Left hand and right hand

[eliza1976]

So do you start learning a new piece by learning one side of the hand first then combine them together ? I can play fluently when using either side of the hand but only when one hand is utilised. But when I start putting both hands together, I realise I have to switch my mind to and fro from treble to bass clef and then from bass to treble clef. And in a way, my playing often gets a lot of hiccups and hesitation. Do you often sight read while playing or you go along with your memory while playing in a way you don't actually really 'sight read' at all ? 

[pencilart3]

Try learning the easier hand extremely well. Learn to play it while you watch tv, solve riddles, have conversations. Make it second nature. Then put the other hand with it, concentrating on that hand, because you can play the easier hand well and you can play the harder hand, because you are concentrating on it. I'm trying it with prelude no. 16 right now. I learned the right hand very well and then the left hand just came when I could concentrate on the jumps.

[adodd81802]

I've just learnt a piece and find it interesting what you have said.

So this definitely depends on the song, finding patterns etc can make your brain work less hard in my opinion. Learning the rhythm of a song will help you with the timings.
Taking a waltz for example, usually you expect that ONE two three, ONE two three, rhythm, once you know how the notes should go together that makes your practice sessions more efficient.

Next is memorizing the notes, but playing them a lot slower, while still keep rhythm. I have the horrible habbit of getting the rhythm, remembering the notes, then forcing to play at full speed as quick as possible. what happens is your brain knows what you got to do, but the muscle memory hasn't quite sunk in. 50% of the time you breeze through "that hard bit", then others you stumble on the same bit over and over. Definitely practice very slowly, even the easy bits until you really don't have to think about where your hands are going, they just go there.

I would usually, to start, sight read the melody to get a feel for the right hand, but really start working on the left hand as that tends to keep the rhythm in a lot of songs (Chopin Nocturnes as an example) memorize a couple of bars until i know exactly what's going on then slowly add the melody.

Hope that helps. It may not be the best approach, but i can relate to the difficulties you are having.

[iansinclair]

I'm a bit of a maverick -- but then, I was an organist for years before I switched to piano, so I guess some idiosyncrasies are to be expected?

I always learn all the parts together (left and right hand and, for organ, pedals).  I have tried learning one hand and then the other, and for me at least it simply doesn't work.  When I start learning a piece, things can get pretty weird, but taking it a bit more slowly usually helps.  Among other minor things, this helps in deciding which notes to play with which hand; there is no rule that says one has to play all the notes on the bottom stave with the left hand and the top with the right, and sometimes things are much easier taking some notes with the "wrong" hand.

I try, also, to get the overall shape of the piece -- phrases, dynamics, that sort of thing -- and what I want to say with it in place very early on.

Then I gradually get it up to tempo.  There will still be rough patches, and I go over them with care as needed.

Then -- and only then (and actually rather rarely) -- do I even try to memorise the piece.  Usually I don't even particularly try, but what happens is that I wind up looking at the music less and less as time goes on, and sometimes I find to my surprise (really!) that I have, in fact, memorised it (I might point out that organists almost always play with the music).

[indianajo]

When you are ready to put the hands together after single hand practice, you are not thinking bass clef or treble clef or even looking at the music particularly.  You are thinking of a particular series of hand movements.  Those hands movements should be so second nature your don't need to look at the music except to figure out which sequence comes next.
I first did this when I was nine, so it wasn't such a stretch.  Right hand practice, left hand practice, then together practice.  Always very slowly , my teacher always said if you were making mistakes you were going too fast.  
So at age 60, I added feet to this. Organs finally got down to where I can afford one, they are $200 or less now.  So I practiced the first 8 measures of Passacaglia & fugue in C min for about a thousand times, until I could do the feet movements without looking.  Then I stretched it out to learn the whole first two pages of the piece with the feet, which is just a variation on the first 8 measure.  
Then, after RH and LH practice independently, I put it all together.  Whoah, 60 years old and I can still learn new things.  
I can play 4 pages of that piece now, after 5 years practice.  Now the barrier is learning to do it in shoes, taking a lesson in sock feet is considered barbaric, for some reason.  But life is boring without a challenge.  
So don't be too quick to put it all together is my advice, not at least until you've got the movements memorized with your lower brain.  And any mistakes, you're going too fast.  As Mrs. Jelson used to say.
Sight reading is a whole 'nother deal, and something Mrs Jelson didn't really teach me to do.  I've had to kind of get into it these days as the "last resort" piano player at churches, one step above letting the computer play the music.  I find it helps to think of the different notes in bass and treble clef as part of one chord.  they do have the chord symbol up above the staff in the hymnal, it helps me to sight read to look at that thing sometimes and let the hands play the chord instead of the individual notes. 

[chopinlover01]

 
I can play 4 pages of that piece now, after 5 years practice. 

IMO that about sums it up.
Takes far too long in most cases. There are many instances where, for short little passages, it's useful to practice that passage isolated (fast little runs, chordal passages, quick arpeggios, big leaps), but for learning entire sections is usually a waste of time.

