Why do we splash in Op 10, no 1?

[hmpiano]

[reading mode off]

@ hmpiano

 I would have expected something like the arpeggios in op. 10 no 11; that's what I call good "ripping".
[reading mode back on]

Yes,

has 'ripping', obviously just one arpeggio at a time.  Imagine it going up the keyboard repeating the same arp and you've got it.  Just how that differs from my example is beyond me.  After all it's the technique not my technique that's in question.

[nyiregyhazi]

Yes,

has 'ripping', obviously just one arpeggio at a time.  Imagine it going up the keyboard repeating the same arp and you've got it.  Just how that differs from my example is beyond me.

Her arm motions are sideways and her fingers move to produce key movement. Your arm movements press down through stiffened fingers that scarcely move at all. Her notes are all controlled and audible as part of a musical line.  Yours are not. The fact that you are ignorant to such things is why you do not improve and why you are a world apart from accomplished performers. Learn some humility (and try actually listening) before trying to make such an embarrassingly deluded comparison. This is almost on a par with a non-pianist who learned to press the notes of Fur Elise in the right order and who thinks they are playing as well as a great pianist, based on that alone. If you did the same as her, you'd be playing such pieces to her level. You know as well as I do that you couldn't even get to the end of either Etude.

[werq34ac]

Back to this idea of ripping, how are you supposed to rip an arpeggio with more than 5 notes using only the arm? The arpeggio itself may only be one movement, but your fingers make it possible.


And no, ripping is COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE with the method of practice I recommended. How is it possible to play (this time the number refer to fingerings) 4512 without moving the fingers? The arm is used to group the movements of our fingers into a single gesture.

[hmpiano]

I think you're asking what is a rip?  I think, as far as a quick observation goes, it's a pushing of the arm into the fingers which push into the keys.  I'm sure Abby Whiteside has a far more comprehensive explanation - she devotes a whole chapter to ripping arpeggios.

[ajspiano]

I think you're asking what is a rip?  I think, as far as a quick observation goes, it's a pushing of the arm into the fingers which push into the keys.  I'm sure Abby Whiteside has a far more comprehensive explanation - she devotes a whole chapter to ripping arpeggios.

For starters, 10/1 requires shaped arm circles. That is that the forearm is fractionally higher over the middle notes of each octave (fingers 23 or 24) and slightly lower on the 1-5 transitions. It's not possible to push down while doing that - it's contradictory.

If it was only 1 octave, maybe, but not when it has to repeat. You must have a fluent circular pattern that loops back into itself.

That aside, if you push through your fingers and fail to activate them and your hand you will experience structural weaknesses and breaks in the wrist and on each successive finger.

You can bark up this tree if you like (pushing down into the fingers) but you will have to use your fingers, and you will continue to splash. It does not facilitate anything above a slow to moderate tempo with any accuracy. Then even if you use the fingers you 1-5 transitions will be unbalanced and out of control as far as both eveness and dynamics at anything above say 100bpm.

[nyiregyhazi]

I think you're asking what is a rip?  I think, as far as a quick observation goes, it's a pushing of the arm into the fingers which push into the keys.  I'm sure Abby Whiteside has a far more comprehensive explanation - she devotes a whole chapter to ripping arpeggios.

He asked no such thing. If you do ripping that way, do the groups he outlined and upload the result at speed. Any old tool can play four ascending notes with the poor technique you describe then stop for a rest- especially if they don't give a damn about one of the four notes getting totally swallowed up in the sound, to the point of being inaudible. Upload a film of yourself ripping the groups he describes at speed- so that the difficult occurs in the middle of the group, without being conveniently sidestepped via pauses that occur in the exact spot of the difficulty.

If you're not brave enough either prove that you can rip these units (or more likely, to expose your present inability to do so), you're not in a position to have an informed opinion about technique.

PS. I'd like to politely request that as many readers as possible report this ignorant troll to the moderators and get him removed. I've reported him previously and am not quite clear why he has still not been banned (for what would be the third time). Whether it's pure incompetence and low standards or a case of getting off on winding people up, he should not be allowed to post in this group. This is a forum for serious pianists, not fools.

[werq34ac]

He asked no such thing. If you do ripping that way, do the groups he outlined and upload the result at speed. Any old tool can play four ascending notes with the poor technique you describe then stop for a rest- especially if they don't give a damn about one of the four notes getting totally swallowed up in the sound, to the point of being inaudible. Upload a film of yourself ripping the groups he describes at speed- so that the difficult occurs in the middle of the group, without being conveniently sidestepped via pauses that occur in the exact spot of the difficulty.

