I have failed enumerable times in the past in attempting to learn this technique. This extraordinary presentation has made it so simple its almost embarrassing that other experienced teachers cannot communicate how to master this technique. Thank you very much Cory!
My advice for playing 4:3 polyrhythms. While yes, this is a good tutorial, I find a much less complex way of learning is much more easy. This is applied to Fantaisie Impromptu. Simply, print out the pages starting with the part on measure 13 (or you can bring out all of the pages.) I highly recommend starting on measure 13 no matter how many pages you bring out. I know this is really long, but it works. This is how I learned Fantaisie Impromptu, and with this, it makes it pretty easy. Go through each step and eventually, you'll get there. Part 9 talks about the slow section. Before I even get started, I think this is important. Playing with a metronome is tricky. I don't recommend you do it, really. It will probably mess you up. So, instead of that, think of your left hand as the metronome, so as long as you keep your left hand at a steady beat, your right hand will probably be at a steady beat as well. 1. Starting on measure 13, draw lines connecting the notes meant to be played together. Memorize the first tiny thing, half of measure 13, the first half. Memorize it (it's not too hard, I would think. It's just a few notes) 2. Then simply, play it at FULL SPEED playing EVERY note in your left hand, but ONLY the melody of your right hand. The melody in measure 13 is always played at the same time as a note in your left hand. For this particular measure, your right hand plays a G# with your left hand A. then your left hand has C# and F#, then your right hand plays an F# with your left hand A, then your left hand has F#, then C#. Just focus on that single part of measure 13. Play it at full speed. I know you are missing a total of 6 notes in your right hand, but just bear with me. 3. Once you're comfortable, try playing that entire section like that (starting on measure 13, ending on measure 17. Measure 17, the melody is the 2nd in the group of 4, not the first, therefore just ignore it until you get the rhythms right together. Remember, full speed, your right hand only playing the melody (the accented notes). Once you're comfortable with that, it's time to move onto the next step. 4. Adding in the other 3 notes in each group of 4. This seems really hard at first, but just go for it, at FULL SPEED. This is important to play it at full speed. Try your best to maintain even notes in both hands, but play it at full speed, or even as fast as you can. The other notes simply fit into place and you don't have to do a single thing. 5. Once you are comfortable with those few measures, go back to measure 17, and play 17-24, where the melody is the 2nd note. Since you just played it with the melody on the first note, this suddenly became pretty easy. 6. Go back to the beginning of the piece. Since you've been playing the 4:3 pretty easily (or should be at this point) then apply what you've been doing, starting with drawing the lines so you know which note in your right matches your left. Remember, the first notes being played together is a rest in your right hand. Count the rest as the first "note" in your group of 4 7. Just go for it! (Okay, learn the notes first by playing hands separately, but after that...) Go for it at full speed. Don't hesitate. "But what if I make a mistake" don't ask that, just go for it, remembering which notes get played with which notes. I highly recommend memorizing everything, but if you don't have it memorized, then it doesn't really matter. Just remember which notes get played together, hand have the other 3 notes in your right hand just fit right in. The more you do it, the more comfortable you'll be, and the more smooth it will become. 8. Just a little thing, once you've mastered measures 5-40, measures 83-118 are literally, exactly the same, and then the 4:3 is gone for the rest of the piece, so once you learn 5-40, you've pretty much conquered the entire piece, since the rest is pretty easy and repetitious. 9. There is, of course, the slow section, which also has the weird rhythm. Just a couple things to keep in mind. At the end of every measure that has a group of 4 grace notes followed by a dotted quarter, every time, the next note will be an 8th note, so just focus on playing it somewhere in between two notes in your left hand. Also, don't forget that 16th notes are faster than triplets in your left. Don't play them with a note in your left hand, play it right after. Each 16th is always followed by a note that is played with a note in your left hand. So your left hand plays 3 notes, then simply treat those 16th as if they were long grace notes; a note whose only purpose is to lead into the note following. Anyway, hope this helps!
Ryolio Your way is possible but not very clear. After that you maybe play the fantasie in a "ok" way - but you have to go through this proces everytime you want to play such a polyrhythm. BachScholar shows how to practice the rhythm for everytime, so his way is much better.
Its actually pretty ez, just think the 4th and 8th note in ur right played the same time with the 3rd and 6th with the left, just practice bar 5 and 6 over and over again and you'll eventually gonna master it quickly (i did this for like 3 days and it works lol)
Hey UA-cam viewers. Trust what this guy is teaching! It works! I started playing piano at age 21 but never learned rhythm. I just learn chords. I could never wrap my brain around playing 2 different tempos with each hand. After watching this video, I practiced exactly what he said for about a week and I can play the first couple of measures of the fantasie impromptu! Obviously slow because I’m a noob but I can play the rhythms! This guy is the best. I now believe that I can actually be a descent piano player because of this. Thank you. Hope this encouraged someone.
Hey Cory: Thanks for the wonderful tutorials. I've been a pianist my whole life. Berklee scholarship at sixteen, the whole works, but then threw away my chance by going into rock bands at a very young age and then leaving my classical music all together. Then recently at age 55 I began to practice again to see what I could do with my ability once and for all. I started with Beethoven's Moonlight and used your progressive tempo tutorial for the third movement. I am happy to say I have almost mastered the piece at 128 or 130 on the metronome and I wish to thank you for the wonderful approach to learning. I am now going to begin to tackle polyrhythms and take on Chopin's Fantasie impromptu. THANK YOU for your work and help.
