@ThePianoProfKateBoyd Thank you so much, professor, for taking the time to answer my question, and I feel like I'm one of your students. I have watched this a number of times. I've also watched all of your videos about this topic. I appreciate your input 👍 Recently I just found your channel, and I've subscribed to it. It amazed me how much I've learned from you outside of my regular lessons, yet I don't pay you anything. Blessed your heart ❤️ to help tons of people like me. I am looking forward to your next video.
Every video you do makes me want to run to the piano and practice what you just taught 😂 Very helpful, thank you. I am going to try this 30 day challenge
For me sight reading is slow but I noticed I improved when I played a few measures at a time. This was the best trick to sight reading I learned from my band instructors. They made learning piano more enjoyable.
Thank you for posting these videos!! I’ve been looking for advanced teaching on UA-cam for a while and so happy I found your channel. You explain things very intelligently and concisely
The first day I started with a teacher I was completely lost when he put up sheet music that I hadn't written all the notes above the staff. I bought a Bach Chorale Sightreading book and spend at least 15 minutes every day. I am at a 2 voice level but I try the 3 and 4 voice levels at the suggestion of my teacher. The chords don't jump off the page yet, in fact, they crawl out with a limp...but it's starting.
Way to go - keep it up! Open score reading is a true challenge! It's essential to develop an understanding of the feel of the keyboard - practice playing while looking at the score and not looking at your hands.
I recommend the Practice of Harmony to learn about figured bass and how all this music was written. Its basically intervals over a bassline that tells the harmonic story. All the exercises are done at the piano. It is life changing
I have been sight reading daily for about a month now. 15-20 minutes a day. I’m using the Paul Harris series and also various easy piano songs that I can find either online or in books. It’s hard and takes so much concentration but I think I’m getting better slowly. I do play each exercise 2-3 times before I move on like you suggest.
Great! It's a good observation that it takes a lot of concentration, especially to change mental habits and improve the speed of hand-eye coordination. Good luck!
@@odiajulius2349 may I ask how long you worked on sight reading before you felt that you “cracked the code”? How long each day/how many exercises from his books did you practice? I am now on Book 4 of his series “How to Improve Your Sight Reading”. I plan on getting through all 8 books.
I'm also using the Paul Harris series. I did grade 1 just fine but then I realized I was struggling too much in grade 2 so did grade one again but this time it went much faster and didn't even feel overwhelming. I guess I've improved. Will start grade 2 again soon. Just sick with covid right now
Great video! The challenge for me is to apply music theory with sight reading. I've been learning piano theory in my piano lessons for years. I took California Certificate of Merit Level8 test (total 10 levels) a few years ago, I scored 98% in theory. I can answer questions but still find it hard to apply with a piece of music, e.g. secondary dominant chord. Does only a new piece you never played count for sight-reading? The 2nd time when I play the same sight reading piece, I can do much better. However, it's impossible in a sight reading test.
Typically, yes, sight-reading applies to playing a piece through for the first time without having practiced it. Sometimes playing it through a second time can count as "sightreading" as long as you haven't spent time in thorough practice yet. The more you practice the skill of sightreading the more you will be able to recognize music theory concepts in the music and further develop your skills! Good luck and happy practicing! 😊👏🏻
Dear Prof, I am so glad that you continue to both preach sightreading and continue to show us new angles in. Is their good value to listening to a recording with the score? It would seem like speed-reading but perhaps it would make our reading brain move faster. Thoughts?
Definitely! In fact, somebody just wrote to me the other day to tell me that she did a lot of listening to pieces on UA-cam in videos that also show the score, and it helped her sight reading immensely. This is also why I always recommend listening to several recordings while following along in your score before you learn a new piece.
Great video, thanks! I like it when you share how it applies to your life, and how you've seen the brain\body work when it comes to learning piano more effectively. The way you explained ways to more deeply learn about a song.., and good point about the music you play being the point. I imagine that helps prevent people from falling into being too dependent upon the notation, to bring it to life. I'm looking forward to more of your videos.
Time for a review after one month. I have several level 2 method books, and I use my level 1 method books for sightreading to have easier pieces to practic. Gotta be tenacious like a Bulldog, eh Prof?
Do you have a tutorial on how to practice scales? I tend to avoid practicing them. But more and more I am hearing the importance of practicing scales and chords.
