Pianists/musicians: Help needed

[-NN-]

Yeah it's not going to magically improve in one day but regular practice will certainly yield results especially if it's focused and targeted, and that appears to be the case.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

Yeah it's not going to magically improve in one day but regular practice will certainly yield results especially if it's focused and targeted, and that appears to be the case.

Not too focused, no. I've done this sporadically, a few minutes at a time. When I get the keyboard I plan on working on it on a regular basis (at least 1 hour a day is my goal.)

But I am honestly surprised by the change just from practicing this a few weeks, I sincerely thank you for your help and encouragement.

 

[-NN-]

Guitar is another instrument that I would really like to be good at, but I know I would have much more trouble than I have with piano. The reason I know this is because my parents enrolled me in a guitar course when I was 10 or 11, and it was a miserable failure. I don't know if @-NN- or some other people would agree, but I think guitar is more challenging than piano (at least it was for me,) just based on the way you need to move your fingers. I find piano to be much more "orthogonal" if you will.

Have you ever tried going back to piano? Maybe you would be better at it now? Congratulations to you for not giving up and finding an instrument that you are good at. The guitar, no less! Have you tried playing any of Nick Drake's songs, BTW?

No I found learning the piano way harder than learning the guitar... like, no contest harder. Both are hard for me though because small hands or not so much small hands but inflexible hands (very tight skin in general). However, I'd say it's much easier to improvise useful ideas on the piano, but using both (and any other instruments) is handy because they all have their own more orthodox idiomatic writing styles and therefore you can get something new and fresh from each.

 

[-NN-]

Not too focused, no. I've done this sporadically, a few minutes at a time. When I get the keyboard I plan on working on it on a regular basis (at least 1 hour a day is my goal.)

But I am honestly surprised by the change just from practicing this a few weeks, I sincerely thank you for your help and encouragement.

I don't mean a strict schedule but I mean that your practice is focused, in that you know exactly what you're trying to achieve with your practice and it's aimed at improving something specific (which is what you've done, right?).

BTW a few mins at a time is perfectly fine.

Anyway, very happy to help. I'm happy it's actually working and it must feel good to realise you didn't even remotely hit a wall or anything like that.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

No I found learning the piano way harder than learning the guitar... like, no contest harder. Both are hard for me though because small hands or not so much small hands but inflexible hands (very tight skin in general). However, I'd say it's much easier to improvise useful ideas on the piano, but using both (and any other instruments) is handy because they all have their own more orthodox idiomatic writing styles and therefore you can get something new and fresh from each.

I have the same problem you claim to have (inflexible hands), so the guitar was always a huge challenge for me. Twisting the fingers to make a simple chord was a task, not to mention transitioning to different chords. I was very young then, but I doubt things have changed much. I was never a piano virtuoso, but at least I could play at some basic level. I believe Liszt had small (but very nimble hands,) whereas Chopin had huge hands. At least that is what my piano teacher told me at some point.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

I don't mean a strict schedule but I mean that your practice is focused, in that you know exactly what you're trying to achieve with your practice and it's aimed at improving something specific (which is what you've done, right?).

BTW a few mins at a time is perfectly fine.

Anyway, very happy to help. I'm happy it's actually working and it must feel good to realise you didn't even remotely hit a wall or anything like that.

Yes, it is focused in that sense, you are right. My hope is that by practicing this passage over and over I haven't merely acquired some kind of muscle memory. I really don't think so, because (as I said earlier) before I couldn't even think of the two discrete parts simultaneously, and now they appear most of the time clearly in my mind.

Yes, I really thought I had hit the proverbial wall, and I'm very happy that wasn't the case. I'd never aspire to be a professional musician, but feeling that at least there is a basic level of competence that you can achieve with enough dedication is very important.

 

[-NN-]

I have the same problem you claim to have (inflexible hands), so the guitar was always a huge challenge for me. Twisting the fingers to make a simple chord was a task, not to mention transitioning to different chords. I was very young then, but I doubt things have changed much. I was never a piano virtuoso, but at least I could play at some basic level. I believe Liszt had small (but very nimble hands,) whereas Chopin had huge hands. At least that is what my piano teacher told me at some point.

I thought Liszt had a huge hand span in the realm of Rachmaninoff so if I got that wrong then I've misunderstood for more than a decade. It was hard for me to learn some of the repertoire of Vai, Satriani, or solos from Nuno Bettencourt because fret 3-8 is actually difficult for me. I never learned these instruments properly anyway (meaning no rulebook) and that applies to everything else in life; ergo, an excess of autistic and/or dereistic thinking. Learning sheet music is incredibly boring lol.

