Knowing that wrist rotation is what it needs to play 2nd section of Fur Elise (bar 32 and 34), yet I couldn't play it well. Your video explains exactly how we could execute wrist rotation in an efficient manner. I'm putting this video in my practice plan. Can't wait to learn this technique and polish my playing Fur Elise 😊
Thanks for the tutorial, Regarding "my BONUS Exercise for You!" I feel some tension from keeping the pivot finger, which is the pinky, pressed the entire time.. Any advices..?
Thanks for watching! If you have an acoustic grand, you can take advantage of key let off... the point near the bottom of the key depression where there's a little "bump." If we depress 5th finger very slowly we can find that point. It takes very little energy to push the key beyond, but we get a tiny bit of feedback here through the finger. Try keeping the 5th finger right at that bump, no further depressed (not a full depression of the key) but also not released. Doing this can help alleviate tension from too firm a 5th finger that continues to push into the key after it's job is done. If this is too difficult to start with, just place your 5th finger on the key surface, don't press at all, and rotate toward it, then back toward the other fingers, playing/striking notes with fingers 1 through 4, but never with finger 5. This will also give a similar sensation. How it feels to do both of these variations should be very close to the correct feeling of the actual exercise. Then we need to pair the relaxed feel of the hand when 5 doesn't have to engage with a comfortable hold of the key when we do use 5 to play. Let me know if these help!
19:54 For those interested, the reason for this is that when your palm is facing downward on the keyboard, your radius in the forearm has already crossed over the ulna. Sort of like crossing your fingers with the middle finger over the top of the index finger. If your fingers are already crossed, it is easy to uncross them (this is rotation toward the pinky) but impossible to cross them much further than they already are (i.e. rotation towards the thumb) - especially without moving your elbow up and away from your body.
100%. I thought about including a graphic of the bone structure but decided against it. The bones literally make an "x" shape across one another when the palm is down, and open to be nearly parallel with each other when fully supinated. Thanks for the detailed comment!
Outstanding. I followed along as I looked at my book that you suggested I purchase. Next, I will be watching the video again and will play along with you😅
What a great video, Charles. Thank you for going into such wonderful detail to show how we should be doing wrist rotation. What an eye-opener it is to learn how we *should* be playing!
Maybe the rotation is too fast to see, but I am studying the hand position of Oscar Peterson on TH-cam. There does not seem to be a whole lot of rotation. The man's hands are so effortlessly still even when he is playing with complete hand independence jumping all over the keyboard at lightening speed. Please respond, Charles!
Hey Brian! I looked at a couple Oscar Peterson vids just now. It can be tough to get a good angle of his hands it seems! The ones that I found, I do occasionally see a bit of "throw" toward 5 or 3 while soloing which makes me think that overall, yes, he does incorporate rotation. Linear passages are even harder to tell, but the speed that he's known for can be made far easier with just a few degrees of rotation, especially around finger crosses, than perfectly flat hands. This video is one of the better examples I've found: th-cam.com/video/UHXGBg6aCGE/w-d-xo.html You can definitely observe rotation used in a variety of passages here, but at most probably about 10 degrees, and more typically 5 or fewer. There are a few closeups of his right hand where, if you watch the underside of his palm VERY carefully, you'll see it. So yes, I do think he used rotation, perhaps not even knowingly, but it got incorporated in his technique as he pursued higher and higher levels of playing. He's a great example of using this technique in a near invisible way, necessitated by speed.
@PianistAcademy1 the albums 15 minutes long let me know which is your favorite and pick whichever piece you want out of the 6 my personal favorites are 2 4 and 5
It's crucial to note that at the last exercise, being on a high enough tempo, even a teacher can struggle with in-tempo accuracy regarding the 5th 4th and 3th finger of the left hand, as demonstrated, usually being the ones who are not that much fluent in every pianist, so that we as students understand that everyone has its limits but with more practice rhey can sure surpass them while also showing that everything can be hard until we practice enough and make it seem like nothing. I would also like to propose an idea for tutoring videos: you can start approaching different techniques and break them down by facing them on actual pieces, pieces like Mozart Sonatas who are being thought as simple, yet their complexity lies on pure technical things like the rotation and they also present quite a large number of different passages, AKA needing different techniques, throughout their development, even inside each part of them, as Mozart liked to experiment with different piano techniques while developing his themes.