Paul Zarvis Your welcome, Paul. I love it when "boomers" get back into music...in your case, classical. You must have been really good for a scholarship at Berklee at 16! Probably half of my students on Skype are around your age. I played in rock bands in high school and gave all that up for classical.
BachScholar Hi again Cory. Yeah I was the opposite! I was into classical and studied under a very good teacher named Emmanuel Levinson and also did two or three summers at Tanglewood with a pianist named Rudolph Serkin. I lived in Lenox MA so it was a great way to get to meet great pianists. Anyway, I was into classical and practicing at least five hours per day and then I found Rock and Roll and went that way. DUMB!!! Here is a link to some of my music from 2005 or 06. Looking forward to learning much more from your videos. They are immensely instructive and practical. Thanks so much! Here's that link: ourstage.com/profile/theacthundertones/songs. Take care and hope to hear some of your recorded playing if you have? Later. PZ
My husband has a dream that I'll be able to play Fantaisie Impromptu. I had official piano lessons up until I was 12 and everything after has been self taught. I love your videos, they are so educational as I continue to try and push myself in piano. My brain hurts but it is a good hurt. Now to go practice polyrhythms!
I asked my teacher for 2 3 polyrhythm on Schubert’s serenade and she says “just practice a hand in a time to get it ,and it takes about 3or 4day with many videos,but if there was a video like this ,it won’t take a day. Thank you ❤
After $0.25 cent lessons from a cousin starting when I was 13, I at age 71 have been working on my own "fiddling" with the pianoforte for some 58 years. I am dumbfounded at my level of ignorance, even though I have played Rachmaninoff and Chopin, Grieg, etc. Thank you for these videos.
As a drummer, I am fascinated by this video. I always strive to understand music and see the full picture and see things from a different perspective, rather than just from my own point of view and this video was a great help to me :) Thanks
Now I want to fully ditch my piano teacher. This week I asked her for help with 3:4 on a Debussy piece and she said, "Oh, it's easy. Just practice and you'll get it." >:{
Sign up with me for lessons via Skype. I have openings and I will teach you how to play 3:4 correctly. Most teachers don't teach 3:4 because they can't do it themselves. I am one of the only teachers in the world who teaches 3:4 correctly. Please see my website for more details!
thinkofsomecreativeusername Instead of posting a typo correction in a separate post, you can edit what you've typed by clicking on those three dots to the right of your post and selecting "edit."
Outstanding video, thank you! When people emphasize the value of all the information we have available to us nowadays that we should better take advantage, this video for me is exactly what they’re talking about.
Before this i didnt know what polyrhythms were and you taught me in this video. I can still remember everything you explained. I had played the fantasie impromptu before but i never noticed the rhythm. I see it in a new way now thanks to you. I hope to see more.
By far this has been the best explanation of polyrhythms I’ve seen. My piano teacher couldn’t even help and She’s awesome! Thank you, as I’ve struggled with the polyrhythm section of the second movement of Beethoven’s sonata #1 that is a 4:3. Well done.
It was a great help while studying the first Etude Andantino F-moll of the 3 Etudes without opus number. This has the same rythm as the Fantaisie Impromptu. Thank you very much from Holland.
Very, very useful. Crystal clear. Brilliant...and it really shows the work that goes behind learning to play polyrhythms with confidence and consistency. Not something you can master in a weekend, but wonderfully satisfying when you finally ‘get it’.
Thanks for this turoetial. A colleglue , a formaer student of my late mother, and a music major told me he was once jealous of me because I was learning Lize Hungarian Rapsody no 2. Later her had Fantasky Impromptu in his repatoire. I coule never figure out how to get it together. Now at age 73, I;m going to attemp to leaern it.
I never really played Polyrythm and since I'm not able to go to my piano teacher, I decided to home teach myself a little bit and this video is helping me quite a bit, so I'll go with the exercise for now, practice thus for a week until it's fluent, meanwhile memorise the notes of Fantasie Impromtu and I hope I will be able to play it, even if the pre phase will take long. Thank you very much for all your helpful sessions, I'm really grateful for thus.
Thank you for this video. I'm finally understanding polyrhythms. I can do it at a slow speed now and ill keep practicing and increasing the speed. Great video
Oh my gosh! I absolutely adore Fantaisie Impromptu. Thank you so much for breaking it down in a very logical but practical way. Amazing Cory!!!! Truly Amazing!!!! I can now see how to begin putting it together.
As always, a very clear and informative video, Cory. Thanks for posting it! When I was in college, a drummer friend of mine told me a great (and funny) way to remember and practice 4:3 is by saying or thinking the phrase, "Eat your goddamn (or goshdarn) carrots." "Turnips" or "Cheetos" would work, too. : ) Of course, any phrase with that rhythm would be fine. Many years have gone by since he told me, but I've never forgotten it. This is just a variation of what you've explained so well in the video, but for anyone who wants to get this under his or her fingers even if away from the piano is to simply tap on a table or thighs with two hands or index fingers. So, if the right hand is going to do the group of "4" say (or think) and tap like this and gradually speed it up: Eat your god damn Chee tos R R R R REPEAT L L L Something I do--even without thinking, as it's kind of relaxing--is to practice rapidly switching the roles of the left and right hand. In other words, give the 4 to the right hand for the first 4, then immediately give the 4 to the left and keep alternating without stopping. It's an excellent coordinating exercise. It would look like this: Eat your gosh darn tur nips Eat your gosh darn tur nips R R R R R R R etc. L L L L L L L
To 3e3op88 I can play 4 against 3 using a different system that does not rely on mnemonics, but I just don´t get your explanation, and believe me I´m trying my best. The second right hand hit falls on the o of "your". The third right hand hit is aligned somewhere between the h of "gosh" and the d of "darn". The fourth right hand hit is aligned somewhere between the letter r and n of "turnips" ? The third left hand hit falls on the n of "darn". If somebody on planet earth could explain to me how to understand this kind of millimetric syllabic sub-division, I would genuinely love to hear from them.