(And on piano beyond an 8ve is difficult over the spread of a chord.)

 

[AlxThm]

Guitar is another instrument that I would really like to be good at, but I know I would have much more trouble than I have with piano. The reason I know this is because my parents enrolled me in a guitar course when I was 10 or 11, and it was a miserable failure. I don't know if @-NN- or some other people would agree, but I think guitar is more challenging than piano (at least it was for me,) just based on the way you need to move your fingers. I find piano to be much more "orthogonal" if you will.

Have you ever tried going back to piano? Maybe you would be better at it now? Congratulations to you for not giving up and finding an instrument that you are good at. The guitar, no less! Have you tried playing any of Nick Drake's songs, BTW?

Haha Actually yes, i play piano from time to time with my band, but its more of a basic blues rythm (Thats why i don't know much about Drake's sorry :c) but still, it just doesn't feel natural to me you know, its like, the moment i picked up a guitar i knew it was going to be my instrument and its my love now, i gotta admit, there's Music, Then Tennis and then Food in my life, in that specific order and thats what i'm interested in you to get some inspiration about music, because its such a beautiful thing, know, you can also try to know your limits, when i started i was a teenager who wanted to play like 280bpm super fast songs, and i knew that that wasn't my way either, so.. i found the blues, and the blues just changed my life it made me feel so happy that was a genre when i could feel and play in my own way and was then that i finally got fully happy with my own music and habilities to play, i'm not saying that i dont care to keep going forward in my technique its just that i now can keep going on my way and, you coukd try to do the same, don't be too hard with yourself, your music, your fingers, they are just yours and if you can't be happy with them, thinking about you're not enough for yourself you'll never be happy and you will regret someday about left something you loved

 

[Comb Over Champion]

I thought Liszt had a huge hand span in the realm of Rachmaninoff so if I got that wrong then I've misunderstood for more than a decade. It was hard for me to learn some of the repertoire of Vai, Satriani, or solos from Nuno Bettencourt because fret 3-8 is actually difficult for me. I never learned these instruments properly anyway (meaning no rulebook) and that applies to everything else in life; ergo, an excess of autistic and/or dereistic thinking. Learning sheet music is incredibly boring lol.

(And on piano beyond an 8ve is difficult over the spread of a chord.)

I think you might be right, though my teacher told me the opposite (on doing a search just now, it seems she wasn't the only one who thought that.) But this site shows Liszt as having a span of a 13th (like Rachmaninov,) which explains part of his opus. Some of the guys in one of the forums I just visited remarked that de la Rocha could play some of the more challenging Rachmaninov works using broken chords, so there!

http://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/instruments/piano/pianists-hand-span-infographic/

Regarding your remark about not learning the instruments properly, you seem to have a very firm understanding of musical theory however.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

Haha Actually yes, i play piano from time to time with my band, but its more of a basic blues rythm (Thats why i don't know much about Drake's sorry :c) but still, it just doesn't feel natural to me you know, its like, the moment i picked up a guitar i knew it was going to be my instrument and its my love now, i gotta admit, there's Music, Then Tennis and then Food in my life, in that specific order and thats what i'm interested in you to get some inspiration about music, because its such a beautiful thing, know, you can also try to know your limits, when i started i was a teenager who wanted to play like 280bpm super fast songs, and i knew that that wasn't my way either, so.. i found the blues, and the blues just changed my life it made me feel so happy that was a genre when i could feel and play in my own way and was then that i finally got fully happy with my own music and habilities to play, i'm not saying that i dont care to keep going forward in my technique its just that i now can keep going on my way and, you coukd try to do the same, don't be too hard with yourself, your music, your fingers, they are just yours and if you can't be happy with them, thinking about you're not enough for yourself you'll never be happy and you will regret someday about left something you loved

Nick Drake was actually primarily a guitarrist, that's why I asked you if you played any of his music. Good for you for finding something you can be passionate about. If you can make a living out of it, even better. Yeah, you are also right that being down on yourself doesn't help anything, with music or anything else. You should start a YouTube channel and upload some of the stuff you play with your band.

 

[ojo rojo]

Glad to hear you're making progress with your quest to improve. Isn't it incredibly satisfying when those little break-throughs start happening? When I first experience moments of locking in whilst playing two independent patterns simultaneously - whether two hands working independently on a keyboard or between voice/instrument - at first, it feels almost as if I'm momentarily floating; suddenly disconnected from my own conscious actions but able to control them on a more intuitive level. This information is perhaps of no use whatsoever but fortunately you have -NN- giving you some clearly-considered advice. . obviously knowledgeable on this subject, and seemingly interested in your progress -
the infraweb at its best.