[indianajo]

P&F in Cmin is on hold for a source of organ shoes that doesnt' involve serfs in dorms working 24/7 if business is good, uncompensated industrial accidents, money that has no value overseas,  disappearing relatives in secret prisons that don't have an address, owners that make 1000000000 times what their workers do.  The current source of those and all other consumer goods has all those problems.  I'm learning how to glue shoes together this summer since the lords of commerce have decided the only free worker made alternative to the *****ese shoe is the electric wheel chair.  How many serfs have you paid the owners of this week?  
If it is made in ***** or any other country with those problems in the news , I buy used at Salvation Army or Goodwill, or I do without, or I make my own.  Right now I am doing without organ shoes. 
People that don't bother to learn the notes before they attempt to play the piece together make too many mistakes, IMHO.  I heard Lang Lang make two of them on Rhapsody in Blue July 4 on TV. If you don't have time to learn the notes, play a recording, not the piano

[louispodesta]

So do you start learning a new piece by learning one side of the hand first then combine them together ? I can play fluently when using either side of the hand but only when one hand is utilised. But when I start putting both hands together, I realise I have to switch my mind to and fro from treble to bass clef and then from bass to treble clef. And in a way, my playing often gets a lot of hiccups and hesitation. Do you often sight read while playing or you go along with your memory while playing in a way you don't actually really 'sight read' at all ? 

After many decades of doing it the wrong way, this is what I do:

1) I play the tune, that is I ingrain the melody of the piece in my ear.  This is especially true of Chopin, who was left-handed.  He added all kinds of written out improvisations that can waste you a whole lot of time trying to learn.

2) Write out the chord symbol harmony above each major chord, keeping in mind that this is no college theory assignment.  It is a personal learning tool to help you in a major way know your music.  Hank Hemsoth of South Texas State University taught me in 1981 (graduate student of John Perry, and the piano lick in the theme from "Arthur") that if you can't hear in your own mind what the composer was trying to say, all of the note practice in the world will not bring out the true essence of the piece.

Then, you slowly focus on sections that you have problems with, and that is specific to you.  Sometimes, it is in a particular hand, and sometimes, it is hands together.  The Taubman/Golandsky  taught principle of "Blocking" is something I suggest you explore. 

[themeandvariation]

Hi Eliza.
If,as you say, you have each hand fluently, but are having hiccups, Do focus on one of those hiccup areas.. It can be a half of a measure or smaller… And play it slowly … and notice if there is a hand position change in either hand… If there is, then you must also consider how you coordinate the attention of your Eyes… Sometimes it is tricky, if the piece isn't memorized and you are having your eyes dart from the page to the hands and back again without pausing the beat.  It is usually this sort of thing that causes hiccups.. All that is needed is working those spots at a slow beat you can keep, while being aware of the 'choreography' of your eye mov't.
If you could post the piece in question, it may shed light on what you are experiencing… Or perhaps, this is just something you notice generally...

[timothy42b]

I'm a bit of a maverick -- but then, I was an organist for years before I switched to piano, so I guess some idiosyncrasies are to be expected?

I always learn all the parts together (left and right hand and, for organ, pedals).  I have tried learning one hand and then the other, and for me at least it simply doesn't work. 

For me it depends on the piece.

Something like a Bach invention requires me to learn hands separate.

That doesn't seem to help for an SATB hymn, I have to learn that hands together. 

For the OP:  your struggle is a classic beginner hurdle that everybody goes through.  It will pass. 

[roncesvalles]

I think, once you reach a certain level, it's best to play with both hands together.  If something is difficult or you are having difficulties in phrasing, separate the hands and get it how you like it, so you know how you want it to sound.   Play with both hands slowly, just getting the notes right, not the time.  You can always bring it back up to speed once you're more familiar with it.

For sight reading, look for patterns.  In a short while you'll be able to play arpeggios and runs by sight, just by glancing at the clef in question--runs are particularly easy to sight read, especially in classical and baroque music (look at the bottom note, then for any accidentals, then the top note).  Arpeggios are pretty easy to sight read when they're in the clef--you'll grow accustomed to their patterns over time.  In time you will hardly need to look down when arpeggios are playing in the left hand, until you come to late Romanticism, Impressionism, and more modern pieces where they're filled with accidentals and unusual intervals.   Most pieces use repetitive patterns in different harmonies, so being able to recognize those patterns makes sight reading easier.   Understanding music and harmony helps because you can quickly think things like "oh, this is just like the thing I did two measures ago, except in D major", which cuts down on the time you would be spending reading each note individually. 

In the end sight reading isn't about reading each individual note but recognizing patterns, so you can quickly execute the notes.   It also might help if you write out the harmony in each measure (or beat, in some cases) above the measure, so you can recognize that this is just an e minor arpeggio or ostinato, or this is just a Bb run up to the fifth.  Sight reading can be hard, but it is a skill that can be developed.  Be patient and keep trying.

[pencilart3]

I think, once you reach a certain level, it's best to play with both hands together. 

you don't say?!? 

[timothy42b]

 Play with both hands slowly, just getting the notes right, not the time.  You can always bring it back up to speed once you're more familiar with it.

Careful, that could be taken wrong. 

If "not the time" means don't worry about the rhythm, I disagree vehemently.  You should always play in time.

But if you mean play as slowly as necessary, but in strict tempo, then okay. 

[pencilart3]

Well said, Tim.

[louispodesta]

One thing that has not been addressed here is that the playing of the piano and any other motor skill is the development of certain neuron/dendrite motor pathways.  In, addition, no one, to my knowledge, has extensively commented on the fact that, absent Liszt, most composer/pianists were left-handed.

So, in that I am tackling the Rach 2nd Concerto, I of course learn the left hand separately because he was left-handed.  Most of the score in the left hand is written-out improvisation.  Aand if you want to get it sort of right, then you get that part out the way ahead of time.

That leaves one with the freedom to focus on the beautiful melodies in the right hand.  As far as there being any theoretical relationship, in a classical compositional sense between the two hands, I personally do not see or hear it.   Rachmaninoff just fits it in, and then some!

When 90% of your performance repertoire are your own compositions, then you get to have that luxury.