Excellent! Your tutorial helped me once and for all to finally understand this structure which seems complicated at first but once you assimilate it, it's pretty clear. Thanks a bunch!
Sir! you are amazing. After many efforts and moments where I was about to just quit Piano I found your Tutorial. I finally managed to play the three against four when playing the Fantaisie. And this is just because of your tutorials. Thank you! Thank you Sir! You Rock \m/ You're awesome!!
Excellent. I am a teacher who can naturally play polyrhythms, but I was struggling teaching it. I am so thankful for your explanation. I have actually sent the link to a few of my students.
Dear sir, I thought that I would be never able to play it, but thanks to your wonderful lessons I'm actualy already progressing and able to play a couple of bars slowly, but correctly. Thank you!
Thanks Cory! Very helpful. I'm learning Chopin Etude F minor posthumous and the entire piece is 3:4. I think I get it. Played the Fantasia Impromptu years ago and forgot. I appreciate your videos.
Thank you for your thorough video on polyrythms! Well explained and with plenty of exercises to follow on the keyboard as you explain! The romatics are my pending subject and this will help me explore them better.
Mr Bach scholar I don't know how big(inclusive) your ears are?? but right now in the NYC jazz scene there are a number of influential but relatively unknown drummers consciously influencing creative music with exactly these concepts e.g. Mark Guilana and Chris Dave and Hiatus Coyote the alterna band. Also Bembè an afrocuban folkloric rhythm brilliantly addresses these ideas as well🙌.
I constantly tried playing Chopin's Fantaisie Impromptu but always failed when i used both hands but after watching this, it was EXTREMELY helpful and now i could play it well
I never struggled with a 4:3 or 3:4 polyrhythm but I did struggle with the rapid 4:6 polyrhythm on the last page of Chopin's Étude Opus 25 no. 11 until I listened to his Trois Nouvelle Étude no. 2 for about a day and internalised the rhythm, which was exaggerated by the performer in the recording that I listened to in order to emphasise the melody. I think I subconsciously internalised the 3:4 polyrhythm as a child whilst listening to Chopin's Fantasie Impromptu over and over again.
You’re such a wonderful teacher!! A thorough, super well explained and easy to understand tutorial like no other! Dividing the underlying rhythm into triplets makes so much sense!! I’m probably 20 years away from playing the Fantasie Impromptu, but hey - gives me time to practice the 3:4 / 4:3! 10 thumbs up, 5 on each hand! 🤪 THANK YOU!!! Kindest regards all the way from Denmark 🇩🇰
Excelente ejercicio Maestro, ahora tengo un buen ejercicio para enseñarselo a mi hijo de 8años que ya tiene 11meses estudiando Piano con los ejercicios de Hanon, actualmente se encuentra en la lección 40, muchas gracias por compartir sus conocimientos. dios le bendiga.
I used to make up tables using the Lowest Common Multiple (12 "steps" in this case) just as you showed here, and just practice tapping my hands at the resulting pseudo-syncopated rhythm. Thank you.
Maths...now that I understand and can at least do it somewhat. But still having a problem trying to retain the beat while hearing the notes I'm playing when I speed up and my fingers instinctively try to line up in a more regular pattern...well I'll keep practicing. Thanks though for this approach.
Really interesting video-im actually struggling with much more complex polyrhythms 5vs3 and the like, and when this video came up i was intrigued that it was so long. I think that your methodological approach could probably be useful in all kinds of polyrhythms even more complex/rarer ones..thank you. 2 and 3, and 3 and 4 feel pretty "natural" at this point to me (professional musician in training) and i was wondering how to teach myself other less common combinations!
Cory!! i left one week for my final and gotta do the czerny germer part 4 polyrythm........THANK YOU SO MUCH! THIS REALLY HELPED ME A LOT. Francisco, Bahia Blanca, Bs.As. Argentina
This video is great I've been trying to get the beat and rhythm solid on the fantasie impromptu for a day or two but man, this really helps! Excellent work!
This was basically how I learnt the Fantasie Impromptu some years back. But wouldn't the 'proper' way be to decouple the two rhythms and simply have one part of your conscious brain thinking in threes and another part thinking in fours? That way, you wouldn't have to learn a new way of thinking every time you came across a new rhythm e.g. 4s against 7s, 3s against 5s, 5s against 11s and so on. It would also seem to be more musically correct, since you would be thinking in 3s and 4s instead of essentially thinking in 12s (or worse, not thinking at all and just hoping that your subconscious deals with it). Of course this is easier said than done. Do you have any idea how to get to the point where you can divide your attention in that way?
