I texted a friend of mine who directs a local church choir. When he texted me back, he asked if I could accompany for a joint ascension service for three congregations. I took a look at it (here is a link for it) and said to him, “I can learn that in a week.”
I failed to look a the metronome marking.
I could play it easily at 60. 104? I wasn’t sure if I could make it in a week, but I didn’t want to back out. My friend was counting on me. Here’s what I did to get it done.
Tactic #1: Mini-Practices
The first practice of the day I did my normal stuff – scales, technical studies, and etudes – before I started working on the music. Then I practiced the piece one or two times using plans below. Then I took a short nap to get the myelin building up on my new neurons.
After the nap, I did something active for the same reason. I put in my garden, went for a run, cleaned the house, you get the idea. Then I practiced again, just going through the song two or three times.
I did this process 3-5 times per day. It was great because using this process, I was able to practice at least twice as long as normal per day without pain, injury, or tension.
Tactic #2: Metronome
I didn’t play without the metronome. Every time I started feeling comfortable with the piece, I would pop the metronome up a notch, usually once per mini-session, sometimes once every-other session.
There are a couple of reasons for this:
1. Since I was playing with a choir, I didn’t want my natural rubato to start creeping in.
2. The metronome helps you find the parts that you’re messing up on so you can fix them.
3. The metronome makes me a little nervous. I needed that because I was going to be playing this in front of 300-400 people, and I have stage fright. (Aack!)
Tactic #3: Twinkling
If I was having a hard time with transitioning from one chord to another, I would play the two chords over and over, starting slowly and building up speed until it fell apart. Then I’d back up a measure or two and if I hit that chord easily, I would continue through the piece.
Tactic #4: Drilling Measures
Sometimes there would be a whole measure that I couldn’t get. In that case, I would play the measure over and over again, starting slow and working it up to speed and a little past that. To make sure I had it in my fingers, I would back up to the beginning of the phrase and keep on playing if I was able to play it in context.
Tactic #5: Play Tough Chords in Octaves
Sometimes I would have to jump over an octave and hit a block chord. Sometimes this would happen in both hands. If I was having a hard time making that jump, I would play the chord as written, then play it an octave down. I would play another octave down. I would continue to 8vb the chord until I ran out of room on the piano.
Then I went up an octave from the bottom octave of the piano. Then up another octave. I continued to 8va the chord until I reached the top octave of the piano.
Then I went down an octave from the top octave of the piano. I continued to 8vb the chord until I came to the original position of the chord. As usual, I backed up to the beginning of the phrase to make sure I had learned the chord and if I had, I continued on.
Tactic #6: Practicing Backwards
I started out playing the last page. Then the last two pages. Then the last three. So on and so forth until I hit the first page. Sometimes I did this by phrase, which ended up being more like half-pages.
I did this tactic when I was having a hard time adjusting to a new metronome setting. It really worked and I was usually able to bump the metronome up a notch after practicing like this. I only used this tactic once per day and it took up an entire mini-session of practicing.
Tactic #7: Dropping Notes.
THIS TACTIC IS FOR ACCOMPANIMENT ONLY! I had to simplify certain parts in order to play them up to speed. If there was a measure that I just couldn’t get or a chord that I just couldn’t jump to, I would analyze my part against the choir part and cut what I could, keeping the main part of the chord intact.
Here were my judicial cuts
1. I switched to the melody and the lowest bass note for a section that had too many jumps. The choir was singing unison at that point, so as long as I had the melody, it sounded fine.
2. I had to make over-octave leaps in my Left hand in one section, with 4-5 note chords in both hands. It was the same chord all measure in the Left hand (inversions), so I only played the first one in each measure.
3. I had a 16th-note run that was 4ths with the occasional 2nd. Since it wasn’t a normal arpeggio, I couldn’t play it and then play the block chord at the end. I had to choose one or the other. I left the run out and played the initial chord and the chord at the end.
4. There was a section where I was playing something very similar to what the choir was singing, but I had an extra 1-2 notes in each hand. I switched to what the choir was singing, and switched back to my part at a time when my part diverged from the choir part.
This tactic was a last-ditch effort. If I had 2-3 months to work on it, I never would have dropped notes.
Results
In the end, I got the piece up to 104, but it wasn’t a comfortable 104. I told the director that I could play it at 96 and he was fine with that.
The rehearsal was rough because I had all these new sounds coming at me, what with the trumpet and the choir. After the rehearsal, I made my kids sing the melody line while I played the accompaniment a couple times per day. I should have done that for the initial practices, but I didn’t think about it.
The performance went great. My youngest daughter told me she didn’t hear any mistakes. Given her familiarity with the piece and her musical training (4 years on the piano and 6 months on the flute), I would call that a success!
процесс, требующий очень вдумчивого и аккуратного подхода позиции верховного суда ликвидация ООО а так же закрыть ооо с долгами
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For my 70th birthday I decided to relearn the piano after being away from it for 40 years. I was very fortunate to find a 92 year old Kurtzman grand piano and for the last 8 months have been teaching myself with the aid of some good books and the internet. When I did play decades ago, I had reached perhaps an intermediate level of skill. I am finding that my brain and my fingers ain’t what they used to be! I have been reading up on how to efficiently practice and I have to say that your blog, which I discovered today is the best yet for explaining that. Also, I read your piece on the importance of practicing scales, chords, cadences and arpeggios- I have been wondering WHY on earth we do that and WHAT relationship they have to the pieces I play…. your explanation cleared a lot of that up for me. Thank you for sharing your knowledge !!! You are very generous to do that.
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I’ve heard from many retirees that their hands and brain don’t communicate like they used to. They say that it becomes more and more important to do a proper warm-up (scales, technical studies, etudes) as this happens, because it gets the brain and the hands talking to each other easier.