I, however, had always found string and wind instruments, as well as the human singing voice, can teach me just as effectively (if not more) on how to phrase poetically a musical line as listening to pianists.  Just check out this amazing cello masterclass on youtube, and I am sure you will agree:

or how about this:

This is what I call analytical memory, and was discussed in my other blog: Efficient Memorization

Let’s look at below example from the Liszt Sonata in B Minor:

The left hand just look so hard to memorize!  Actually not so if you break it down and find out how Liszt came up with every single note!

Let’s first look at Bar 1 and Bar 2, just the left hand:

mmm… this looks chaotic and impossible to memorize?!  Hey what if I hide the 2nd note in each 16th group:

Hey!  Looks like this is really just the B minor melodic scale coming down stepwise!  Look at the highest note in each group:   G natural, F Sharp,    E,    D,    C Sharp …  (red circles below) :

yes, this is exactly the B minor melodic scale!  All the other notes shown above are part of this scale.

Now going back to the original passage:

It is very clear now the function of the 2nd 16th in each group is to complete a ‘turn’, and it is always a semi-tone below the first note of the 16th group.

Ok, I am sure if you know the B minor melodic scale very well, you can now play this exact passage from memory already, just perhaps at a very slow speed.  Or if you want, write it out on staff paper from memory!

The rest of the passage can similarly be analyzed this way too!

• Solidifying Memory - Mixing It Up!
• Efficient Memorization

Let’s take a passage from Scriabin Sonata No. 5 that trouble me a lot:

I will learn to play from memory only left hand, start with Bar 7 and then Bar 8,    pause,      then Bar 5 and Bar 6,    pause,    then Bar 3 and Bar 4     and so on.   Do the same for right hand,  and also hands together.

If you want more security with memory, learn to play following from memory:   Bar 8,   pause,   Bar 7,   pause,   Bar 6,  and so on.  The smaller the unit, the harder it becomes and the better your memory will be for this passage.

I find the left hand for Bar 2 and Bar 6 specifically hard to memorize.  I will learn to play from memory Bar 1 and beginning of Bar 2;    pause;    then proceed to Bar 5 and Bar 6;    pause ;    then back to Bar 1 and Bar 2;    and so on.

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Top 3 recommendations:

Salzer, Felix - Structural hearing : tonal coherence in music
Hindemith - The Craft of Musical Composition
Schoenberg - Theory of Harmony

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Other recommendations:

Some of the following books some are intense. Pick what you find suitable!

Analysis
Rosen, Charles - Sonata Forms
Rosen, Charles - Beethoven’s Piano Sonata
Bernstein, Leonard - The Answered Question (Lecture Series)
Harris, Robert - What to listen for in Mozart

Harmony
Gauldin, Robert - Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music
Piston, Walter - Harmony
Persichetti, Vincent - Twentieth-Century Harmony

Composition
Brindle, Reginald Smith - Musical Composition
Dallin, Leon - Techniques of twentieth century composition; a guide to the materials of modern music
Delone, Richard - Aspects of twentieth-century music

• always start memorizing a new piece from the start of your learning process  (see also my article “Efficient Memorization“)
• start not necessarily from the beginning of the piece, but with the most difficult passage first - because it will require more time to solidify
• always learn similar sections together - put them side by side, and learn them at the same time.  Analyze any subtle differences in terms of harmony, texture, or other markings

For example, when I learn the Liszt Sonata in B-, I start learning from this passage which I know will take a long time to master:

Initially I allot 30 minutes daily on this passage.  Gradually I decrease the amount of time spent as I am more solid with it.  Of course, I do everything that all teachers say I should do: practice hand separately, in short phrases, slowly, rapidly in short bursts, use rhythms to scramble the phrase, etc…

I also dig through the score and identify similar passages, and learn them simultaneously:

Putting side by side allows me to notice that in Recapitulation, the 16ths figure in Exposition is transformed into triplets,  and Recapitulation has the marking “Stretta quasi presto” which the Exposition did not have.  Perhaps Liszt is asking that the tempo in Recapitulation shall be slightly faster, and hence he wrote triplet for greater speed?  I am not saying this is necessarily what Liszt wants, but putting the passage side by side allow me to ask such interpretative questions.