@@peterwilson5726 This is correct, but it's not so much a matter of splitting your brain as muscle memory IMO. Practice one hand until you can do literally anything with the other hand, and not get distracted. Then, since you've basically automated one hand, adding the other one on top, no matter the rhythm, should be a doddle, so long as you can sub-divide the beat accurately. This is how I got better at 3 against 4, but the splitting into 12 method is a good sanity check. Also, sometimes with very complex and free polyrhythms, I think you can afford to not be exact, or even divide the "polyrhythm" into chunks, as is common with the extended ornaments in Chopin.
I have trouble keeping my left hand balanced, the first, fourth, seventh notes are slightly longer than the other left hand notes. It’s also the only way I can make my left and right hand sound right. If I speed up some of the notes that aren’t suppose to overlap are overlapping on top of each other. I know this can fool normal audience who don’t have deep knowledge of music but for music judges they can tell easily.
As well as it is normal that we start to learn this mathematically, but importantly one must develop a feel of it and do it without any mental effort or else it'll sound mechanical. For example, like thinking of the color of paint of your kitchen's walls. You see it as green (or whatever is correct), yet you do not know precisely, but you can completely imagine the correct green of it, and same should be applied to polyrhythms I feel. Sure some people need this mathematical approach I suppose because they weren't born with it. Tends to be a lot of black folks are born with this wonderful sense of rhythm as others need to work for it, or some can just never truly achieve it without being sloppy and I suppose this is all part of the genes, yet doesn't mean one can be a bad musician, for I doubt Jimmy Page had such a wonderful sense of rhythm and many times he gets carried away in his sloppy manner (which I love), yet it is his uniqueness and he's known for it. Pat Metheny on the other hand, is incredible with rhythm, he can hit a 32nd or 64th before the beat or after accurately to create this feel of controlled rubato that Coltrane had. Anyway I got carried away... But it's all in the feeling, and then once you feel and stop thinking then the emotion will naturally come out, yet even if one doesn't feel perfect rhythm it does not mean the emotion won't be let out either. It's all about the emotional input of what we get by the performer's emotional output from the stage or a recording. Just my two cents.
This is a wonderful tutorial! Unfortunately i have a big problem. I can play all the music with separate hand but when i try to put them togheter.. nothing. I can play only first six measure and after i get stuck. I have no problem playing C scale in polirhymt. What should i do?
Thanks a lot for this tutorial ! In was desesperate to find how to work the 4 / 3 ... without a teacher it's difficult... I thing the exercices you give will save me. (Excuse my ugly english...)
![How to Play THREE Against FOUR Rhythms on the Piano [Feat. Chopin Fantasie Impromptu]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/gNnKFnqQjKs/mqdefault.jpg)
![How to Play THREE Against FOUR Rhythms on the Piano [Feat. Chopin Fantasie Impromptu]](/img/tr.png)
![POLYRHYTHM- Learn and MASTER 3:4 and 4:3 [MUSIC THEORY - RHYTHM- COUNTING]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/c1pejTgLuhA/mqdefault.jpg)
I have failed enumerable times in the past in attempting to learn this technique. This extraordinary presentation has made it so simple its almost embarrassing that other experienced teachers cannot communicate how to master this technique. Thank you very much Cory!
You're welcome! 3:4 polyrhythms happens to be one of my unusual "specialties"!
I started learning 3:4 yesterday and after watching this video I''m even more confused. The rhythm just makes no sence to me...
I got it! :D All I needed was to speed it up on 1.25
My advice for playing 4:3 polyrhythms. While yes, this is a good tutorial, I find a much less complex way of learning is much more easy. This is applied to Fantaisie Impromptu. Simply, print out the pages starting with the part on measure 13 (or you can bring out all of the pages.) I highly recommend starting on measure 13 no matter how many pages you bring out. I know this is really long, but it works. This is how I learned Fantaisie Impromptu, and with this, it makes it pretty easy. Go through each step and eventually, you'll get there.
Part 9 talks about the slow section.
Before I even get started, I think this is important. Playing with a metronome is tricky. I don't recommend you do it, really. It will probably mess you up. So, instead of that, think of your left hand as the metronome, so as long as you keep your left hand at a steady beat, your right hand will probably be at a steady beat as well.
1. Starting on measure 13, draw lines connecting the notes meant to be played together. Memorize the first tiny thing, half of measure 13, the first half. Memorize it (it's not too hard, I would think. It's just a few notes)
2. Then simply, play it at FULL SPEED playing EVERY note in your left hand, but ONLY the melody of your right hand. The melody in measure 13 is always played at the same time as a note in your left hand. For this particular measure, your right hand plays a G# with your left hand A. then your left hand has C# and F#, then your right hand plays an F# with your left hand A, then your left hand has F#, then C#. Just focus on that single part of measure 13. Play it at full speed. I know you are missing a total of 6 notes in your right hand, but just bear with me.
3. Once you're comfortable, try playing that entire section like that (starting on measure 13, ending on measure 17. Measure 17, the melody is the 2nd in the group of 4, not the first, therefore just ignore it until you get the rhythms right together. Remember, full speed, your right hand only playing the melody (the accented notes). Once you're comfortable with that, it's time to move onto the next step.
4. Adding in the other 3 notes in each group of 4. This seems really hard at first, but just go for it, at FULL SPEED. This is important to play it at full speed. Try your best to maintain even notes in both hands, but play it at full speed, or even as fast as you can. The other notes simply fit into place and you don't have to do a single thing.