Thanks for another AMAZING and VERY helpful video! Can we please get a copy somewhere (download?) the Haydn Sonata music score, even just the page you are showing (also other scores you use in your other videos)? So we can practice marking our copy and playing these intervals as you talk about them ? Thanks so much for all you do for us!!
Yes! Tucker is a 2-year-old rescue. We got him from the Michigan Standard Poodle Rescue and it's working out well! He's a bit shy and skittish but he loves piano music!
Thank you Kate for another fine lesson. Do you have any thoughts on how to deal with what I'll call the "long measure problem"? For instance, a measure of a Medtner sonata with a thick key signature and tons of accidentals has me grinding to a halt by the end as all the accidentals and anti-accidentals take up all the mental bandwidth. Is it better to write in clarifying notation at the outset or just to persist in trying to improve this particular short-term memory skill?
It sounds like that particular measure needs extra TLC - when I have that in a piece I'm working on, I take that measure apart and do extra drilling, both hands separate and together. Also, I have a policy that if I mis-play an accidental more than once, I write it into the music. It saves time to help clarify by writing in cautionary accidentals. Also, if a chord is enharmonically a different chord (i.e., spelled as F-flat major,) I'll write the "easier-to-remember" harmony above the chord (i.e., "E Major"). Hope this helps!
@@ThePianoProfKateBoyd Super thoughtful of you to give this detailed reply. I will give your 1 free flub policy a try. Yes, those enharmonic chords give me a brain ache more often than not. Best wishes and thanks again!
Thank you. This is really practical as you brought out what you actually do. I got discouraged to do sightreading, but now am revived. I find my problems to be in having good fingering and getting tempted to read note names and not interval. Also another problem in areas where the score has four parts, how can I simultaenously look at g clef and bass clef notes and play without delay? Thanks alot madam
Thanks for your question. Can you clarify what you mean by "four parts"? If you are talking about open score reading, with 4 different staves, that is very challenging and involves high-level sight reading proficiency at a semi-professional level. If you are talking about a score with a treble and bass clef that has 2 parts in each hand (like a chorale or hymn setting), that will involve learning to scan the music and recognize the patterns. Start with something simpler that is within your ability to do pretty well, and then build on that gradually over time.
While watching this video, I often felt the urge to click the like button. Then I realized I had already clicked it! Unfortunately, UA-cam doesn't allow multiple likes on a single video.
Do anynof your sightreading videos cover reading ledger lines quickly? I never got very proficient once it got above about high E or low A, Im not sure why or if there is a tip on getting better at those.
There's no easy trick I'm aware of - I'd suggest learning which ledger line notes are on lines or spaces and then also visually memorizing the look of distance between different ledger line intervals so you can scan and process them easily.
If you have big jumps you can definitely look down to find them. The goal is not to "never" look down, under any circumstances. The goal is to reduce/minimize your dependence on using your eyes to find the notes, and improve your hands' ability to feel the distance between the notes, so that you can read music and rarely need to look down at your hands. It's a good exercise to gain familiarity with the topography of the keyboard and improve your tactile abilities to do exercises where you "feel" and "measure" your way between notes that are far apart. Good luck!
@@ThePianoProfKateBoyd That's great! I feel relieved and self-assured. I'm really improving with minimizing my looking down. I'm still having problem with strange distances. But I'm sure that if I can "indulge" to look down for a half-second, it's all set. Thank you very much again, Kate, for your kind and attentive advising!
Melodic patterns are when the melody repeats the same shape over and over. For example, if you have an ascending broken 4-note arpeggio as a melodic line, and then that repeats several times starting on a different note, that would be a melodic pattern. (Example pitches: C-E-G-C, D-F-A-D, E-G-B-E)
Sorry for asking alot of questions We have many keys and intervals in different keys have specific buttons whether white or black Now if you play intervelically without being mindful of the note names, how do you quickly figure out that the interval involves white or black buttons For instance, if I am in C major and spot a 5th interval from C, i know its G and its a white key Now how can this apply in others keys? Or does it mean that each key should be learnt by heart?
Good question! Yes, you're correct! You need to learn the black-white key patterns for each key. A good place to start with that is to learn chord progressions in all major and minor keys. If you can play I-IV-V7-I in all major and minor keys, that will help you get a feel for the black/white key patterns unique to each key, and that in turn will help you when you're sight reading in a specific key. If you don't know what I mean when I talk about chord progressions, I recommend that you learn some theory - a good series that was written for pianists is Keith Snell's "Fundamentals of Piano Theory" books. Good luck!