Learning them side by side also make the memorization process way more efficient.

The mind is just like water: if you don’t disturb it, it has no ripples

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Quick Fixes For Anxiety while in Backstage …..

• Deep and slow breathing: breathe out about twice as long as you breathe in ²
• Express a positive emotional states physically: recreate the body posture and facial expressions that my body normally assumes when I feel calm, confidence, relaxed, and centered. Imagine feelings of tremendous confidence and self-assurance. “I am totally empowered, in the flow” ³
• Ground myself to the present moment: Focus on things outside of myself - such as looking at the different colors around me. Try to find things that are green, or blue, or red. Listen to the sound the audience is making: is someone sneezing, coughing, laughing, talking? Listen to the entire mix of sound coming from the audience. ⁴
• Be aware of myself: sound I am creating (my breaths), my movements, my emotions ¹²
• Create a safe place in my mind: visualize myself in a beautiful, serene setting, and feeling perfectly calm and peaceful. Or visualize the day after the performance, the next month, or next year: see that life goes on as usual, and today’s performance will be just a small part of a long journey. ⁵
• Create imaginary humor about the surroundings: use the “scrambling technique” adapted from Neurolinguistic Programming. Imagine as vividly as possible using all my senses a fearful situation (such as performing in front of an audience!). Then scramble the images and make the picture as ridiculous, silly, and bizarre as I possible can. For example, imagine the piano keys are flying away to the audience, which the audience grabs and start licking them! ⁶
• Positive visualization and mental imagery: Days, weeks, or months before a performance, imagine myself during the performance feeling calm and relaxed. Feel how I walk onto the stage with confident. Visualize how I adjust the piano bench, and test out the pedal’s depth and resistance. Imagine the energies from the audience merging with mine, and how the music flows harmoniously - fusing me and the audience into one. ⁷
• Slow measured movements when walking on stage towards the piano ⁸

Surrendering into the spirit of the zone…no audience, no me -  everything was gone except the music ¹

• Listen to music that is dissimilar to what I am about to perform, but establish the right mood.  For example, I try not to listen to piano classical music before I have to perform.  Instead, I listen to Jazz, orchestral works, or movie soundtracks.  See also my article “Ipod Fights Stage Fright“.
• [I just learnt this from the Washington competition] Just have a jolly mood!  Chat away with others, feeling ‘how cool and fun it is that I am going on stage and people actually sit for 30 min and listen to me!”.  Do something fun and crazy to relax - e.g. try juggling!  or act goofily in front of someone!  Create a fun mood!
• Try not to talk to people for 30-45 mins before my turn.  Feel myself suspended in the boundless cosmos;   in one with humanity;  visualize the smallness of Earth in this Universe;  imagine the insignificance of the next hour in the big scheme of things;   feel “Euphoria”;   feel the happiness in being able to share my experience with others in next 30 mins.

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Quick Reminders …

• My goal is to clearly and honestly convey my own musical intentions and emotions. Not to impress anyone, not to have others agree with my interpretation. ⁹
• I am going to perform exactly how I had practised.  I am not going to play the piece differently (e.g. faster, louder) to impress anyone, or to ‘project’ more.  Any projection required will be adjusted through my ear, not by banging the piano harder.
• I am here sharing with the world my love of music.  Bring the audience along with me, feel the energy, and spirits will come!
• Stop being critical - say to myself: “I am allowed to fail!”. Try to achieve an unthinking state - relaxed but be aware. Simply be aware, without judgment. ¹⁰
• Recall what I wrote in my vision statement.
• Remember I need to project the smallest pianississimo to the farthest audience!

