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Lesson 11-15 (March/April)
General aims:
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playing the pieces with the student (e.g. the teacher plays the accompaniment and the student plays the melody), learning how to cooperate, listening to the other person’s playing and making sure that the sound proportions are correct
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learning how to memorize the pieces (learning hands separately by heart, visual memory of the structure of the piece and ability to start from different phrases throughout of the piece) and how to reduce a stage fright (presenting a grading exam as a kind event, paying attention to the appropriate dress and behavior and organizing little performances during the lesson and for student’s family during the week)
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sight-reading (remembering the key signature, noticing the dynamic and articulation markings and looking ahead)
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broken chords (associating tonic chords with the harmonic structure of ‘Das Schaukelpferd’)
Grading pieces:
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Clementi ‘Arietta’
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clarity of the strong and the weak beat
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maintaining the same speed throughout the piece
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quality of the sound in forte and piano
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Duro ‘Calypso Joe’
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ability to play hands together
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style of the piece (adding accents on the weak beats and sudden dynamic changes)
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avoiding unnecessary head and foot movements (that distract rather than help with playing the correct rhythm)
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speed (working towards a fluent speed)
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Gurlitt ‘Das Schaukelpferd’
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equality of the quavers in the right hand
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introducing dynamics while sustaining small accents on the strong beats
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Problems faced:
Maintaining the pulse
Since November we have been working on maintaining the pulse while playing the pieces. Oliver has significantly improved but he still has moments when he forgets to listen to his playing and starts getting faster. According to him, he just looses concentration and starts thinking about things not connected with piano and his fingers start speeding up unintentionally. He was asked to practice by singing the melody line while playing the piece. I hope it’ll keep him thinking about music while performing.
Clever practicing
As I mentioned before, Oliver found my practicing charts helpful but I wanted him to start setting up his own practice goals. At the moment, I write the bullet points of what he has to pay attention to and his task is to write down his practicing regime, stick to it and show me what he has done in the next lesson. Then we can modify or change all the exercises that didn’t work or don’t make sense.