There's a bit of a discussion going on about "sight reading" where people associate it with "prima vista". We're playing a passage more than once (the ideas are fantastic!). Are there different meanings to "sight reading" used in different places? Thx. :)
The first time you read a piece would be "prima vista" - so you need to play it through without stopping at a steady tempo. But if you only read a piece a single time and move on without examining it further, your opportunity to actually improve at sight reading and learn from that example is lost. An analogy would be: if you take a language quiz and you only score 6/10 on the test, you will learn more if you take the time to examine and practice the things you missed, in order to get a higher score on the next test you take. And so, taking the time to repeat and do a little practicing on your sight reading selection AFTER reading it through the first time will help you identify the patterns, notes and rhythms you missed and increase your ability to recognize them the first time in the next piece you sight read.
Learning theory - especially the circle of fifths, chords and intervals, and applying it to every piece you play will help you start to identify chords more quickly. There are a few basic progressions that repeat, and so, with continuous practice, you will start to recognize them more easily as you scan the music. One series I particularly like is the Keith Snell "Fundamentals of Piano Theory" series that presents music theory specifically for pianists.
Sorry madam for lots of questions We have many keys and if you sightread by interval without being mindful of note names, how do you quickly figure out if the interval lands on the white or black button
Watch Next: 4 Apps to Help You IMPROVE your Piano Sight Reading! 🎹👀 ua-cam.com/video/YnJc4kjK-5U/v-deo.html
Very helpful! Thanks a lot!
@ThePianoProfKateBoyd Thank you so much, professor, for taking the time to answer my question, and I feel like I'm one of your students. I have watched this a number of times. I've also watched all of your videos about this topic. I appreciate your input 👍 Recently I just found your channel, and I've subscribed to it. It amazed me how much I've learned from you outside of my regular lessons, yet I don't pay you anything. Blessed your heart ❤️ to help tons of people like me. I am looking forward to your next video.
Every video you do makes me want to run to the piano and practice what you just taught 😂
Very helpful, thank you.
I am going to try this 30 day challenge
Awesome! So glad to hear that! Good luck with the 30-day challenge!
For me sight reading is slow but I noticed I improved when I played a few measures at a time. This was the best trick to sight reading I learned from my band instructors. They made learning piano more enjoyable.
Good tip! It can be really helpful to do just a few measures at a time - that can help break it down into smaller pieces.
Thank you for posting these videos!! I’ve been looking for advanced teaching on UA-cam for a while and so happy I found your channel. You explain things very intelligently and concisely
You are so welcome! Thanks for your comment!
The first day I started with a teacher I was completely lost when he put up sheet music that I hadn't written all the notes above the staff. I bought a Bach Chorale Sightreading book and spend at least 15 minutes every day. I am at a 2 voice level but I try the 3 and 4 voice levels at the suggestion of my teacher. The chords don't jump off the page yet, in fact, they crawl out with a limp...but it's starting.
Way to go - keep it up! Open score reading is a true challenge! It's essential to develop an understanding of the feel of the keyboard - practice playing while looking at the score and not looking at your hands.
I recommend the Practice of Harmony to learn about figured bass and how all this music was written. Its basically intervals over a bassline that tells the harmonic story. All the exercises are done at the piano. It is life changing
Thank you for the suggestion! I'll check it out!
I have been sight reading daily for about a month now. 15-20 minutes a day. I’m using the Paul Harris series and also various easy piano songs that I can find either online or in books. It’s hard and takes so much concentration but I think I’m getting better slowly. I do play each exercise 2-3 times before I move on like you suggest.
Great! It's a good observation that it takes a lot of concentration, especially to change mental habits and improve the speed of hand-eye coordination. Good luck!
Paul Harris cracked the code for me back then . Best approach I know of yet
@@odiajulius2349 may I ask how long you worked on sight reading before you felt that you “cracked the code”? How long each day/how many exercises from his books did you practice? I am now on Book 4 of his series “How to Improve Your Sight Reading”. I plan on getting through all 8 books.