5. Once you are comfortable with those few measures, go back to measure 17, and play 17-24, where the melody is the 2nd note. Since you just played it with the melody on the first note, this suddenly became pretty easy.
6. Go back to the beginning of the piece. Since you've been playing the 4:3 pretty easily (or should be at this point) then apply what you've been doing, starting with drawing the lines so you know which note in your right matches your left. Remember, the first notes being played together is a rest in your right hand. Count the rest as the first "note" in your group of 4
7. Just go for it! (Okay, learn the notes first by playing hands separately, but after that...) Go for it at full speed. Don't hesitate. "But what if I make a mistake" don't ask that, just go for it, remembering which notes get played with which notes. I highly recommend memorizing everything, but if you don't have it memorized, then it doesn't really matter. Just remember which notes get played together, hand have the other 3 notes in your right hand just fit right in. The more you do it, the more comfortable you'll be, and the more smooth it will become.
8. Just a little thing, once you've mastered measures 5-40, measures 83-118 are literally, exactly the same, and then the 4:3 is gone for the rest of the piece, so once you learn 5-40, you've pretty much conquered the entire piece, since the rest is pretty easy and repetitious.
9. There is, of course, the slow section, which also has the weird rhythm. Just a couple things to keep in mind. At the end of every measure that has a group of 4 grace notes followed by a dotted quarter, every time, the next note will be an 8th note, so just focus on playing it somewhere in between two notes in your left hand. Also, don't forget that 16th notes are faster than triplets in your left. Don't play them with a note in your left hand, play it right after. Each 16th is always followed by a note that is played with a note in your left hand. So your left hand plays 3 notes, then simply treat those 16th as if they were long grace notes; a note whose only purpose is to lead into the note following.
Anyway, hope this helps!
Ryolio This is really complicated. My way is better.
BachScholar is right. His way is easier, and very clear. It doesn't, however, take away the fact that you have to practice....and lots!
Ryolio Your way is possible but not very clear. After that you maybe play the fantasie in a "ok" way - but you have to go through this proces everytime you want to play such a polyrhythm. BachScholar shows how to practice the rhythm for everytime, so his way is much better.
BachScholar Biased much? JK LOL
Its actually pretty ez, just think the 4th and 8th note in ur right played the same time with the 3rd and 6th with the left, just practice bar 5 and 6 over and over again and you'll eventually gonna master it quickly (i did this for like 3 days and it works lol)
Hey UA-cam viewers. Trust what this guy is teaching! It works! I started playing piano at age 21 but never learned rhythm. I just learn chords. I could never wrap my brain around playing 2 different tempos with each hand. After watching this video, I practiced exactly what he said for about a week and I can play the first couple of measures of the fantasie impromptu! Obviously slow because I’m a noob but I can play the rhythms! This guy is the best. I now believe that I can actually be a descent piano player because of this. Thank you. Hope this encouraged someone.
Hey Cory: Thanks for the wonderful tutorials. I've been a pianist my whole life. Berklee scholarship at sixteen, the whole works, but then threw away my chance by going into rock bands at a very young age and then leaving my classical music all together. Then recently at age 55 I began to practice again to see what I could do with my ability once and for all. I started with Beethoven's Moonlight and used your progressive tempo tutorial for the third movement. I am happy to say I have almost mastered the piece at 128 or 130 on the metronome and I wish to thank you for the wonderful approach to learning. I am now going to begin to tackle polyrhythms and take on Chopin's Fantasie impromptu. THANK YOU for your work and help.
Paul Zarvis Your welcome, Paul. I love it when "boomers" get back into music...in your case, classical. You must have been really good for a scholarship at Berklee at 16! Probably half of my students on Skype are around your age. I played in rock bands in high school and gave all that up for classical.
BachScholar Hi again Cory. Yeah I was the opposite! I was into classical and studied under a very good teacher named Emmanuel Levinson and also did two or three summers at Tanglewood with a pianist named Rudolph Serkin. I lived in Lenox MA so it was a great way to get to meet great pianists. Anyway, I was into classical and practicing at least five hours per day and then I found Rock and Roll and went that way. DUMB!!! Here is a link to some of my music from 2005 or 06. Looking forward to learning much more from your videos. They are immensely instructive and practical. Thanks so much! Here's that link: ourstage.com/profile/theacthundertones/songs.
Take care and hope to hear some of your recorded playing if you have? Later. PZ
My husband has a dream that I'll be able to play Fantaisie Impromptu. I had official piano lessons up until I was 12 and everything after has been self taught. I love your videos, they are so educational as I continue to try and push myself in piano. My brain hurts but it is a good hurt. Now to go practice polyrhythms!
I asked my teacher for 2 3 polyrhythm on Schubert’s serenade and she says “just practice a hand in a time to get it ,and it takes about 3or 4day with many videos,but if there was a video like this ,it won’t take a day. Thank you ❤
After $0.25 cent lessons from a cousin starting when I was 13, I at age 71 have been working on my own "fiddling" with the pianoforte for some 58 years. I am dumbfounded at my level of ignorance, even though I have played Rachmaninoff and Chopin, Grieg, etc. Thank you for these videos.
