Practice Tools

Practice Strategies & Approaches

Introductory videos on how to approach and organise your practising for more productive and rewarding sessions.... Read >>

Skeleton Practice

This series of articles will describe how to deconstruct a score and use skeleton practice by way of a number of examples. New articles and examples will be added on an ongoing basis therefore please do watch this space!... Read >>

How and When to Use Slow Practice

I have noticed some folk think they are beyond slow practice – that’s something only beginners do. Far from it! One of the twentieth century’s great pianists, Sergei Rachmaninov practised so slowly that even his colleagues didn’t recognise the piece. This was not music he was learning from scratch, but something he had performed many times and was practising slowly in order to keep it in good shape. If you’re serious about playing the piano, there’s no getting away from slow practice. It is a cornerstone of our work from the beginner stages right through to the advanced level, and... Read >>

Looping

To make ourselves thoroughly comfortable with a tricky passage, it can be helpful to practise it “on a loop”, repeating several times. With each repetition we aim to finesse our sound, to feel loose and free in the body and to correct any unwanted accents, wobbles or dings. Chopin - Waltz in E minor, B.56 Beethoven - Sonata No. 30... Read >>

Developing Speed

Now that you've learnt your piece at the "Speed of no mistakes", how do you go about increasing the tempo to performance speed? Many pianists use the incremental metronome method in which the metronome tempo is gradually increased for a passage. However, there are much better ways to build speed! This video introduces a few highly effective methods for increasing tempo whilst avoiding tension and retaining accuracy. Schubert -... Read >>

The Practice Tools Lecture Series

Without an understanding how to approach practising the piano, day-to-day practice can often be unfocussed and unproductive. In this series of video lectures, I identify and explore various practice tools that will help pianists of any level get the most out of their time spent practising.... Read >>

Luxuriant Piano Playing

A Wellness Philosophy and Practice

In these excerpts from his presentation at NCKP 2021, William Westney shows that whether we are concert performers or beginners, we can all luxuriate in free-flowing, generous, comfortable, unfettered, and unforced movements that “feel great” at the piano.... Read >>

Miming

Miming, or "shadow" practice, is a silent piano technique where the pianist deliberately prevents the keys from sounding—either by lightly touching or partially depressing them—to develop finger control, internal hearing and independence between hands or voices. Chopin - Étude Op. 25, No. 1 Clementi - Sonatina in C Major, Op. 36 no. 3 (1st mvt) ... Read >>

Doubles

Doubles (or triples!) is a way of addressing challenging patterns within passages where we have a string of fast notes of like rhythmical values (e.g. semiquavers) by playing each pair of notes twice (or more). Mozart - Var. 1 From 12 Variations on "Ah vous dirai-je, maman", K. 265 Nielsen - Snurretoppen (No. 2 from Humoreske-Bagateller, Op. 11) ... Read >>