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Stepping Cross the Line - onto Concert Platform

I was inspired by a behind-the-scene footage of the amazingly moving film “Monster’s Ball“.  The footage shows how Halle Berry and Billy Bob Thornton prepared themselves seconds before the camera rolls for a highly intense scene inside a car.  Instead of seeing the actors meditating intensely, they were actually joking with each other even seconds before the camera starts rolling.

As soon as the camera rolls, suddenly the actors ’snap’ right into their characters, as if they put on a mask and are no longer themselves, but are the characters they are portraying - their facial expressions, intensities of their eyes, and their whole body suddenly changed 180 degrees.

I now see an imaginary line dividing the backstage and concert platform.  As soon as I cross that line, I ’snap’ into the musical character I am portraying.  I visualize myself being a creature shedding my old skin, emerging anew becoming the music itself!

I am an actor of the music - I am not myself anymore, but the character portrayed by the music ¹¹

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While Sitting on Piano Bench, Right Before Touching the Piano

• Feel resistance and depth of right pedal, ensure bench right height and distance from piano.  Then take 2 deep breath.  Always start playing the piece when breathing out (to simulate the feeling of singing the music)
• Remind myself: If piano is unknown, risk too much than too little sound. If opening is soft passage, use soft pedal but project main melody.
• I am sharing my love of music with the world!  Feel myself in-one with the energy in the concert hall.
• I am projecting my music to the audience sitting at the farthest corner.  Don’t play only to myself!  Share it with the world!
• For technically demanding passages: remember to feel a little distant from the physicalities and be the “conductor”. Don’t get excited or I will lose control.
• Imagine I am my favorite performer, that I am in Carnegie Hall performing in front of a few thousand people. ¹³

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Real Time Adjustments During Performance

• If notice sound does not project with soft pedal, leave it off! Don’t struggle to project with soft pedal on just because I practised with the soft pedal during that passage.
• For big sounds, if the piano does not project enough, do not try to project more than how I had practised it. Trying to force more sound out of the piano will only distract myself.
• Sing! : either in my head, or imitate the physicality of humming but without making a sound.  Immediately my focus is on the music and the sound, and any adjustment will become automatic.
• Focus on the sound, the touch of the keys, how my hand is moving. Never think - just observe ¹²
• Step back a little - never get totally emotionally involved or I will lose control ¹⁴
• Feel relaxed physically, even though emotionally I might be intense.  Close my eyes to hear, and to feel if necessary / when possible.
• Breathe slowly!  Remember: sing along and dance with the flow!  Feel extremely relaxed!  Breathe with the music!

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References

1 Green, Barry, The mastery of Music: Ten Pathways to True Artistry, by, p. 187

2 Esposito , Janet E., In the Spotlight: overcoming your fear of public speaking and performing, p. 50

3 Ibid., p. 98

4 Ibid., p. 49

5 Ibid., P. 46

6 Ibid., P. 86

7 Ibid., P.88

8 Kochevitsky, George, The Art of Piano Playing: a scientific approach, p. 53

9 Green, Barry, The Inner Game of Music, p. 18

10 Ibid, P. 28, 34

11 Ibid., P. 80

12 Ibid., P. 22

13 Ibid., P. 91

14 Green, Barr,  The Mastery of Music: Ten Pathways to True Artistry, p. 136

• play a bar, or opening of a bar, then skip a bar or two
• play a bar, then play the previous bar, or skip a few bars backward
• pair up like passages from different spots within the piece - jump around back and forth - do this from memory (but make sure you know where you are at within the piece)

I will do this hands separately, or hands together.  This technique allows me to have many starting points in a piece, such that if I lose concentration accidentally during a performance, I can re-start without pause (and hopefully nobody will notice either).

Let’s take the opening of Chopin’s Polonaise Op 53 as an example:

Example 1 - skipping bars:

Example 2:

Example 3:

You can scramble it up even more!  And do this hand separately, hands together, or jumping back and forth between left hand and right hand.  But key is train yourself to do this from memory.  Soon you will be able to pick up any point in a piece and know what the left or right hand supposed to be.

