature and accidentals. 

If you see

F# G# A# B C# D# E# F#

You could read each note, or simply read the entire figure as the F# major scale.

Do I have to actively force myself to read ahead or does it come naturally when you can read fast enough?

I would say you have to be aware of it.  If you find you start ahead then gradually the reading spot falls back towards the playing spot and starts slowing down the music - yes you need to keep a conscious effort to look ahead.  You need to train yourself so that reading ahead becomes a natural instinct. 

[anna_crusis]

I know that the main coal is to read ahead and that requires your reading speed to be faster than the tempo. Do I have to actively force myself to read ahead or does it come naturally when you can read fast enough?

I think of it not as looking ahead but taking in as much in one glance as possible (vertically as well as horizontally). If you see a familar scale or broken chord pattern then you can absorb that as one complete musical 'word' and look at what comes next while your fingers automatically rattle off what you just saw. The faster you can identify notes and intervals, the easier it is to perceive musical 'words' (obviously, knowing a lot of scales and chords helps too).

If you read this sentence out loud, you'll find you're actually 'looking ahead' because you're reading word by word, not letter by letter. Try thinking of music in the same way.

[yuc4h]

Thank you all for your replies.

yes you need to keep a conscious effort to look ahead.  You need to train yourself so that reading ahead becomes a natural instinct. 

I think of it not as looking ahead but taking in as much in one glance as possible (vertically as well as horizontally). If you see a familar scale or broken chord pattern then you can absorb that as one complete musical 'word' and look at what comes next while your fingers automatically rattle off what you just saw. The faster you can identify notes and intervals, the easier it is to perceive musical 'words' (obviously, knowing a lot of scales and chords helps too).

If you read this sentence out loud, you'll find you're actually 'looking ahead' because you're reading word by word, not letter by letter. Try thinking of music in the same way.

These 2 advices kinda contradict each other. I did some experimenting with the method Quantum posted and noticed that if you make an effort to look ahead, it will reduce the effective reading speed by like 80%, since you have to 'memorize' the bar you will play next so you can read ahead. Trying to force yourself to look ahead is really ankward.

Anna crusis on the other hand suggests that sight reading will more or less develop naturally by reading music. Do you think that the strength of your sight reading is just directly proportional to the amount of pages you have read through?

Quantum, how difficult pieces can you sight read straight through? When you studied sight reading, did you force yourself to look forward or just read and let it come naturally? How long did it take to achieve a reasonable strength in sight reading?

[quantum]

Quantum, how difficult pieces can you sight read straight through? When you studied sight reading, did you force yourself to look forward or just read and let it come naturally? How long did it take to achieve a reasonable strength in sight reading?

I used to suck at sight reading.  Probably what made me develop memorizing skills very quickly.  Before I'd cringe when someone put some music in front of me and expect me to play on the spot. 

At first I thought of developing my reading skills by just learning many new pieces and trying just to "read" a lot more.  In uni I studied piano accompanying with a pianist who specializes in collaborative work and accompanies several operas a year.  Up till then I thought that just plowing through more music would improve my sight reading.  After some intensive study on the subject with my teacher I noticed a marked improvement.  I realized it is not enough just to read more material, but learn how to read more efficiently and using better techniques.  Also experience with different styles and instrumentation (baroque, classical, romantic, 20th C., voice accomp., instrument accomp., opera reductions, etc.) helps as when one builds a vocabulary in a style it is easier to recognize motifs and play certain techniques. 

Both the suggestions made my anna_crusis and myself are compatible.  Just a different way of thinking about it. 

Yes, memorization is part of sight reading efficiently.  There is really no way around that.  You will be utilizing your short term memory to very quickly retrieve, store, and output information.  You will also be utilizing your long term memory to pick out recognizable patterns such as scales, intervals, chords, arpeggios, etc. and assign them to groups of notes. 

It is very difficult to take the first steps out of locking your eyes on a note that your fingers are playing.  It can be done with persistence.  This will also be a great help later in forming interpretations while sight reading and anticipating events in the music.  It was not easy for me either to change my conception of how to read, but it was worth the effort.  The new behavior took time to adjust to. 

To continue with anna_crusis's text analogy.  We want to go from the laborious task of reading letter by letter, forming a word, looking it up in the dictionary, interpreting it's meaning, and putting it into context - to reading and comprehending a single sentence in one go. 

I was probably half way through uni before I thought I could read at a reasonable rate.  As for difficulty, I've sight read some 20th C. chamber works with out too many drastic errors; Bach fugues aren't so bad as before.  As for sight reading chorales, I used to do that every so often, but now do so every week.  Taking up a position as a church music director has even further contributed to my sight reading skills by employing frequent exercise of reading techniques.  I need to perform at least 8 hymns or choral selections every week, and it's not the same 8 from week to week either. 

[anna_crusis]

Anna crusis on the other hand suggests that sight reading will more or less develop naturally by reading music. Do you think that the strength of your sight reading is just directly proportional to the amount of pages you have read through?

Some may disagree with me but my opinion is that sight reading is simply the art of reading music really well. If you can identify any note in an instant (including ledger lines), and recognise 3rds,4ths,5ths,6ths,7th and octaves just as instinctively, then you have the basic tools to become a good sight reader. All you need then is to practice a lot with many different pieces, playing them once or twice and then moving on. And look constantly for patterns and structure in the music.

One thing that helps me a great deal is to sight read pieces without playing them ie: imagine the fingering and piano keys in my mind's eye. If you train yourself to visualise your playing in this way it makes it a hundred times easier to do it for real.

The Clementi sonatinas Op36 are good for sight reading. Give them a try. Minuets and contradances are also good fodder.

[timothy42b]

Some may disagree with me but my opinion is that sight reading is simply the art of reading music really well. If you can identify any note in an instant (including ledger lines), and recognise 3rds,4ths,5ths,6ths,7th and octaves just as instinctively, then you have the basic tools to become a good sight reader.

I think you've left out an intermediate step that is a real stumbling block to the beginner at this. 

They have to recognize instantly, but they also have to know keyboard geometry.  Once past this, then I think you're right.