As a drummer, I am fascinated by this video. I always strive to understand music and see the full picture and see things from a different perspective, rather than just from my own point of view and this video was a great help to me :) Thanks
You are, definitely, the best music professor that I’ve ever seen. Thank you, really. ♥️
Now I want to fully ditch my piano teacher. This week I asked her for help with 3:4 on a Debussy piece and she said, "Oh, it's easy. Just practice and you'll get it." >:{
Sign up with me for lessons via Skype. I have openings and I will teach you how to play 3:4 correctly. Most teachers don't teach 3:4 because they can't do it themselves. I am one of the only teachers in the world who teaches 3:4 correctly. Please see my website for more details!
BachScholar wait, so there are other secrets and teaching material not present in this video? :D
BachScholar There are way to much "teachers" who can't even play some classical pieces. Sad :-(
I'm learning Debussy's Reverie and my teacher's like "just alternate them and you'll get it" and I'm like "wat"
It is Time for you to Look After a better pianoteacher
10:04 closing my eyes and speeding it up on 1.25 helped me to understand 3:4. Thank you so much
I am a guitarist and i was like, how is that possible, keyboardist are crazy
+Jeje Ivanovsky :-D
lol yeah wie are
*we
I know right, I'm also a guitarist, and when I try this on my brother's keyboard my brain crashes
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Outstanding video, thank you! When people emphasize the value of all the information we have available to us nowadays that we should better take advantage, this video for me is exactly what they’re talking about.
Before this i didnt know what polyrhythms were and you taught me in this video. I can still remember everything you explained. I had played the fantasie impromptu before but i never noticed the rhythm. I see it in a new way now thanks to you. I hope to see more.
By far this has been the best explanation of polyrhythms I’ve seen. My piano teacher couldn’t even help and She’s awesome! Thank you, as I’ve struggled with the polyrhythm section of the second movement of Beethoven’s sonata #1 that is a 4:3. Well done.
It was a great help while studying the first Etude Andantino F-moll of the 3 Etudes without opus number. This has the same rythm as the Fantaisie Impromptu. Thank you very much from Holland.
Very, very useful. Crystal clear. Brilliant...and it really shows the work that goes behind learning to play polyrhythms with confidence and consistency. Not something you can master in a weekend, but wonderfully satisfying when you finally ‘get it’.
Thanks for this turoetial. A colleglue , a formaer student of my late mother, and a music major told me he was once jealous of me because I was learning Lize Hungarian Rapsody no 2. Later her had Fantasky Impromptu in his repatoire. I coule never figure out how to get it together. Now at age 73, I;m going to attemp to leaern it.
I never really played Polyrythm and since I'm not able to go to my piano teacher, I decided to home teach myself a little bit and this video is helping me quite a bit, so I'll go with the exercise for now, practice thus for a week until it's fluent, meanwhile memorise the notes of Fantasie Impromtu and I hope I will be able to play it, even if the pre phase will take long. Thank you very much for all your helpful sessions, I'm really grateful for thus.
Thank you for this video. I'm finally understanding polyrhythms. I can do it at a slow speed now and ill keep practicing and increasing the speed. Great video
Oh my gosh! I absolutely adore Fantaisie Impromptu. Thank you so much for breaking it down in a very logical but practical way. Amazing Cory!!!! Truly Amazing!!!! I can now see how to begin putting it together.
As always, a very clear and informative video, Cory. Thanks for posting it!
When I was in college, a drummer friend of mine told me a great (and funny) way to remember and practice 4:3 is by saying or thinking the phrase, "Eat your goddamn (or goshdarn) carrots." "Turnips" or "Cheetos" would work, too. : ) Of course, any phrase with that rhythm would be fine. Many years have gone by since he told me, but I've never forgotten it.
This is just a variation of what you've explained so well in the video, but for anyone who wants to get this under his or her fingers even if away from the piano is to simply tap on a table or thighs with two hands or index fingers.
So, if the right hand is going to do the group of "4" say (or think) and tap like this and gradually speed it up:
Eat your god damn Chee tos
R R R R REPEAT
L L L
Something I do--even without thinking, as it's kind of relaxing--is to practice rapidly switching the roles of the left and right hand. In other words, give the 4 to the right hand for the first 4, then immediately give the 4 to the left and keep alternating without stopping. It's an excellent coordinating exercise.
It would look like this:
Eat your gosh darn tur nips Eat your gosh darn tur nips
R R R R R R R etc.
L L L L L L L
Very helpful, brother.
3e3op88 this is so helpful!!!
3e3op88 I've always heard it as "pass the god damn butter"
To 3e3op88
I can play 4 against 3 using a different system that does not rely on mnemonics, but I just don´t get your explanation, and believe me I´m trying my best.
The second right hand hit falls on the o of "your".
The third right hand hit is aligned somewhere between the h of "gosh" and the d of "darn".
The fourth right hand hit is aligned somewhere between the letter r and n of "turnips" ?
The third left hand hit falls on the n of "darn".
If somebody on planet earth could explain to me how to understand this kind of millimetric syllabic sub-division, I would genuinely love to hear from them.
Thanks for the detail and showing us slowly ... found this tutorial so helpful thank you
It is us whom are in your debt and must give grand thanks for your re-giving of inspiration and insight of technique.
One of the first videos on youtube that explains these types of rhythms. Thanks so much
heres a phrase that helped me
pass the goddamn butter pass...
T L R L R L T
me on the piano, focused and with conviction: "Pass. The goddamn buddrr... PASS. the goddamn buddr PASS >:(
HAHAHAHHHAAA thank you so muck
Excellent! Your tutorial helped me once and for all to finally understand this structure which seems complicated at first but once you assimilate it, it's pretty clear. Thanks a bunch!
