Our latest Practice Clinic recording features answers to questions on memorisation, how to bring a new piece up to speed, avoiding fatigue, pedalling and more in works by Heller, Burgmüller and Chopin.
Practice clinic questions
Stephen Heller Etude in E Minor, Op. 47 No. 15 – I’m having problems keeping up with the succession of broken chords featured in this piece. Can you advise me on how to cope and memorise all the harmonic changes this piece has?
Developing speed in new pieces – When learning a piece, how do you make the decision to move from slow practice in sections to full speed practice using the chaining technique?
You also suggest that once you start practising at speed, you shouldn’t go back to playing slowly. But I often find that attempting to play the piece at speed exposes problems that seem best addressed by slowing everything down.
Burgmüller 18 Characteristic Studies, Op. 109 Nos. 5 & 13 – I’m practising some of the studies from this set and questions about two of them:
- My RH gets very stiff and tired in No. 5, La Source (Spring). Can you suggest some ways to practise to help with that?
- The pedalling marks are confusing me in No. 13, L’orage (Storm). In some places they feel much too long, other places the release points are missing. There are also places there is no pedalling marked when it seems to be needed. Please advise!
Chopin Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 – No matter how much I practise I can’t seem to manage the RH spot in the coda, from bar 216. I can do it slowly but get in a tangle when I play up to the tempo. Any practice tips or suggestions would be much appreciated!
Next practice clinic & new format
Going forward, our practice clinics are no longer taking place on Facebook live but are rather pre-recorded and published alongside our regular blog posts. Please sign-up to our mailing list here for updates on future practice clinic dates and to receive links to the recordings when they become available.
Watch previous clinics
Recordings of past practice clinics are posted up on our blog, Facebook page and YouTube channel once recorded and you can also view our full archive of previous events via these platforms.
How they work?
Further information on how our practice clinics work is available here or please click here to find out more about the Online Academy.
Online Academy subscribers can submit questions for practice clinics up to two weeks before each session. This can be done using the link provided on the Online Academy dashboard under “subscription benefits” (click here to sign-in and visit your dashboard).
Further information on how our practice clinics work is available here or please click here to find out more about the Online Academy.