Chord / degree recognition in sight-reading

[tomp86]

When you sight read a piece, do you find it beneficial to think about what chord it is you are playing and will be playing next? If the chord is blocked I understand it's much more obvious to calculate what the chord is, but if broken apart do you bother to identify the chord?

Follow-up question: When memorizing repertoire, do you make the effort to remember all the chords and/or degrees in the piece along with the notes?

[ranjit]

Yes, I do. Most tonal music uses a certain set of common diatonic chords, in relative order of frequency. I find it especially useful to recognize Is and Vs, but I don't necessarily analyze every chord. To your follow-up question -- somewhat: I tend to remember more the patterns, but also a rough idea of the chord structure, especially if it's simple.

[tomp86]

Hi ranjit. Yes makes sense. Anticipating where the piece will go based on the chord your playing can make it eaiser to prepare yourself for the next chord. Like when your on a dominant 7 you can feel it wants to resolve so you have a good idea of what notes will come next.
With memorizing pieces I never used to bother to remember each degree (or chord) in the song. For many classical pieces, it does not seems as beneficial (I may be wrong), but for more modern pieces and pieces that follow repeated chord progressions, it's very useful to prepare for the next chord

[brogers70]

When you sight read a piece, do you find it beneficial to think about what chord it is you are playing and will be playing next? If the chord is blocked I understand it's much more obvious to calculate what the chord is, but if broken apart do you bother to identify the chord?

Follow-up question: When memorizing repertoire, do you make the effort to remember all the chords and/or degrees in the piece along with the notes?

For me, at this point it's pretty automatic to know what the chords are and how they relate to each other, so I don't make any effort to remember the chords. It is sometimes helpful both in sight reading and memorization.

Say, in sight reading your left hand has some repetitive accompaniment pattern like Alberti bass, or ascending triplets spelling out the chords, then recognizing the chords and progressions makes it easier to know where your fingers have to go next.

In memorizing, I don't consciously make an effort to memorize all the chords by rote, but maybe there's a place where I notice I have memory slips, so I'll make a mental note to myself "Remember at that awkward spot, it's a C# minor chord in first inversion," and that kind of thing helps a lot more than just playing through the trouble spot over and over.

It seems like you're making progress in this subject; just keep at it. It will take some months or years before it becomes automatic, but it will.

[tomp86]

For me, at this point it's pretty automatic to know what the chords are and how they relate to each other, so I don't make any effort to remember the chords. It is sometimes helpful both in sight reading and memorization.

Say, in sight reading your left hand has some repetitive accompaniment pattern like Alberti bass, or ascending triplets spelling out the chords, then recognizing the chords and progressions makes it easier to know where your fingers have to go next.

In memorizing, I don't consciously make an effort to memorize all the chords by rote, but maybe there's a place where I notice I have memory slips, so I'll make a mental note to myself "Remember at that awkward spot, it's a C# minor chord in first inversion," and that kind of thing helps a lot more than just playing through the trouble spot over and over.

It seems like you're making progress in this subject; just keep at it. It will take some months or years before it becomes automatic, but it will.

Cool thanks brogers for sharing with me your experience on this. It good to know the capabilities of a more advanced player so I can track my progression. I aim for this feeling of automatic / second nature chord recognition and how they relate together that you have.  For me I only see these chords and how they relate in a theoretical sense sometimes and usually on beginner level pieces

[j_tour]

Well, I'll echo what brogers70 said, and even go one step further.

For me, it's absolutely a HUGE part of how I memorize pieces, especially among classical and early romantic composers (Beethoven, for example). 

Not only the basic harmonies, but how they're voiced (what's the bass movement, what's the basic character of the voicing, i.e., is it thick, in the middle register, how many notes are doubled at the octave and beyond, and some other kind of subjective traits I don't really analyze beyond knowing the "flavor" of the voicing).

I don't bother with that for Bach, though, to name one exception, nor for Debussy, to name another.