Sir! you are amazing. After many efforts and moments where I was about to just quit Piano I found your Tutorial. I finally managed to play the three against four when playing the Fantaisie. And this is just because of your tutorials. Thank you! Thank you Sir! You Rock \m/ You're awesome!!
Excellent. I am a teacher who can naturally play polyrhythms, but I was struggling teaching it. I am so thankful for your explanation. I have actually sent the link to a few of my students.
Fantastically clear and very helpful! Thank you so much. I am just about to start this piece and I'm so glad I found your video.
I normaly don't watch tutorials, but this one was REALLY helpful. Thanks for that!
I love this, thank you..I just started learning Fantasy impromptu myself and I found this to be extremely helpful
Dear Cory,
Thank you for this, I've been battling with it for months it finally sounds ok!! Thanks for your clear explanation.
Katie
Excellent explanation. I've been trying to work this out mathematically for a long time. This makes perfect sense.
Dear sir, I thought that I would be never able to play it, but thanks to your wonderful lessons I'm actualy already progressing and able to play a couple of bars slowly, but correctly. Thank you!
Soooooo helpful!! I finally figured out how to do this after watching your tutorial video😭 Thank you sooo much for making this!🙇
Thanks Cory! Very helpful. I'm learning Chopin Etude F minor posthumous and the entire piece is 3:4. I think I get it. Played the Fantasia Impromptu years ago and forgot. I appreciate your videos.
Thank you for your thorough video on polyrythms! Well explained and with plenty of exercises to follow on the keyboard as you explain!
The romatics are my pending subject and this will help me explore them better.
Mr Bach scholar I don't know how big(inclusive) your ears are?? but right now in the NYC jazz scene there are a number of influential but relatively unknown drummers consciously influencing creative music with exactly these concepts e.g. Mark Guilana and Chris Dave and Hiatus Coyote the alterna band. Also Bembè an afrocuban folkloric rhythm brilliantly addresses these ideas as well🙌.
thanks so much! I finally wrapped my head around this rhythm with your help. now I just gotta increase the tempo slowly but surely :D
Fabulously done! I love the way u present it
I constantly tried playing Chopin's Fantaisie Impromptu but always failed when i used both hands but after watching this, it was EXTREMELY helpful and now i could play it well
I never struggled with a 4:3 or 3:4 polyrhythm but I did struggle with the rapid 4:6 polyrhythm on the last page of Chopin's Étude Opus 25 no. 11 until I listened to his Trois Nouvelle Étude no. 2 for about a day and internalised the rhythm, which was exaggerated by the performer in the recording that I listened to in order to emphasise the melody.
I think I subconsciously internalised the 3:4 polyrhythm as a child whilst listening to Chopin's Fantasie Impromptu over and over again.
You’re such a wonderful teacher!! A thorough, super well explained and easy to understand tutorial like no other! Dividing the underlying rhythm into triplets makes so much sense!! I’m probably 20 years away from playing the Fantasie Impromptu, but hey - gives me time to practice the 3:4 / 4:3! 10 thumbs up, 5 on each hand! 🤪 THANK YOU!!! Kindest regards all the way from Denmark 🇩🇰
that was the best expansion ever!
I'm not a good pianist or keyboardist by any means, but incredibly enough, this came pretty naturally to me.
Excelente ejercicio Maestro, ahora tengo un buen ejercicio para enseñarselo a mi hijo de 8años que ya tiene 11meses estudiando Piano con los ejercicios de Hanon, actualmente se encuentra en la lección 40, muchas gracias por compartir sus conocimientos. dios le bendiga.
I used to make up tables using the Lowest Common Multiple (12 "steps" in this case) just as you showed here, and just practice tapping my hands at the resulting pseudo-syncopated rhythm. Thank you.
Great video, not enough teachers explain the math behind abnormal rhythyms aThis is unrelated but you have gone gray in a very dignified manner.
your tutorial is extremely thorough, very understandable and easy to catch.
thank you for your great work
This and the following video actually gave me hope, that I will be able to master this one day!
Thank you!
I was struggling with this concept for years. Thank you
Thanks you! You are a true lifesaver.
Amazing, Thank you so much for the video.I don't know how I would have ever approached 4:3 poly-rhythms without your help. Cheers!
Maths...now that I understand and can at least do it somewhat. But still having a problem trying to retain the beat while hearing the notes I'm playing when I speed up and my fingers instinctively try to line up in a more regular pattern...well I'll keep practicing. Thanks though for this approach.
Really interesting video-im actually struggling with much more complex polyrhythms 5vs3 and the like, and when this video came up i was intrigued that it was so long. I think that your methodological approach could probably be useful in all kinds of polyrhythms even more complex/rarer ones..thank you. 2 and 3, and 3 and 4 feel pretty "natural" at this point to me (professional musician in training) and i was wondering how to teach myself other less common combinations!
Im a beginner and even i can understand it. This is the best piano lesson ever made
you are my best teacher. thank you.
Cory!! i left one week for my final and gotta do the czerny germer part 4 polyrythm........THANK YOU SO MUCH! THIS REALLY HELPED ME A LOT. Francisco, Bahia Blanca, Bs.As. Argentina
Thank you very much for this video. It has helped me so much! It was the first time that I play the fantasie impromptu notes in the right rhythmen.
