Reading ahead Options

[elisabethann]

Hi I am having trouble with reading piano music a bar or so ahead. I play a bar, but my eyes do not move quickly enough ahead, so my timing is out. My teacher has tried covering the notes that I have just played to make me look ahead but not successful really yet.
My teacher who is very well qualified says she is 3 bars ahead which seems to me to be impossible!
I am only grade 3/4 but in theory grade 6.
So I am not daft (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/fruitcake.gif)

[sbhoa]

I'm somewhat above that but the problem I have when consciously trying to read ahead is that I try to play the bar I'm looking at....

[Scooby Doo]

Don't despair. It's not easy and takes time. Keep practising, and it will improve. Maybe you could aim to stay one beat ahead to start with, then 2 beats, then 3 and so on - don't worry so much about bars for now?

[delicato]

Hi I am having trouble with reading piano music a bar or so ahead. I play a bar, but my eyes do not move quickly enough ahead, so my timing is out. My teacher has tried covering the notes that I have just played to make me look ahead but not successful really yet.
My teacher who is very well qualified says she is 3 bars ahead which seems to me to be impossible!
I am only grade 3/4 but in theory grade 6.
So I am not daft (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/fruitcake.gif)

This sight reading i difficult, for me too. I do not know what else you have tried but what i try to do is practice really slowly so hopefully making it easier. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

.......your way ahead with your theory then!

[dolce@piano]

I can't really say exactly which bar I',m looking at in general when I sight-read but I know I do it pretty well so don't get too hung up about being exactly one bar (or two or three ahead).

What matters is that the beat is steady.

If you're having trouble with this, the absolutely best thing is to play duets or play accompaniments. You can also play along to CD backing tracks (although you'll soon 'learn' the piece and so it won't be sight-reading).

And, of course, the old trusty favourite, the metronome.

You need some method to impose a steady beat so you are forced to respect it. Then your eyes will look where they need to (wherever that is).

[andante_in_c]

Not everyone can read very far ahead as people have different short term memory capacities. What increased practice can do is to give a musician more ways to 'chunk' the music, as short term memory treats a chunk as one item of information.

So, for example, a beginner might need to remember the notes G, B, D coming up as three separate items, whereas a more experienced player might just need to think 'G major triad'.

It's a bit like athletic prowess: we can all improve, but not all of us can become Paula Radcliffe, however much practice we do.

[goldfish]

Hi Elisabethann,

If you happen to have an iPad I suggest you have a look at Wessar International's SightRead4Piano app. I am sure that by using that you would soon become much better at reading ahead. It makes the music that you have already played disappear, it includes a metronome, and you can set the pace at which to play. My students have found it incredibly useful and they enjoy using it.

[linda.ff]

Hi Elisabethann,

If you happen to have an iPad I suggest you have a look at Wessar International's SightRead4Piano app. I am sure that by using that you would soon become much better at reading ahead. It makes the music that you have already played disappear, it includes a metronome, and you can set the pace at which to play. My students have found it incredibly useful and they enjoy using it.

I've treid covering up the music that's just gone - or rather the music that's currently being played - but I've found that in many case it stalls them, becasue I've taught most of my pupils to read by melodic shape (I don't mean they don't recognise the notes, it's just that it's often not the first way of calculating what note you're playing next) and if you can't see where you're coming from (or actually, since they should be reading slightly ahead "where you will have been coming from"), you often can't see where you're going to.

[maggiemay]

Yes, I agree. When my pupils are sight-reading (eg one hand of a new piece, not necessarily exam-style sight-reading) the thing that most often stalls them is a line break. They lose track of what the last note was.

[dolce@piano]

Yes, same here to Maggiemay and Linda.ff.

I've tried covering up the music as you go along but I think it makes the line look very weird (I've tried getting someone to do it for me too) and the pupils get thrown.

I still do it occasionally for those couple of really annoying pupilis who insist on repeating each bar/half-bar three times before moving on, but that's more just to make a point, not really as a teaching tool.

I do quite like single-hand sight-reading practice where I'm playing the other hand and I keep going, nothing but nothing stops me, and they just have to keep up/catch up - that makes them look ahead !