So great to see you making video for set 2. It motivates me to keep learning 😁 Following your video series on set 1, I'm able to apply wrist circle in my repertoire, eg. playing arpeggio
Im an intermediate player just learning songs on my own and this is so helpful! Im trying to learn a song with fast right hand arpeggioes all throughout, and I couldnt understand even why practicing slowly it would tire out my hands by the middle of the song. Now I know my fingers were doing all the work when I should have been rotating!
All of the exercises you show have the metric accents on the inside notes, rotating toward the thumb. The opposite accentuarion, such as occurs in left hand broken octaves (Beethoven "Pathetique") is not addressed. Do you have a recommendation for accented outer fingers? Chopin's "Winter Wind" right hand also comes to mind.
To my hands, it's truly the same motion, just shifted rhythmically and with a more aggressive outer rotation... also think of 1st movement of "Appassionata" (measure 50) where both hands have very strong outer accents that show melodic movement amid a flurry of 16ths, also on metric accents as well. If you really wanted to practice something like that within this exercise, simply shift the first 16th of each grouping to the final 16th of the previous "measure" so that the downbeat becomes the note articulated with finger 5... then 5 will get all of the metric accents you are looking for!
Thank you for the videos and help and advice you give to us all. As an very senior beginner is the arm rotation applicable to learning scales ? Thanks from the UK.
That's a great question! Technically, yes, we can employ rotation in scales and in scale-like passages but it will be a very minimal form of what's discussed here. As a beginner you might try experimenting, but know that the rotation in scales doesn't really truly become beneficial until we are pushing our tempo up to and beyond 16ths at around 120bpm, around RCM level 9-10.
Thank you. I had observed that outside accentuation does not have the same advantage of rotational range that is available for inside. So it does make sense to simply rotate outside with more vigor. It does relieve the finger of unnecessary effort.
You might also find that it helps to prepare the rotation to the outside with the small, but crucial, rotation inside first. Even just a few degrees of preparation in the opposite direction makes a large impact on how much energy we can "throw" toward the outside of the hand.
Thanks! It's always nice to hear when someone else also pays attention to all of those little details that, I think, most people would never think about! Hope you're well!
Like this man
From Brazil!
Thanks, Francisco!
Knowing that wrist rotation is what it needs to play 2nd section of Fur Elise (bar 32 and 34), yet I couldn't play it well. Your video explains exactly how we could execute wrist rotation in an efficient manner. I'm putting this video in my practice plan. Can't wait to learn this technique and polish my playing Fur Elise 😊
Sounds great!! Thanks for watching!
Exactly, also for Passacaglia (Handel).
👌🏻
Thanks for the tutorial,
Regarding "my BONUS Exercise for You!"
I feel some tension from keeping the pivot finger, which is the pinky, pressed the entire time.. Any advices..?
Thanks for watching! If you have an acoustic grand, you can take advantage of key let off... the point near the bottom of the key depression where there's a little "bump." If we depress 5th finger very slowly we can find that point. It takes very little energy to push the key beyond, but we get a tiny bit of feedback here through the finger.
Try keeping the 5th finger right at that bump, no further depressed (not a full depression of the key) but also not released. Doing this can help alleviate tension from too firm a 5th finger that continues to push into the key after it's job is done. If this is too difficult to start with, just place your 5th finger on the key surface, don't press at all, and rotate toward it, then back toward the other fingers, playing/striking notes with fingers 1 through 4, but never with finger 5. This will also give a similar sensation. How it feels to do both of these variations should be very close to the correct feeling of the actual exercise. Then we need to pair the relaxed feel of the hand when 5 doesn't have to engage with a comfortable hold of the key when we do use 5 to play.