Here is a even more extreme example:

Of course, if you do this for the whole piece, it may be too overwhelming.  Why not just set aside 20 minutes daily for 2 weeks to work like this on spots that you have memory trouble.  Gradually build this up and soon you will have the entire piece 100% solid in your memory.

Now let’s look at another example.  Below are excerpts from two similar pssages from the Liszt’s Sonata in B-:

I will pair up each like passage, and jump back and forth between that from Exposition to that from Recapitulation.  For example:

Key is train yourself to do this from memory.  Each time before you jump, give yourself a slight pause and say to yourself silently where you want to jump to (perhaps sing the tune in your head, imagine the bar visually in your mind’s eye, or imagine your hand position for that spot you want to jump to).

Initially of course you will need the score but if you break it apart like this, you soon can start your piece anywhere you want!

(see also my article “Efficient Memorization“)

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Fake Singing

Working with Ms Marietta Orlov at TSMAF’s masterclass 2008, I found she had an interesting teaching technique. After a student had played through a work, she would ask the student to play the piece again, while she sang along. Her voice effectively conveyed the musical flow despite most of the time being pitchless. Her singing voice was like waves of energy that allowed me to feel the energy of the music.

Inspired by this, I started practicing my piece while imitating this singing but not only pitchless, but also silently - that is making no voice but use my breath to mimic the energy of the music. This allowed me to use my breath to produce the musical flow without making any distracting noise.

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Tongue Conducting

Later, I added a conductor to my performance: my tongue lightly tap the roof of my mouth for keeping the rhythmic beats.  It is as if I am saying ‘Dah Dah Dah’  or ‘Tah Tah Tah’ silently.

So now I have a singer, conductor, and pianist all in one!  Somehow this ‘fake singing’ and ‘tongue conducting’ allows me to actively listen to myself, and be at the moment, maintain an unthinking state.

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Unfocused Gaze, Looking Away

I then read in a book about performance anxiety. About how pianists often look at the keys of the piano, which is not the actual source of sound! This book suggests pianists should look at the strings which is where the sound come from!

After a little experimentation, I found that if I looked at the left hand side (so that I am looking away from the audience); looking with unfocused eyes anywhere from slightly toward the ceiling or to the piano strings calmed me tremendously! It also helped me listen to my own playing much better. Marietta Orlov also mentioned in the master class that hearing is the most important thing when it comes to musical performances, next comes tactile sense. Last is sense of sight. Therefore, playing with unfocused eye help me put my mind into hearing and tactile, and less on seeing.

Hey if you have other ideas, please let me know.  Write your ideas in Let’s Talk.

1) Don’t follow blindly my advice! Use my input only as a starting point!

2) Finding the right fingering / hand position is a prerequisite for efficient memorization.

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My ‘theory’

Type 1: aural memory - reinforced by hearing or imagining the sound

Type 2a: visual memory - the music score - reinforced by reading very slowly or mentally visualizing the details in a music score

Type 2b: visual memory - hand positions - reinforced by watching or mentally visualizing hand positions and finger movements. Mentally visualizing hand positions can be accompanied by actual physical movements of hands, arms, fingers but without actually touching the piano.

Type 3: analytical memory - reinforced by making up your own ‘story’ of how the composer came to choose the musical elements: the musical idea, the pitches, the harmony, time signature, rhythm, register, structure, and so on.

Important thing is make up your own story, not borrow other’s story. It is very enlightening and great learning to read others’ analysis of a work, but always try to analyze a work yourself too!  But key is analyze it in sound (i.e. play it on piano, or imagine it in your head;  and not analyze it only on paper).

Type 4a: physical memory (muscles engaged in piano playing) - reinforced by practising on the piano closed eye / looking away from the keyboard, in regular or slow motion, feeling the touch and movement of the entire body.  Feel every finger, arm, hand, shoulder, back, breath movements.  Remember how you feel physically - connect to your whole body!  Choreograph your breaths!