Right..
Back to poasting silly pics



Happy New Year!

 

[ojo rojo]

Nowhere near as mellifluous as Nick's Riverman. Impressive nonetheless..

 

[Nostradamus]

Music has been the unatainable love of my life. I had piano lessons as a kid for a number of years, but quit because I wasn't getting anywhere. I could play some pieces reasonably well if I was relaxed, but more often than not it was a painful experience. My hands would get stiff, so I would either play too loud or too soft. Sustain pedal action was a mess. But...

The most challenging thing for me was hand independence. This is the main subject of my post. Hand independence at the piano (specifically parts with different metrics/rhythms) was incredibly hard. It's as if my brain can't even think the two different parts simultaneously. To give you an example: Listen to this piece by Nick Drake (River Man). It's not a piano piece, but it is a very clear example of what I mean. Notice the rhythmic pattern in the chord part and then notice the main melodic line (voice). It's pure beauty, but it's something I don't think I'd be able to ever play.

I can't overstate how much this frustrates me. I am very good at thinking songs in my head. I am very good at coming up with melodies, harmonies, etc. But I can't execute. I don't know if it's something intrinsically wrong with my brain, or if it is something that could be learned. This problem threw me into a deep depression a few times, and recently I've been thinking of pursuing music again, and I'm going down that same path. I just want to know if it's a hopeless pursuit and I'd better forget about music and move in a different direction. Ironically, I'm exceptionally good at writing, but it never attracted me so much as the pure joy of music for some reason (Fate's cruel design, I think).

I play Classical pieces and I think practice and relaxations techniques like Yoga works well. your fingers won't be relaxed if your mind isn't. and learning proper finger techniques and your arm and elbow positioning always help. but your entire arm from shoulder down has to be relaxed.

 

[Tennis_Hands]

I predict that this thread will turn into another of those attention-seeking threads that Rusty does so well.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

Glad to hear you're making progress with your quest to improve. Isn't it incredibly satisfying when those little break-throughs start happening? When I first experience moments of locking in whilst playing two independent patterns simultaneously - whether two hands working independently on a keyboard or between voice/instrument - at first, it feels almost as if I'm momentarily floating; suddenly disconnected from my own conscious actions but able to control them on a more intuitive level. This information is perhaps of no use whatsoever but fortunately you have -NN- giving you some clearly-considered advice. . obviously knowledgeable on this subject, and seemingly interested in your progress -
the infraweb at its best.

Right..
Back to poasting silly pics



Happy New Year!

Yes, the one thing about music is that there is a deeper divide between what you see in your mind, and the ability to put it into fruition, so even if you can think of something, there are additional obstacles in your way to get what you want (vs something more immediate, like writing.)

I wasn't expecting to see the improvement just from sporadic exercises in these few weeks, that's for sure. And you are correct, it is a great feeling!

Happy New Year too, I hope hte hangover is not too severe.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

Nowhere near as mellifluous as Nick's Riverman. Impressive nonetheless..

Yes, that is impressive, but at this point to me that's gymnastics more than music. I remember having a conversation with a College Professor (a Physics professor, not even a Music professor) about the relative merits of Liszt, and he protested that much of his work was an artificious shell without much payload in terms of deep meaning, and he pointed me to Beethoven's Quartets. I personally think Liszt has some great works, but I can actually see his point now.

 

[Comb Over Champion]

I play Classical pieces and I think practice and relaxations techniques like Yoga works well. your fingers won't be relaxed if your mind isn't. and learning proper finger techniques and your arm and elbow positioning always help. but your entire arm from shoulder down has to be relaxed.

Thank you, but I don't think this specific problem had to do with muscle tone. What classical pieces to you play, by the way? Are you a pianist?

 

[MatsPhilander]

 

[jhick]

Yes, that is impressive, but at this point to me that's gymnastics more than music. I remember having a conversation with a College Professor (a Physics professor, not even a Music professor) about the relative merits of Liszt, and he protested that much of his work was an artificious shell without much payload in terms of deep meaning, and he pointed me to Beethoven's Quartets. I personally think Liszt has some great works, but I can actually see his point now.

Hiromi is an amazing pianist. Not all of her music is pure virtuosity. She plays with tons of emotion and passion. Some of her work I personally can't get into, but others are just magical.

 

[LGQ7]

I don't know music nor piano. I taught myself to be ambidextrous. Everyday I flip a coin to see if I'll be left handed or right handed that day. I wear my watch on the hand that day to remind myself. Then, as much as I can, I'll do everything that hand that day, except like signing a credit card receipt.