Full trills and tremolos in octaves

[robertus]

Greetings,

I have sometimes heard it asked if it's possible to play a complete and true trill in octaves. I believe I have found a way of doing this, by using the fingering of 2&5, alternating with 1&4 (in the same manner in which one would typically perform trill in sixths).

Here is a link to a demonstration of this technique:

Attached also is a graphic of a preliminary exercise, showing how it works.

I've heard that Henselt used to play Chopin's Black Key Etude in octaves, and suspect he may have used a similar approach....

Anyone tried this approach or technique before?

[perfect_pitch]

I can barely reach a 10th, so this is almost entirely impossible for me. I can sort of do it, but there's WAY too much arm movement needed for me to achieve it.

There's too much splaying of my fingers to achieve it. How big are your hands???

[andrewuk]

It might have been helpful to position the camera so that your hands were fully visible.

[robertus]

I can barely reach a 10th, so this is almost entirely impossible for me. I can sort of do it, but there's WAY too much arm movement needed for me to achieve it.

There's too much splaying of my fingers to achieve it. How big are your hands???

I can reach an eleventh comfortably, and a twelfth if its white to white or black to black.   

[lostinidlewonder]

Yeah well I can do it but it is not something you are going to find in pieces all over the place now are you? The technique has microscopic application.

[perfect_pitch]

I can reach an eleventh comfortably, and a twelfth if its white to white or black to black.

[lostinidlewonder]

Why jealous pp? No composer will seriously use a lot of 11ths and 12ths unless they want their music to alienate itself from being played! Just break them and say please to those composers works  Or use your big toe!

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Probably the caveat should be made that there is a risk of injury if the pianist pushes themselves too hard here. I can do 14/25 octave trills but only up to a certain speed and that is probably not any faster than doing them as 14/15 with rapid thumb hops. Of course any potential passage using this can be re-expressed as alternate hand octaves if the other hand is free during the duration of the trill and then velocity will be no problem.

[perfect_pitch]

I think you'll find that pianists with large hands probably find it easier to play the works of Rachmaninoff of Liszt. I mean, it was late high school before I could even reach that 10th, and even then I can just snag it - they're slow - RH is even slower.

[robertus]

Why jealous pp? No composer will seriously use a lot of 11ths and 12ths unless they want their music to alienate itself from being played! Just break them and say please to those composers works  Or use your big toe!

My hands are actually not that big- I am 6'3" (are fairly average height these days), and my hands are in proportion. But I did a lot of stretching exercises. These really do work (if you do them persistently), because I am able to stretch much further (and play comfortable when extended) than people whose hands are visible bigger than mine.