I'm also using the Paul Harris series. I did grade 1 just fine but then I realized I was struggling too much in grade 2 so did grade one again but this time it went much faster and didn't even feel overwhelming. I guess I've improved. Will start grade 2 again soon. Just sick with covid right now
Great video! The challenge for me is to apply music theory with sight reading. I've been learning piano theory in my piano lessons for years. I took California Certificate of Merit Level8 test (total 10 levels) a few years ago, I scored 98% in theory. I can answer questions but still find it hard to apply with a piece of music, e.g. secondary dominant chord. Does only a new piece you never played count for sight-reading? The 2nd time when I play the same sight reading piece, I can do much better. However, it's impossible in a sight reading test.
Typically, yes, sight-reading applies to playing a piece through for the first time without having practiced it. Sometimes playing it through a second time can count as "sightreading" as long as you haven't spent time in thorough practice yet. The more you practice the skill of sightreading the more you will be able to recognize music theory concepts in the music and further develop your skills! Good luck and happy practicing! 😊👏🏻
Extremely useful Prof.Thanks.
Glad it was helpful!
Dear Prof, I am so glad that you continue to both preach sightreading and continue to show us new angles in.
Is their good value to listening to a recording with the score? It would seem like speed-reading but perhaps it would make our reading brain move faster.
Thoughts?
Definitely! In fact, somebody just wrote to me the other day to tell me that she did a lot of listening to pieces on UA-cam in videos that also show the score, and it helped her sight reading immensely.
This is also why I always recommend listening to several recordings while following along in your score before you learn a new piece.
10:18 10:21
Thanks for this xxx
Such a great video, thank you so much 🙏🏼
Glad it was helpful!
Thank you for clarification
Great video, thanks! I like it when you share how it applies to your life, and how you've seen the brain\body work when it comes to learning piano more effectively. The way you explained ways to more deeply learn about a song.., and good point about the music you play being the point. I imagine that helps prevent people from falling into being too dependent upon the notation, to bring it to life.
I'm looking forward to more of your videos.
Thanks so much! Glad you're here!
Time for a review after one month. I have several level 2 method books, and I use my level 1 method books for sightreading to have easier pieces to practic. Gotta be tenacious like a Bulldog, eh Prof?
Go Dawgs! 😊
Do you have a tutorial on how to practice scales? I tend to avoid practicing them. But more and more I am hearing the importance of practicing scales and chords.
Yes, I have a scale playlist. Here's the first video in the series. Enjoy! ua-cam.com/video/gIDxRODsEV4/v-deo.html
Thank you so much. Blessings.
Thank you for your help
You're very welcome! 😊
Thanks for another AMAZING and VERY helpful video! Can we please get a copy somewhere (download?) the Haydn Sonata music score, even just the page you are showing (also other scores you use in your other videos)? So we can practice marking our copy
and playing these intervals as you talk about them ? Thanks so much for all you do for us!!
Yes! Tucker is a 2-year-old rescue. We got him from the Michigan Standard Poodle Rescue and it's working out well! He's a bit shy and skittish but he loves piano music!
Thank you Kate for another fine lesson. Do you have any thoughts on how to deal with what I'll call the "long measure problem"? For instance, a measure of a Medtner sonata with a thick key signature and tons of accidentals has me grinding to a halt by the end as all the accidentals and anti-accidentals take up all the mental bandwidth. Is it better to write in clarifying notation at the outset or just to persist in trying to improve this particular short-term memory skill?
It sounds like that particular measure needs extra TLC - when I have that in a piece I'm working on, I take that measure apart and do extra drilling, both hands separate and together. Also, I have a policy that if I mis-play an accidental more than once, I write it into the music. It saves time to help clarify by writing in cautionary accidentals. Also, if a chord is enharmonically a different chord (i.e., spelled as F-flat major,) I'll write the "easier-to-remember" harmony above the chord (i.e., "E Major"). Hope this helps!
@@ThePianoProfKateBoyd Super thoughtful of you to give this detailed reply. I will give your 1 free flub policy a try. Yes, those enharmonic chords give me a brain ache more often than not. Best wishes and thanks again!
Thank you. This is really practical as you brought out what you actually do.
I got discouraged to do sightreading, but now am revived.
I find my problems to be in having good fingering and getting tempted to read note names and not interval.
Also another problem in areas where the score has four parts, how can I simultaenously look at g clef and bass clef notes and play without delay?
Thanks alot madam
Thanks for your question. Can you clarify what you mean by "four parts"? If you are talking about open score reading, with 4 different staves, that is very challenging and involves high-level sight reading proficiency at a semi-professional level.