If you're not brave enough either prove that you can rip these units (or more likely, to expose your present inability to do so), you're not in a position to have an informed opinion about technique.

PS. I'd like to politely request that as many readers as possible report this ignorant troll to the moderators and get him removed. I've reported him previously and am not quite clear why he has still not been banned (for what would be the third time). Whether it's pure incompetence and low standards or a case of getting off on winding people up, he should not be allowed to post in this group. This is a forum for serious pianists, not fools.

He makes good comedic value..

[perprocrastinate]

He makes good comedic value..

Speaking of comedy, I had a great time reading this thread!

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=22028.0

[j_menz]

Speaking of comedy, I had a great time reading this thread!

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=22028.0

Haha.  Any thread consisting (largely) of people who have never played (or seriously attempted) pieces discussing their difficulties is bound to descend into farce.  I read that thread hoping to learn something, so I was rather less amused.

[hmpiano]

For starters, 10/1 requires shaped arm circles. That is that the forearm is fractionally higher over the middle notes of each octave (fingers 23 or 24) and slightly lower on the 1-5 transitions. It's not possible to push down while doing that - it's contradictory.

If it was only 1 octave, maybe, but not when it has to repeat. You must have a fluent circular pattern that loops back into itself.

My wrist rises as I get to the loudest note of the rip - 5, and falls quite quickly.

That aside, if you push through your fingers and fail to activate them and your hand you will experience structural weaknesses and breaks in the wrist and on each successive finger.

I don't think any technique is 100% arm or 100% finger.  All that comes out in my mp3?

You can bark up this tree if you like (pushing down into the fingers) but you will have to use your fingers, and you will continue to splash. It does not facilitate anything above a slow to moderate tempo with any accuracy. Then even if you use the fingers you 1-5 transitions will be unbalanced and out of control as far as both eveness and dynamics at anything above say 100bpm.

I think the way I wish to play this piece is the hardest way possible, prone to splashing as the hand/arm is quite free but surely no problem for Chopn?

Anyway ajs, thanks for your thoughtful advice and for taking me seriously rather than joining in all the bullying, a level of disapprobation quite out of all proportion.  I appreciate that.

edit: just occurred to me that practicing it the conventional way is probably good practice - so I'll be doing that for a while.  My first impression is that it's very much a strong side of the hand approach but then piano playing from the early 19th century onwards, apart from Chopin, seems to me like that.

[nyiregyhazi]

 All that comes out in my mp3?I think the way I wish to play this piece is the hardest way possible, prone to splashing as the hand/arm is quite free but surely no problem for Chopn?

If you sincerely believe that either your hand or arm is free, you are delusional. we heard your mp 3 and saw your video- in which you force things so stiffly that you couldn't even succeed in making your fourth finger heard- never mind controlling a musical progression.

Taking a difficult route is nothing to be proud of unless it directly makes musical results easier. Otherwise it's nothing but musical suicide. Stop trying to glorify your incompetence and have the balls to accept it. No other step will permit you to move on and actually start improving your truly dismal standard of accomplishment. Only a deluded idiot thinks that making an utter mess of a difficult route is noble or clever. The right route is that which makes it easy to control your sound and any other is a fool's path. It would be okay if you were humble, but your pretence of expertise makes you an extremely harmful and detrimental presence in this forum.

The only reason that you play so poorly is that you are unwilling to criticise either yourself or the doctrines that fail you. It's sad, because you could easily improve- if you could only let go of your delusions of expertise.

[j_menz]

I think the way I wish to play this piece is the hardest way possible, prone to splashing

Um, then why do you wish to play it that way?  Surely we should be aiming for the easiest way possible and the most accurate and controlled?  I'm struggling to see any possible reason to play a piece otherwise.

[ajspiano]

My wrist rises as I get to the loudest note of the rip - 5, and falls quite quickly. I don't think any technique is 100% arm or 100% finger.

If your wrist rises from the bottom to the top of the arp, how exactly are you pushing down into the fingers with your arm as the primary motion?

My description in the last post was rushed an obviously lacking in detail - its sounds as though you need to think about what possible differences there are between what you are doing and what you think you are doing, and in turn..  particularly how you are describing what you are doing.

All that comes out in my mp3?

Structural breaks would be evident in anyone who experiences "splashing" and finds it difficult to play the piece to any reasonable tempo - as I said before, the balance and stability of your playing structure is thrown out by the content of this work. If you were stable and had no breaks you wouldn't be asking the question you are.

