How To Play Piano Fast?

[danhuyle]

How do I play a piece of music fast? I practice with a metronome at a slow tempo, then take it up a notch each time. I play from memory starting slow, then when I get fluent with it I play faster. It's just that I'm always 1 minute (or more) slower than the recording. I know it's not a race, and at the same time, it feels like one. Normally when I emphasize speed, I lose tone, musicality and pedaling is blurred, then when I focus on phrasing and rhythm, it's too slow.

Question is, how can I play piano as fast as Richter playing Chopin Etude Op10/4 without sacrificing rhythm, musical expression, phrasing?

When it comes to playing fast pieces, and the only way to make it musical is to play it fast  otherwise it doesn't work.

[landru]

Have you broken your fast pieces into what I call "gestural sections"? These are sections that could be either be phrases, parts of phrases or even sets of phrases - but what is common is that the section can be played within one hand "flourish" or gesture and then after that section your hand either moves position, jumps, or whatever.

If you can do these sections faster than your desired speed then you work on the transitions to the next section at the desired speeds or faster. So two parts - practice the gestures, then practice the transitions between gestures. Rather than building up speed by incremental metronome clicks, you are building the piece at the desired speed by breaking it into sections. Make the problem you are working on not speed - but piecing together performance ready sections.

This method has helped with some people where speed blocks occur because of starting slowly and increasing speed gradually.

[braintist]

Personally I start off slow but not so slow that it seems kinda pointless. Like you I would then speed up if I gain a level of mastery over that speed. However, when you practice slowly do you keep an eye over your hand movements? The trick to overcoming speedblocks in this case is to observe your movements carefully and see if you are making any unnecessary actions while playing. It is also important to make as little movements as possible while playing slowly. When you speed up later the unnecessary actions would eventually be reflected and you may feel tensions and lack of control. It is easy to see techniques as a bunch of notes that is on a score; however, that is not really beneficial. It is better to relate to the notes as bodily movements in relation to the keyboard.

In addition, landru has also mention a very important point about breaking into "gestural sections". This is very helpful in the case of chopin etudes as most of the phrases are similar repeated figures. To add on to his methods, you can try to vary the rhythms and vary the accents on various notes or for a specific finger you find having issues (eg. accenting on every note which uses the ring finger). This should provide you with a sense of awareness on that area you find weak in. The accents are just for practice, do not play them when you perform. Practice consciously and not mindlessly.

Regarding your issues on not having proper tone, musicality, phrasing and rhythm. It just shows that you are using incorrect practice methods (I hope this is not too harsh). I suggest that you try videoing your fingers playing from different angles and notice all the unnecessary actions that you have made.

When it comes to playing fast pieces, and the only way to make it musical is to play it fast  otherwise it doesn't work.

Though without speed Chopin etudes except for op 10 no.3 it is difficult to bring out the character. By no means is musicality lost when played slowly. A conscious awareness of musical direction and phrasing must still exist. It is very crucial that you can play musically while slow and also fast. Only then would you have a firm affirmation of playing the section confidently.

All these advice are based on my experiences. I am not sure if it works for you but it works very effectively with me. If this doesn't sound helpful just ignore it and spend your time on something more effective

[riskarb]

I'm hardly one to lecture on playing piano..... but IMHO:

- Playing slowly and clearly is much more difficult (and way more important) than playing fast. I used to play fast instinctively and it just masked (and continues to mask) my sub-rate technique. If I could do it again, I'd focus purely on clarity and build up speed only after I had achieved that.

- Having said that, once you've got clarity and want to hit the speed of light, it helps to stay very light on the wrists + fingers and NOT to play through the bottom of the keys...... dance on them (think of a frog running on water) and avoid excessive body motions. Repeated scales and arpeggios/chromatic passages seem to help..... even better, pick out all the fast passages in your pieces and use those as an exercise.

Good luck..... and if you want to trade some speed for clarity, consider me a willing party for  the latter!!

[nyiregyhazi]

Conventional approaches typically involve speeding up the metronome and organising many notes into groups.I certainly don't disagree with those. However, what about each individual movement? If the right quality is not there in the most basic individual building blocks, there's a permanent issue that slows things down. There's no obvious reason why these styles of practise would deal with that basic quality.You might find this post interesting:

   There's a hole in my bucket

It stands to reason that if there is any give in the finger, it will take longer between initiating the movement and the sound actually being produced. Obviously, when having to play fast and quiet, the finger is required to move slower, in order to achieve the quiet sound. However, my suspicion is that when there is "give" in the finger, there's an even bigger time-lag between beginning the movement and the occurring sound- compared to when a finger produces an equivalent volume without any give.

I believe that these issues play a massive role, when we're talking things like Richter's Etude. At that level, just a tiny bit of added time-lag due to a few fingers giving way could cause the tempo to completely fall apart. However, as I mention in the post, I don't think that the idea of striving for "firm" (in the sense of braced) fingers is the answer.

[kellyc]

Hi: I know this post is several months old, but felt compelled to answer it. You basically ask  how can you play as fast as richter in the Chopin etude op 10 #4. Answer  - you can't. My goodness how many Richters where there. A much better question might be how can you play that etude so it is truly memorable to listen to. Just something to think about.

kelly