The best way to learn piano pieces?
I’ve been playing for 10 years now and even I can’t sit down and sight-read something right off the bat perfectly. The great thing about music is that there’s always something you can do to make it better. It’s always a lot of fun to try and learn difficult pieces because of the great feeling of accomplishment you get after you master it.
A good example of this is when my friend and I sat down to try and play “All of Me” by Jon Schmidt. I told him that I loved that song but I still can’t play it even though I’ve had the music since September. He looked at me like I was crazy! “Do you have any idea how long it took me to get that song that good? Two years!” he said.
So obviously, it’s not easy to learn new pieces. The way I practice them though, is I first play through the entire song at least once to see how far along I am and how difficult the whole song is. Then I’ll go back and practice, practice, practice one section of the song until I get fairly good at it. This could be a part before a key change, or just the first page or something. Then I move on to the next section, but always starting from the very beginning of the song so that the first part I practiced will get even more practice. So I’ll just keep adding on to it in that way. I also play through the entire song at least once a day from the first day I sight-read it on.
It also helps to go really slow at first so you can get the correct rhythms and figure out easier fingering. And this method can obviously be used for any instrument, not just the piano. Another hint: write on your music! If it’s your music, feel free to make notes to yourself about key changes, number difficult rhythms, remind yourself about dynamics and articulation, anything! If you remind yourself enough, you’ll save yourself time and frustration everytime you sit down to practice because you’ll already remember what issues you had last time.
Here’s a quote from my band teacher that really motivated me: “Amateurs practice until they get it right. Professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong.”
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