If you are talking about a score with a treble and bass clef that has 2 parts in each hand (like a chorale or hymn setting), that will involve learning to scan the music and recognize the patterns. Start with something simpler that is within your ability to do pretty well, and then build on that gradually over time.
While watching this video, I often felt the urge to click the like button. Then I realized I had already clicked it! Unfortunately, UA-cam doesn't allow multiple likes on a single video.
Awww, thanks!
Sounds fun.
Do you have music in Braille I can practice with??
Here is a website that provides many Braille resources for music!
nfb.org/resources/braille-resources/braille-music-resources
Great video! What model is the tablet you use to read? Thanks!
Thanks! It's an iPad Pro.
Do anynof your sightreading videos cover reading ledger lines quickly? I never got very proficient once it got above about high E or low A, Im not sure why or if there is a tip on getting better at those.
There's no easy trick I'm aware of - I'd suggest learning which ledger line notes are on lines or spaces and then also visually memorizing the look of distance between different ledger line intervals so you can scan and process them easily.
Is sight reading factory an effective way of practicing sight reading?
Yes, that's a helpful tool!
How to find every single note you read, even those which are far away from the former ones, without searching for them with the eyes?!
If you have big jumps you can definitely look down to find them. The goal is not to "never" look down, under any circumstances. The goal is to reduce/minimize your dependence on using your eyes to find the notes, and improve your hands' ability to feel the distance between the notes, so that you can read music and rarely need to look down at your hands.
It's a good exercise to gain familiarity with the topography of the keyboard and improve your tactile abilities to do exercises where you "feel" and "measure" your way between notes that are far apart. Good luck!
@@ThePianoProfKateBoyd That's great! I feel relieved and self-assured. I'm really improving with minimizing my looking down. I'm still having problem with strange distances. But I'm sure that if I can "indulge" to look down for a half-second, it's all set. Thank you very much again, Kate, for your kind and attentive advising!
What is melodic patterns,thx
Melodic patterns are when the melody repeats the same shape over and over. For example, if you have an ascending broken 4-note arpeggio as a melodic line, and then that repeats several times starting on a different note, that would be a melodic pattern. (Example pitches: C-E-G-C, D-F-A-D, E-G-B-E)
Sorry for asking alot of questions
We have many keys and intervals in different keys have specific buttons whether white or black
Now if you play intervelically without being mindful of the note names, how do you quickly figure out that the interval involves white or black buttons
For instance, if I am in C major and spot a 5th interval from C, i know its G and its a white key
Now how can this apply in others keys? Or does it mean that each key should be learnt by heart?
Good question! Yes, you're correct! You need to learn the black-white key patterns for each key. A good place to start with that is to learn chord progressions in all major and minor keys. If you can play I-IV-V7-I in all major and minor keys, that will help you get a feel for the black/white key patterns unique to each key, and that in turn will help you when you're sight reading in a specific key. If you don't know what I mean when I talk about chord progressions, I recommend that you learn some theory - a good series that was written for pianists is Keith Snell's "Fundamentals of Piano Theory" books. Good luck!
There's a bit of a discussion going on about "sight reading" where people associate it with "prima vista". We're playing a passage more than once (the ideas are fantastic!). Are there different meanings to "sight reading" used in different places? Thx. :)
The first time you read a piece would be "prima vista" - so you need to play it through without stopping at a steady tempo. But if you only read a piece a single time and move on without examining it further, your opportunity to actually improve at sight reading and learn from that example is lost. An analogy would be: if you take a language quiz and you only score 6/10 on the test, you will learn more if you take the time to examine and practice the things you missed, in order to get a higher score on the next test you take.
And so, taking the time to repeat and do a little practicing on your sight reading selection AFTER reading it through the first time will help you identify the patterns, notes and rhythms you missed and increase your ability to recognize them the first time in the next piece you sight read.
The video comes to the surprising conclusion that if you practise every day, you end up playing the piano better.
Dear prof how can you identify chords so fast?
Learning theory - especially the circle of fifths, chords and intervals, and applying it to every piece you play will help you start to identify chords more quickly. There are a few basic progressions that repeat, and so, with continuous practice, you will start to recognize them more easily as you scan the music.
One series I particularly like is the Keith Snell "Fundamentals of Piano Theory" series that presents music theory specifically for pianists.
Sorry madam for lots of questions
We have many keys and if you sightread by interval without being mindful of note names, how do you quickly figure out if the interval lands on the white or black button