Uneven Triplets

[gkatele]

Sigh....

I'm a returning intermediate student - played seriously for 10 years and then stopped due to carreer, kids, marriage, job, etc. Returning after 30 years of no lessons.

I'm having a HELL of a time with some rather simple things, and I hope that I can get some advice here.

I'm resurrecting the Beethoven Op. 49 #2 sonata in G (the "easy") and CPE Bach's Solfiegetto (sp?).

I find that when there are left handed triplets to play, I have a devil of a time getting them even. Rather than being

 "one........two.......three.......one........two.......three"

it comes out as

 "one........two.......three..one........two.......three"

or something similarly obscene.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to improve the eveness of this material. I find it particularly annoying in the Beethoven, and in the Bach, it happens in both hands.

I assume that it's due to a lack of strength, but I may be wrong.

Thanks in advance.

Happy New Year!




George

[nanoc]

well, it surely must be because of lack of strenght in the fingers...... try those czerny etudes you hated so much when you were a student..... you should find something there that (with time and practise) will hopefully get rid of your problem....

[xvimbi]

I assume that it's due to a lack of strength, but I may be wrong.

It is not due to lack of strength, but due to lack of coordination. I am sure you have enough strength to press the keys down thousands of times with any finger. I'd recommend against any dedicated exercise (Hanon, Czerny). Just use those exact pieces you are working on for getting your motoric skills back.

[anda]

the wrist could help - a slight circular movement, just enough to get the weight of the arm on the right finger at the right time.

[donjuan]

Hi George, I was having the same problem and my teacher had me saying "Pineapple" instead of "one, two, three".  I found it helped somewhat because now I think the word "three" sort of drags on longer in nature than "one" or  "two", promoting uneveness.  However, I like emphasizing the syllables of Pineapple more.  See if it works the same for you.

BTW, wow!  30 years w/o playing!! props to you for getting back at it! 

donjuan

[dinosaurtales]

Well, I didn't take 30 years off, but more like 20.  that said, I had similar problems.  It's true what the others are saying, it's mostly getting your "old" coordination back.  I worked pretty hard at it for a year, and now I play better than ever!  But (you are going to hate this because it's tedious and boring) GO SLOW - so slow, in fact, that you will wonder if you are really doing any good.  Get out a metronome (get a digital one, not one of those old fashioned ones - mine had a "limp" - so does my teacher's, which sort of cracks me up - defeating the whole purpose of a metronome and all - but I digress) and work just the triplets with one hand till they are all even and perfect at a very slow speed.  Then slowly (over weeks, probably) speed up a notch at a time).  You'll be amazed how the old coordination will come back!

[gkatele]

Go slow....

Sigh.... it's SOOO frustrating.

I played around with the Bach 2 part invention #14 in Bb this evening and found the same problem. Getting that left hand to sound even on those five notes (you know, those *%#& 32nd notes in the left hand) was almost impossible when I tried to play it at speed. However, when I cut my speed down to about  1/2 of what I used to be able to do, it was OK.

So... my problem is not so much triplets, but unevenness (did I spell that right?) in the left hand.

I'm in no hurry, buy it would be nice to get all of my old pieces into shape.

Next on the agenda, the Rach C# minor prelude (talk about triplets!)

Thanks for the advice, and Happy New Year!

[jlh]

Hi George, I was having the same problem and my teacher had me saying "Pineapple" instead of "one, two, three".  I found it helped somewhat because now I think the word "three" sort of drags on longer in nature than "one" or  "two", promoting uneveness. 

Way back when, I was taught to say "tri-ple-let" instead of "one-two-three".  Same principle I guess.  These days I don't give them a second thought, but when learning to coordinate these types of rhythms I'm sure it helped.

Josh