Let me know if these help!
@@PianistAcademy1 Thank you for your detailed response, I will take all of your points into consideration.
19:54 For those interested, the reason for this is that when your palm is facing downward on the keyboard, your radius in the forearm has already crossed over the ulna. Sort of like crossing your fingers with the middle finger over the top of the index finger. If your fingers are already crossed, it is easy to uncross them (this is rotation toward the pinky) but impossible to cross them much further than they already are (i.e. rotation towards the thumb) - especially without moving your elbow up and away from your body.
100%. I thought about including a graphic of the bone structure but decided against it. The bones literally make an "x" shape across one another when the palm is down, and open to be nearly parallel with each other when fully supinated. Thanks for the detailed comment!
Outstanding. I followed along as I looked at my book that you suggested I purchase.
Next, I will be watching the video again and will play along with you😅
Too nice pants color.
Cherry and black. Nice dress style!
What did you tell about?
🤣
What a great video, Charles. Thank you for going into such wonderful detail to show how we should be doing wrist rotation. What an eye-opener it is to learn how we *should* be playing!
Maybe the rotation is too fast to see, but I am studying the hand position of Oscar Peterson on TH-cam. There does not seem to be a whole lot of rotation. The man's hands are so effortlessly still even when he is playing with complete hand independence jumping all over the keyboard at lightening speed. Please respond, Charles!
Hey Brian! I looked at a couple Oscar Peterson vids just now. It can be tough to get a good angle of his hands it seems! The ones that I found, I do occasionally see a bit of "throw" toward 5 or 3 while soloing which makes me think that overall, yes, he does incorporate rotation. Linear passages are even harder to tell, but the speed that he's known for can be made far easier with just a few degrees of rotation, especially around finger crosses, than perfectly flat hands. This video is one of the better examples I've found: th-cam.com/video/UHXGBg6aCGE/w-d-xo.html
You can definitely observe rotation used in a variety of passages here, but at most probably about 10 degrees, and more typically 5 or fewer. There are a few closeups of his right hand where, if you watch the underside of his palm VERY carefully, you'll see it. So yes, I do think he used rotation, perhaps not even knowingly, but it got incorporated in his technique as he pursued higher and higher levels of playing. He's a great example of using this technique in a near invisible way, necessitated by speed.
That's what I was looking for!!!! You made my day! Thank you so much for sharing ❤
Thanks for watching!
Great vid charles i cant wait for the next stream
Thanks, Rhodesy! I'm looking forward to checking out your latest work!
@PianistAcademy1 the albums 15 minutes long let me know which is your favorite and pick whichever piece you want out of the 6 my personal favorites are 2 4 and 5
This is terrific!!! Thank you for all of this!
Thanks, Bunny! Hope you have been well!
Bravo, la rotazione è spiegata bene, trovo utili le indicazioni date!
Thank you, Giuseppe!
👌👍❤
I was just starting to look into using rotation. Thanks for the video !
I hope you find it helpful, thanks for checking it out!
It's crucial to note that at the last exercise, being on a high enough tempo, even a teacher can struggle with in-tempo accuracy regarding the 5th 4th and 3th finger of the left hand, as demonstrated, usually being the ones who are not that much fluent in every pianist, so that we as students understand that everyone has its limits but with more practice rhey can sure surpass them while also showing that everything can be hard until we practice enough and make it seem like nothing. I would also like to propose an idea for tutoring videos: you can start approaching different techniques and break them down by facing them on actual pieces, pieces like Mozart Sonatas who are being thought as simple, yet their complexity lies on pure technical things like the rotation and they also present quite a large number of different passages, AKA needing different techniques, throughout their development, even inside each part of them, as Mozart liked to experiment with different piano techniques while developing his themes.