This video is great I've been trying to get the beat and rhythm solid on the fantasie impromptu for a day or two but man, this really helps! Excellent work!
This exercise is so useful for playing similar polyrhythms pieces. THANKS!!!
This was basically how I learnt the Fantasie Impromptu some years back. But wouldn't the 'proper' way be to decouple the two rhythms and simply have one part of your conscious brain thinking in threes and another part thinking in fours? That way, you wouldn't have to learn a new way of thinking every time you came across a new rhythm e.g. 4s against 7s, 3s against 5s, 5s against 11s and so on. It would also seem to be more musically correct, since you would be thinking in 3s and 4s instead of essentially thinking in 12s (or worse, not thinking at all and just hoping that your subconscious deals with it). Of course this is easier said than done. Do you have any idea how to get to the point where you can divide your attention in that way?
if you can focus part of your brain on 3 and part on 4 please give my your brain
@@peterwilson5726 This is correct, but it's not so much a matter of splitting your brain as muscle memory IMO. Practice one hand until you can do literally anything with the other hand, and not get distracted. Then, since you've basically automated one hand, adding the other one on top, no matter the rhythm, should be a doddle, so long as you can sub-divide the beat accurately. This is how I got better at 3 against 4, but the splitting into 12 method is a good sanity check. Also, sometimes with very complex and free polyrhythms, I think you can afford to not be exact, or even divide the "polyrhythm" into chunks, as is common with the extended ornaments in Chopin.
OMG！What a wonderful tutorial! Nothing else can just be more detailed than that!
I also advice the first exercice from 'Brahms 50 excercices' where there's the 3:4 / 4:3, 4:5 / 5:4 and 7:6 / 6:7 patters (if I remember correctly)
This is excellent. Very good - my son will practice it.
the best one I found on the internet! thank you so much
I really enjoy your videos and I would like to thank you for doing these for everyone. You're an amazing pianist!
Thank you very much for this video tutorial. It is just a great explanation! Polyrhythms are a kind of headache of mine :)
I have trouble keeping my left hand balanced, the first, fourth, seventh notes are slightly longer than the other left hand notes. It’s also the only way I can make my left and right hand sound right. If I speed up some of the notes that aren’t suppose to overlap are overlapping on top of each other. I know this can fool normal audience who don’t have deep knowledge of music but for music judges they can tell easily.
This tutorial is very helpful and informative! Thank you a lot.
Wow -- your lesson gave me the courage to attempt the Fantaisie!
This is really fantastic, thank you :)
This is awesome I can’t thank you enough for this! I can finally start learning this song correctly!
Best explaination ever. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. Great in depth lesson. I will practice this rhythms on scales. Cheers :)
With this video I learned how to play this piece. Thank you :)
Tnx very much for showing, I'll try it out.
i find it very helpful and useful! Thanks, gonna start practising now~
As well as it is normal that we start to learn this mathematically, but importantly one must develop a feel of it and do it without any mental effort or else it'll sound mechanical. For example, like thinking of the color of paint of your kitchen's walls. You see it as green (or whatever is correct), yet you do not know precisely, but you can completely imagine the correct green of it, and same should be applied to polyrhythms I feel. Sure some people need this mathematical approach I suppose because they weren't born with it. Tends to be a lot of black folks are born with this wonderful sense of rhythm as others need to work for it, or some can just never truly achieve it without being sloppy and I suppose this is all part of the genes, yet doesn't mean one can be a bad musician, for I doubt Jimmy Page had such a wonderful sense of rhythm and many times he gets carried away in his sloppy manner (which I love), yet it is his uniqueness and he's known for it. Pat Metheny on the other hand, is incredible with rhythm, he can hit a 32nd or 64th before the beat or after accurately to create this feel of controlled rubato that Coltrane had. Anyway I got carried away... But it's all in the feeling, and then once you feel and stop thinking then the emotion will naturally come out, yet even if one doesn't feel perfect rhythm it does not mean the emotion won't be let out either. It's all about the emotional input of what we get by the performer's emotional output from the stage or a recording. Just my two cents.
It all starts with muscle memory and experience anyway. You can add rubato and feelings on top of that.
Dima Gorbik true only one gains muscle memory by playing so much and with various tempos.
Merci beaucoup pour ce tutoriel!
This is a wonderful tutorial!
Unfortunately i have a big problem. I can play all the music with separate hand but when i try to put them togheter.. nothing.
I can play only first six measure and after i get stuck. I have no problem playing C scale in polirhymt. What should i do?
Wonderful video, thank you!
Can't wait for the tutorial too.
Thank you for this awesome tutorial. Good job!
Very well explained!
Nice video.잘 구경했습니다.감사합니다.
Gracias por la excelente explicación, un saludo desde Argentina!.
look forward to your next video
Thank you very much. I think now I'm ready to start practicing fantasie impromptu
Thanks a lot for this tutorial ! In was desesperate to find how to work the 4 / 3 ... without a teacher it's difficult... I thing the exercices you give will save me. (Excuse my ugly english...)
Keep up the good work. Love your videos.
Edit: I am actually going to subscribe.
thanks for this very useful tutorial: as well as you are a great pianist you're also a very good teacher!!
Thanks Cory, great tutorial !!!!!!!!!
Super helpful :) Thank you so much!
This is gold!
Great teaching!
THANKS THNAKS THANK you very much!
Thank you - it is very helpful!
thank you very much this is very helpful !