Example;
Now i just finished Beethoven Sonate Opus 49 N° 2. I play the HS at performing speed. Not by memory but most of it i do. (i took me about 2 sessions of 10 minutes each)
I go on now HS for the next pages ?
Is Bernhard also telling, first HS by memory and then HT ?
I just don't know "when" you begin HT ?
I used to learn very fast HT. I pieces like this I used to "start" HT.
Sometimes sight reading is an advantage sometimes not....
steven
-Paul
Ok.
1. Do not worry too much about speed: this sonata is still effective at a slow speed.
2. To try to bring a full page to speed is too large a chunk. We will go into that in a moment.
3. If you want HT = 120, aim for HS = 156 – 180.
4. The most important requirement in the first movement is not so much speed but a sharp distinction between the triplets and the quavers. Don’t let your pursuit of speed blur this rhythm distinction.
5. When you achieve HS perfectly at 156 – 180, you will probably be able to do HT = 120 straight away.
Now for speed practice.
1. Start with the first bar, the 2 triplets in the RH. Work on just those seven notes (add the first note of bar 2). Start by playing the first four notes together as a chord (D-G-B-D), and then the next four notes (D-C-A-G) – notice that I am overlapping the D. You are now going to switch between these two chords for a couple of minutes. This means hundreds of repetitions. Do not worry about speed: it will come naturally as a consequence of the facility you will develop from sheer repetition. Instead investigate movement patterns that will make this switching between chords as easy and comfortable as possible. As soon as your hand starts to feel tired switch hands.
2. For the LH, go straight to bar 15, where the triplet pattern starts again. You see, only bars 1 and 5 (RH) really need speed work – they are triplets – all the other bars are pretty slow in comparison. So there is really no need to do speed work on any of the bars that do not have triplets – great time saving device! So, alternate between the first triplet of bar 15 (D-F#-A) and the first triplet of Bar 16 (D-G-B) playing both as chords (each triplet is repeated four times – but why repeat them? The real problem is switching form one to the other, so just alternate between the two of them – later on you can put back the repeats without having to practise them). Another minute or two, and the LH is tired. So go back to the RH.
3. Now instead of playing the triplets of bar 1 as two separate chords, “wiggle” your hand and arpeggiate the chords, so that you “break the chord” into separate, amazingly fast separate notes. There is a specific movement involved here that is very easy to demonstrate, but very difficult to describe, so you will have to figure it out. The important thing is that this
is not about the fingers. Try to play these notes by lifiting your fingers high and keeping your hand quiet and you will never be able to do it. Instead,
do not move your fingers instead let the arm/forearm position and move them. The movement is like you are “rolling your hand” form side to side, and keeping the fingers relaxed except at the moment where they must press a key, in which case you “brace” the fingers” and let the weight of the arm and the rolling motion of the hand press the keys.
Do not use the fingers to press the keys Use the arm. This is the whole secret. But you have to figure it out. I cannot really describe it. Ask someone who is knowledgeable to demonstrate it for you. At this point your speed should totally amazing and really unnecessary. So
slow down but
keep the same movement pattern. Keep slowing down until you get to your target area of 156 – 180. You don’t really need a metronome – except perhaps on the first trials to get your bearings.
4. Now move to the LH (bars 15 – 16) and do the same thing.
5. If your RH is good and mastered, move to the RH of bars 15 16. In fact, work this way on the section from bar 15 – 21. There is a lot of repetition, so do not play all the chords/broken chords,
just the different ones On the LH this means only two chords. On the RH you will have four cords/broken chords. As soon as you can do those, put them together and play the whole of bars 15 – 21 HS at the target speed (or faster – you will be able to do it if you use the rolling movement). You do not need to wait years to get speed! It is all a matter of figuring out the movement that will allow you to do it easily. That is the
correct movement. It should take seconds if someone shows you, and a bit more time if you have to figure it out by yourself.
6. As soon as you can do bars 15 – 21 HS, join hands by using dropping notes. Start with the LH and drop the RH triplets one at a time, Then invert by playing the RH and dropping the LH triplets one at a time. Go for your target speed straight away (120). Trust me, you will be able to do it, and you will feel so exhilarated that you will make a lot of mistakes out of sheer excitement.
7. That is it for the first page! Now simply join these two ultra fast triplet sections to the slower quaver sections and you will have the whole page.
8. Proceed like that through the rest of the movement – isolating the triplet bars and working on them by using the chord trick and using it only on the different triplets.
9. Notice that some of the scale passages will require unorthodox fingering. And remember to overlap sections or you will inbuild hesitations.
I hope this helps.
Best wishes,
Bernhard.
Topic: Finishing a piece !