Czerny and sight reading

[kghayesh]

I have been playing the piano for two and a half years, and recently i felt that my sight reading sucks. So, I decided to work on improving it.

I didn't know how exactly to do so, but i had a Czerny book Op.599 (First instructor of the piano) which i used when i was at an earlier level. I decided to move back to this book and play all of it from sight (6-pages a day). 

The pieces in this book are of increasing difficulty. The first ten pages i played them from sight so fluently as if i memorized them. But as pieces got harder, i gradually began to stumble and stutter in sight reading them, but i always don't stop and continue to the end even if i was playing so slowly and with severe stuttering..

I don't know whether what i am doing is right or i am just wasting my time....

[lagin]

Do you do grades?  Sightreading two grades below your level would be about right.  For my first year and a bit of sight reading I went soooo slow.  Once I even did eight ticks per beat with the metronome at 40!  Going slow is better than stumbling.  On my exam I got 7 out or 8 or something like that because I hit no wrong notes but went at a snail's pace .  Practice is about the way to get better I'm afraid, and also what did help me ALOT was theory courses.  650 pages of working with notes, drawing note, analysing notes, composing with notes, ect. tends to help, though I doubt you'll want to go this route.

[steinwayguy]

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,7429.0.html
(Grades for sight-reading)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,5621.0.html
(General sight-reading)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,5840.0.html
(When to sight-read)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,4640.0.html
(Two methods of sight-reading)

to quote Bernhard-
"https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,1871.msg14384.html#msg14384
(Reading notation – Richmann’s book – Cambridge word scramble example)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,1976.msg15962.html#msg15962
(Sight reading – Richmann’s book)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2406.msg20820.html#msg20820
(the grand staff)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2577.msg22247.html#msg22247
(Keyboard topography – how to find notes by touch)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2713.msg23282.html#msg23282
(Teaching bass clef – full explanation for the grand staff)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2751.msg23710.html#msg23710
(detailed explanation of the sight-reading process)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2757.msg23890.html#msg23890
(Sight reading techniques – Good post by faulty on the folly of pedagogues)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2763.msg25148.html#msg25148
(music to develop sight reading from scratch)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3205.msg28255.html#msg28255
(how not to look at the keys – discussion of Richmann’s reviews)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3334.msg29381.html#msg29381
(Reading both staffs as a single grand staff - Reasons for working on scales - Detailed discussion of Richmann’s book)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,4461.msg41580.html#msg41580
(Looking at the keys: Good or bad? exercises to help finding notes by touch. Good contributions by Chang).

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,4506.msg42967.html#msg42967
(accompanying to teach sightreading)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,5090.msg48850.html#msg48850
(the score is tabs for piano)"

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,1352.0.html
(developing sight-reading skills)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,6407.0.html
(general sightreading)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,5411.0.html
(another thread on Richman's book)

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3365.0.html

etc., etc.

[anda]

czerny 599 is great for sight-reading. i use it on my students - they have to sight-read a few etudes in class, with me, then go home and work on them.

[galonia]

There are many ways to improve sight-reading - Czerny 599 is not a bad way, but it depends on how you use it.

You'll find that exercises are grouped - so a concept will be introduced, and the next few etudes are just variations on that concept.  e.g. if you play no. 11, you'll then discover the LH notes stay the same for the next six or so etudes.  So you should have no trouble recognising that pattern.

Because my teacher didn't want me to memorise letternames of the notes, and only know how to play in C Major, I was required to transpose these into various keys - that way, I learnt to recognise the intervals and the "shape" of the chord - i.e the way a chord looks on the page, and that corresponds directly in my mind to the correct inversion etc.

This is why Czerny 599 is good - it's so simple, you can do this to the entire 100 and it won't take you that long.  Of course, you might not want to transpose the later ones which have key signatures of many sharps!!!

[terminal]

Since were on Czerny, I am also 2 1/2 years into playing piano and I want to integrate Czerny into my studies. Where should one start?

And is it Ch-erny or Sz-erny, just curious I have heard it both ways.