I would be interested to know what other players consciously think about when practising scales?

Presently I give each note its relative name as I play it. And focus on my left hand when ascending a scale and on my right hand when descending. But I realise that there are many possibilities. And that some may be more conducive to better playing than others.

I focus on how many octaves I've actually done but most of the time I focus on accurate fingering

I focus on the pattern of the keys that makes up the scale - each key has a different shape.

All the above and many more (not necessarily all at the same time).

Fingering patterns should be so well drilled that they need no conscious thought. This is achieved by lots of slow practice making certain to use exactly the same fingers each time. It is good to learn scales in groups that use the same fingering pattern - only when a pattern is well established to learn scales with different patterns.


When playing hands together it is very important that the notes sound precisely together, with not even the tiniest splitting. [Ditto for double thirds and octave - and sixths and fourths too if you practice those]

When playing legato it is important to avoid the slightest hint of overlapping notes (smudging). Each new note should sound precisely (there is that word agin) as the previous one ends.

I also practice starting and stopping on any degree of the scale. This sort of work helps a lot with playing scale passages as they occur in real pieces - and in sight reading - much better than always starting on the tonic.

But right now my main scale work is building towards playing very fast runs with beautiful and even tone. [easy to say - not so easy to do] This often needs changes to the "standard fingerings" to remove awkward thumb shifts.

How are you getting on with just one hand operational, Mad Tom? Do you practise scales with just the left hand, or aren't you bothering with them at present?

Lots and lots of lovely extra scales and technical exercises for the LH. Especially thirds, sixths, and octaves.

Heresy!!

(p.s. Promise not to tell nurse - I took the splints off a day early and have been doing a little bit of Bach with the RH - but it is still too sore for anything with big leaps or loud passages)

[quote name='Mad Tom' date='Oct 7 2008, 07:03 AM' post='748270'
(p.s. Promise not to tell nurse - I took the splints off a day early and have been doing a little bit of Bach with the RH - but it is still too sore for anything with big leaps or loud passages)
[/quote]

*running to the nurse* ... *but saying nothing*

Take care, don't strain yourself! If it is fine to do so, keep massaging and relaxing your RH. Hope to see it back in full action soon!

In the meantime, is your LH now more dexterous than before?

i always try to make crescendo-decrescendo to make them musical, also the arm weight and curved fingers

I normally think about what I'm going to have for lunch Could be the reason why my scales haven't improved much.

Legato: I am always trying to figure out whether my LH is slower than my RH, and whether the LH is too soft. Lately I am required to work on cresc and desc, so I am trying to internalise the points at which I should apply a change in volume. I still suffer from lack of arm weight and too much stress in the forearms, so I am constantly trying to relax.

Staccato: My LH plays in a different way from my RH, resulting in a tired upper arm. I am trying to close that gap.

I have just decided to work on hands separate, a few scales a day, because a test during class revealed that my LH only copies the RH, and actually cannot play many of the scales without the RH leading it! Stupid LH!

I normally read a book when I practice my scales, a habit I've got to get out of very soon!!!!

It's easier to hear this if you practice with hand 2 octaves apart.



This is the danger if you don't practice separate hands as well as together.
The tendency is to think that once you are playing scales hands together you have outgrown the hands separate thing.
I noticed this around grade 5 and after that kept separate hands practice up as well as hand together.

I remember just once being asked in an exam to do a scale with LH only. It really threw me as it would be easier I'm sure to do both hands rather than just LH alone. It was E Minor (Harmonic)

I think about the visual shape the scale makes on the keyboard - the rest of my brain thinks about whatever it fancies...

Being a baby piano player.........I think about the next note to play.
Bev.

Oh dear! I try to concentrate on fingering, but I also say to myself an annoying rhyme, that went with scales when I was a child. Something along the lines of: "Now I'll go up to the top, and down again until I stop - which is very irritating when I'm playing three octave scales.

I believe that is the way the great virtuosi go about it too.

Well the following seemed obvious things to look at (after a few classes...)

- Playing the right notes
- Playing the right notes with the right fingering
- Playing the notes with even rhythm, and not speeding up on the LH ascending/RH descending (which is easier)
- Making sure that the thumb under's rhythm is even
- Listening for equal volume/tone
- Trying to play with all fingers, other than the one pressing down, nice and relaxed

After reading a thread about placing emphasis as to 4/4 or 3/4, I've been playing with that. Whoa, thinking about that messed up a load of other stuff! I don't play with emphasis normally, but certainly an interesting thing to do.

Currently only playing one hand, two octaves. Occasionally playing with two hand, one octave, or one hand four octaves (concentrating on decent hand position).

Now I read people talking about playing hands together, assuming one octave apart - is it possible to play other ways? (Other than contrary motion, which seems significantly easier as I'm doing thumb under at the same time in both hands).

P.S. Only playing C,G & D at the moment. Though have dabbled with others. Arpeggios to follow soon I hope.

scales a third and a 6th apart
scales in legato thirds

I tend to concentrate on fingering for the left hand and my right hand seems to do the right thing .... most of the time!!!! I think lots of practice so that finger memory comes into play is the best course of action.

For me learning hands together was not something I could rush, I just had to keep going and then (like many things on piano ) when it just started to seem hopeless it eventually 'clicks'.
I don't really think about much fingering wise when practicing scales, I find that if I don't think about it then a kind of 'second nature' takes over. However with some scales I use the black notes as benchmarks (e.g. B major- 3rd finger C#, 4th finger F#). Sometimes it's a case of going for it, hoping for the best and feeling relieved when if I finish with the right fingers (probably not the best method).



Exactly the same with me, in my head I might think 5-4-3-2-1-3-2-1 or whatever to guide my left hand but my right hand does its own thing! (Usually right though, as you say)

What Mad Tom wrote: precision, tone, articulation. Varying a lot when it's an easy scale (e.g. I'll try to articulate it in some madly difficult way, or in two different difficult ways, which means I have to slow it down radically).

I'm mystified why or how, but in the last couple of years scales and exercises have become enjoyable. I think happy thoughts and enjoy getting something very simple and/or very slow exactly right. If I've got spare mental capacity I use it to smile and pull strange/mad/happy faces. (Try it!) There's something about playing exercises and scales as music, and trying out different ways of playing them, which seems to dissolve the "oh no, not scales..." instinct I'm so used to.

I used to hate anything other than blasting through pieces at full speed. God know's what's changed - if I knew I'd tell you! Maybe it's age? My brother-in-law, a professional musician, says he only really got to grips with practising properly in his 30s - almost 10 years into his career!

I think most teenage boys suffer from that, so if you're a bloke, it probably is age.

I have to confess that I tend to think about what's for dinner, what is likely to be the next domestic crisis and where are the cats - anything but what I am supposed to be playing. But that's only on the piano

On flute and recorder it tends to be on the lines of "How do I finger the next note, and what is it anyway?"