So in short, I don't know it because of your mp3 - I know it because you're personally concerned with the physical side and how it effects your performance, especially in the form of practicing a specific described in words physical execution throughout the work, rather than practicing controlling the dynamics of the RH, or bringing out the LH over the RH, or rubato... There is obviously nothing wrong with that, - I certainly went through that stage in learning 10/1 - and still revisit it in specific more challenging bars.

We don't normally recommend that students start with this chopin etude, rather 3, 5, 12, or 25/12..  the ones that are supposedly easier. But I'm rather inclined to think that there is a reason this etude number 1. It pretty much makes a single point, a point that will be the foundation of all playing there after. That's the genius of it, its not a how to play arps study, its a general how to use your mechanism study. One that is immediately expanded on in the 2nd etude yet in a completely different musical context (yet the same physical point).

I think the way I wish to play this piece is the hardest way possible

This is totally backward. Don't approach it from the perspective of how you think it should be done physically. Consider what it should sound like, explore the physical side until you find a motion that successfully produces the sound.

I hardly want to get into what chopin might have thought (because I don't know), but I will say that these are just not etudes like hanon exercises. They are not built upon a "exercise" type approach. They are a 'sound' that its VERY difficult to produce (i might even argue impossible) without using the right technique. You can't play it the "harder way" because that's what you want to do because its an etude (thinking that a particular physical execution with improve your playing over time) - chopin's point is to teach you the physically correct way, to force you to find you're "balanced" finger/hand/arm. Progress is fast, find the right movement and suddenly you will not have nearly as much difficulty.

The only trouble with getting the sudden progress here is that this work pushes you so far beyond your limit (as in the limit of those who have not yet learnt this or another such work) that for someone that is not ready it may not happen so suddenly. Which is precisely why when I talked about keyboardclass's video I said he needs to do EASY repertoire. So that the primary focus can be balance (the notes/music isn't at all difficult). So that the "balance" element is an instinctual habit when one returns to this work and gets thrown off it by the wide fast intervals.

One must first develop an awareness that there is even a problem before tackling something that nails that problem to the wall and slaps it around relentlessly.

^Alot of alan frasers ideas help with that - thats not a suggestion that you should agree with alan's conclusions about piano technique, but his exercises (anything fuelled by his feldenkrais training) are specifically aimed at increasing your awareness of balance/stability and the sensations of playing. You can form your own conclusions about whats feels right for you, but you need the awareness. That part is universal...  alternatively you can just directly study feldenkrais or the alexander technique - and apply the concepts to the piano.

[hmpiano]

Well, I haven't got far with playing it 'straight'.  It seems to build up muscles I don't wish to engage with with all the tap, tap, tapping against the wrist as each individual note claims its support from there.  Have you got the link to yours ajs?  I'll have a study of it.

[ajspiano]

Have you got the link to yours ajs?  I'll have a study of it.

No (atleast not right now) you can search back through the audition room..

I hardly think mine is worth studying, not because I can't play it - but there are better models available. I still hit wrong notes from time to time, and i don't have the musical control I want. I'm not currently working on it though..

Edit:
This is one that I had lying on my phone and sent to YouTube just now.

[werq34ac]

No (atleast not right now) you can search back through the audition room..

I hardly think mine is worth studying, not because I can't play it - but there are better models available. I still hit wrong notes from time to time, and i don't have the musical control I want. I'm not currently working on it though..

Edit:
This is one that I had lying on my phone and sent to YouTube just now.

You have a very fluid motion when you play. It could maybe use a little more musical freedom for my tastes, but otherwise nice playing! It's better than I ever got the piece I never bothered to clean it up and refine it so mine was a bit messy when I dropped it.

[ajspiano]

You have a very fluid motion when you play. It could maybe use a little more musical freedom for my tastes, but otherwise nice playing! It's better than I ever got the piece I never bothered to clean it up and refine it so mine was a bit messy when I dropped it.

Thanks, i agree with you regarding "musical freedom". Its not a take I'm proud of, its just the one that was accessible last night.

That said, I don't think I've actually produced a take I'm proud of yet..

[49410enrique]

... I'm proud of, its just the one that was accessible last night...

and today's winner for 'quote taken out of context that sounds slightly pervy" goes to this gem!

and no offense. i love your playing of this etude. i just want to start having some fun each day and find a pervy out of context quote. could be fun. actually probably deserves it's own thread. i just picked yours becuase it was the one that was most acessible a few minutes ago.

[ajspiano]

i just picked yours because it was the one that was most accessible a few minutes ago.