Type 4b: physical memory (vocal cord)- reinforced by singing (or actively listening to) any melodic part - not just main melodic line, but also bass or middle voices in a chordal passage.  For complex rhythmic passages, use non-melodic sound such as “dah dah dah…” to rehearse the rhythm (I find this better than clapping because I can then actually play the passage while pronouncing “dah dah dah…” to further reinforce the rhythmic memory - I can’t clap while playing the passage!)

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Rules for Memorization

And I always follow below rules when learning a new piece of music:
Rule #1: immediately start memorizing when I learn a new piece

Rule #2: when I am touching the piano keys, 50% of the time my eyes are either closed (to reinforce Type 4), or opened but focused on my hands (to reinforce Type 2b). Only 50% of the time my eyes are on the music sheet.

Rule #3: if I struggle with memorizing a particular passage, I simply break it into smaller units, or just move on! Come back to it in an hour, or even tomorrow! Don’t drill on one spot and drive your brain nuts!

Rule #4: always train all types of memory separately, and combining them in any permutations you can dream of.

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Illustration

To illustrate, let’s use Liszt’s Sonata:

Type 1 (aural):with the help of technology, we can listen to a work performed by many pianists on demand. To reinforce Type 1, you can listen to CD so you remember aurally how the music evolves. But watch out: don’t just copy other’s interpretations.  What if the recording for a work you are learning is not available?  You simply have to practise slowly and closed eyes, even hands separately if you need to - focus on hearing the sound.  Or imagine the sound in your head while reading the score.

Type 2 (visual): read the score very slowly. You can sing in your head aurally while reading the score - slowly; or visualize music score and hand positions. I know many students have experienced this type of memory - e.g. before going on stage, moving your fingers in the air to simulate playing the piano. But I now realize I can even just spend 1 hour doing this and not touching the piano, and I can still treat this as an intense practising session! It is easier on my body (no actual physical exertion on a piano); I can do this anywhere (I love riding the subway and doing this); and it works!

A chiropractor told me about an experiment: a group of basketball players are divided into three groups. Group A had normal training for a period of time. Group B had no training whatsoever for the same duration. Group C only has mental visualization. At the end of the period, performance of Group A (normal training) and Group C (only mental visualization) were very close, while that for Group B lags behind significantly. Got the point? (click here to read more on this experiment)

Type 3 (analytical memory): Make up your own story of why a piece is composed like that.  The story does not have to be theorectically sound - just a story that you can easily remember and translates onto the piano keys.

For example, the beginning of the sonata in B- starts with a deep low octave in G:

The damn devil (Mephisto, and Liszt!) is playing a joke on us. He gives us a G which evolves into a seemingly C- melodic scale (above) Are we in C - then? No! Because the next scaly passage (below) seems to be G- harmonic scale (with a C#)!

So I ask him “Where are you leading me?!” … (see below)

The devil leaped up excitedly two times (the two octave leaps on G), and finally crashes on a diminished chord E-G-A#-C#: the diminished chord based on the leading tone of B-!

Type 4 a, b (muscle memory): I often practice on the piano closed eyes or looking away from the piano’s keyboard.  I do this often hand separately, slowly / rapidly / in short rhythmic phrases I made up.   Sometimes I hum or just articulate pitch-less “dah dah dah” to feel the direction of the melody.  (singing in pitch is not required).

Mixing Type 1 to Type 4 in whatever way you want.

I will practice as follows:

• practice right hand alone, slowly, and only the thumb.  This means:

• I monitor my hand has no up-down movement, but has only horizontal movement
• I will place my thumb on the first A without playing - just touching the surface.  Then when ready, I play this A staccato and jump horizontally to the A an octave above, placing the thumb rapidly onto this next key but without playing.   When my finger is on this 2nd A, I pause…. when ready I play this A staccato and jump horizontally to the A# an octave below.   Repeat this process for the passage.   Gradually increase tempo
• To stress myself further, I will add an extra octave:

• when I feel ready, I will add back the top note, but with still the added octave:

• I will also practice this way:

• and this:

• I will add left hand gradually only when I am comfortable playing right hand alone