Wow wow wow - I feel like I am listening/watching my teacher back when I was 16/17yo! TY
So great to see you making video for set 2. It motivates me to keep learning 😁 Following your video series on set 1, I'm able to apply wrist circle in my repertoire, eg. playing arpeggio
Im an intermediate player just learning songs on my own and this is so helpful! Im trying to learn a song with fast right hand arpeggioes all throughout, and I couldnt understand even why practicing slowly it would tire out my hands by the middle of the song. Now I know my fingers were doing all the work when I should have been rotating!
Excelente tecnica y brillantes para llevar la energia fuerza y motivo a la nota o acorde al tocar el piano
Find those exercises so fun to practice. Thank you making the videos!
Thanks!
Thank you so much for the super, Merrick! I'm glad you found this video helpful!
Wonderful content! The POWER of rotation in comfortable and effective piano technique simply is impossible to be overrated! Incredible VID!
Thanks so much!
All of the exercises you show have the metric accents on the inside notes, rotating toward the thumb. The opposite accentuarion, such as occurs in left hand broken octaves (Beethoven "Pathetique") is not addressed. Do you have a recommendation for accented outer fingers? Chopin's "Winter Wind" right hand also comes to mind.
To my hands, it's truly the same motion, just shifted rhythmically and with a more aggressive outer rotation... also think of 1st movement of "Appassionata" (measure 50) where both hands have very strong outer accents that show melodic movement amid a flurry of 16ths, also on metric accents as well. If you really wanted to practice something like that within this exercise, simply shift the first 16th of each grouping to the final 16th of the previous "measure" so that the downbeat becomes the note articulated with finger 5... then 5 will get all of the metric accents you are looking for!
Great! I've been waiting for this for a long time.
Thank you for the videos and help and advice you give to us all. As an very senior beginner is the arm rotation applicable to learning scales ? Thanks from the UK.
That's a great question! Technically, yes, we can employ rotation in scales and in scale-like passages but it will be a very minimal form of what's discussed here. As a beginner you might try experimenting, but know that the rotation in scales doesn't really truly become beneficial until we are pushing our tempo up to and beyond 16ths at around 120bpm, around RCM level 9-10.
Oh, thank you! I'm glad to see you adding to the Hanon/Faber videos. I kind of got stuck at the end of set #3. - Nancy
Great, Nancy! I'm not sure how long it'll take to do another one in this set, but let me know if you have questions about any of the pages!
Thank you. I had observed that outside accentuation does not have the same advantage of rotational range that is available for inside. So it does make sense to simply rotate outside with more vigor. It does relieve the finger of unnecessary effort.
You might also find that it helps to prepare the rotation to the outside with the small, but crucial, rotation inside first. Even just a few degrees of preparation in the opposite direction makes a large impact on how much energy we can "throw" toward the outside of the hand.
I love how you pace your speaking and the background music in your intro!
Thanks! It's always nice to hear when someone else also pays attention to all of those little details that, I think, most people would never think about! Hope you're well!
Great
Great video thank you I will be practicing this.
Thanks for watching, Brett! I hope you find it helpful!
I first saw the terms pronation and supination in golf, lol. Makes sense it’s used in music though.
I've never heard the terms in golf... but that shows more about how little I know golf than anything else 🤣. My best 18 I shot a 94 so... yeah.
@@PianistAcademy1 That’s pretty good! Out of curiosity looked it up for dance/ballet it’s there as well.
Supination and pronation are medical/orthopedic terms for position of the body and portions thereof.
wow 40min video! welcome back! 🤣
Haha, thanks! See you on the live this week?
@@PianistAcademy1 i don't think so, i'm getting my piano tuned tomorrow, i probably won't make a decent recording in time, i prefer waiting
@@serwoolsley No problem! Enjoy the freshly tuned piano!
I love that you're adding more videos! Amazing work