What is the best way for keeping pieces in shape once they've been worked thru and learned?

December 26, 2009 at 10:17 PM ·

This seems to be the problem for me as well. I find if I completely relax It tends to just happen, it doesn't hurt to play the more difficult parts as a warm up before practicing newer pieces, there are a few things in certain pieces that I just can't manage to keep under my fingers without playing them everyday. I think it's absolutely crucial that you have some practice sessions where you play through as many pieces as you can. I have a little thing I do where I'll play to rehearsal no.1, and then after that's just they way you've learned it try connecting it to no.2 and so on. Same as a memorization excercise. I really don't think there is a special trick behind it, just got to find the time and do it.

December 27, 2009 at 12:01 AM ·

 Greetings,

you have raised a very important point an d fortunatley there is a very simple answer.

All you need to do is set a regular day and time once a week to play through your repertoire.  This should be a short session. Half an hour is enough.   It is not a detailed practice session per se-  get through the piece from beginning to end.  Make a note of a few rough patches and do a litlte work,  but not very much.

Once you repertoire becomes longer and more complex one simply has to be more systematic. Keep a journal and cycle things so thta over a month or whatever all your repertoire is covered.  This allows you to run through a single movement one week of a sonata or whatever and the next movement next time if such a split is necessary.

I am an absolute bugbear on this system with my students. It is one of the first things I teach them and I often demand old repertoire off the cuff in a lesson to make sure they are staying with it.

It might sound a bit tough but frankly there is nothing more -stupid- than learning a piece of music and then putting it away for a year or forgetting about t completely.  What a waste!

The plus side is that if you are asked to do a concert on a few days notice or just `play a nice tune for your grandma` it is no sweat.

I call this appraoch to repertoire @being a professional amateur rather than a amateur professional.`

Cheers,

Buri

December 27, 2009 at 10:29 AM ·

Greetings,

That's a great New Year resolution: to put such a system in place.

Cheers,

Bart

December 27, 2009 at 12:23 PM ·

hello!

I'm lucky, I have no such problem whatsoever..... because I never learned a piece through and complete =) 

December 28, 2009 at 04:53 PM ·

When I was a student I often used to envy the way pianists so often seemed to spend so much time actually playing music – in contrast to being a violinist, where it seemed that you had to spend most of your practice learning how to play whatever single piece you were studying at the time; and little time actually just playing.

• Suppose you have learnt 10 concertos, 10 sonatas and 10 short pieces. This would be a small repertoire for a professional soloist, but a much larger one than most players command.
• Suppose the concertos and sonatas averaged 30 minutes each, and the short pieces 10 minutes each.
• The total running time of all the pieces together, rounded up, is 12 hours.
• So if you spent only one hour each week on old repertoire it would take only 12 weeks to play all of it, and you could do this four times a year.
• So with a much smaller total repertoire than that, and shorter pieces, it is even easier to rotate all of it in quite a short time.

December 30, 2009 at 11:43 AM ·

I don't know, sometimes I get things right unknowingly how I do it, not necessarily in violin, other more or less physical activities as well, but since I cannot reliably reproduce, I would not dare to say I learned, and I know them.. 

December 31, 2009 at 06:25 AM ·

This might sound a bit OCD, but I developed a system for cycling through Bach S&Ps and Paganini caprices.  I pick a movement every day, every week, and every month.  Or in Pag's case, longer than a month.  (Smile)  So in any given day, I'll hit three movements of S&Ps and three Pag caprices.  This system allows for "keep in the fingers" review, and in-depth work.  I need both.  (Smile again)

I cycle through the books, and although that might not be the most artistic and soul-satisfying way to review, it gets the job done.  Again, a bit OCD, but I work well with structure.  (Smile yet again)

In addition to the above, I also cycle through sonata, concerto, short piece repertoire, and etudes.  Sometimes I buzz through things under tempo, sometimes meticulous work on a small chunk, and sometimes I nail the flag to the mast and just play. 

As for managing time and lengthy pieces, you don't have to do the whole sonata/concerto/short piece at one time.  Even running through a page is better than nothing.  Good luck!