Anyone have any experience playing the Brahms 51 exercises?

oh boy, brings back some memories - I never really did get my head around these, they were really DIFFICULT!! Best of luck

yup - but I've got small hands so some of the bigger stretch ones were a little tricky........

I have been given several to work on this summer with the warning:

--- These are powerful exercises: they can improve your technique or injure you ---

I am only allowed to touch the ones I have been given in the lesson and am only allowed to practice them exactly in the way shown. Today there was some interesting use of sides of fingers, edges of keys and crossing over etc. to reach. Very interesting. Another with constantly changing width of reach between fingers in arpeggio pattern up and down. Quite a work out.

Sorry- never heard of them! Could someone please let me know what they are so I can get a copy? Are they anything like the Czerny/Hanon exercises?

Thank you...

WoO6 Brahms, Johannes: 51 Exercises

Not like Hanon.
More like Czerny, but then more musical and more oriented towards developing a technique which is prepared to play -- Brahms.

One example of an edition:

http://www.sheetmusicplus.com/a/item.html?...mp;item=3145932

to hear them on a cheap CD (they are a bit spooky):

http://www.amazon.com/Brahms-51-Exercises-...6/dp/B00000148K

I am enjoying numbers 8ab, 26a and 34 at the moment.

Wow....thanks for that! I will get a copy and have a go at them. I'll ask my tutor to help me with them.

thank you

I've often thought that Hanon prepares you to play Hanon, the Chopin studies make it easier to play Chopin etc. On the other hand, a lot of these things are generically good technique and it does seem to me that exercises which are also good music must be more rewarding to play than the merely mechanical Hanon.

For the moment I am doing Hanon book 1 every day as my warm up. When my technique allows, I will move on!

Similar here, am trying to do book 1 & 2 up to the scales every day, then attempting to add 2 pages of scales each day Off to buy book 3 tommorrow if I can find it for a reasonable price! Apparently have to start building up a practice regime for Huddersfield
I like the Chopin studies, I'm learning the revoluntionary at the moment....it gives you left-arm-ache (!) but is brilliant fun

Similar here, am trying to do book 1 & 2 up to the scales every day, then attempting to add 2 pages of scales each day Off to buy book 3 tommorrow if I can find it for a reasonable price! Apparently have to start building up a practice regime for Huddersfield
I like the Chopin studies, I'm learning the revoluntionary at the moment....it gives you left-arm-ache (!) but is brilliant fun

Huddersfield - wow, brings back some very fond memories of Friday nights in the union bar, Tuesday nights at Johnnys, Thursdays at The Station or the Blue Rooms, and even more nights behind the bar at The Zetland, right opposite the campus (at least it was when I was there !!) The music department was fab,it was a brilliant place to be a student, and the tuition in the music dep was top notch.

I'm really looking forwards to it - although worried about how skint I'm going to be (and am already...not even there yet!!) I only put it on my form as somewhere with a lower offer to use as an insurance choice, but went there for an audition and just fell in love with the place! The music department had a real buzz about it, everyone seemed so friendly and the lady who did my interview was really kind & made me feel a lot calmer...it was a great day. Need to remember to pack lots of scarves though, it was freezing when we went!

EDIT: Does anyone know if the Brahm's 51 are avaliable 'individually' in England...if that makes sense Just been looking on musicroom.com and they are only avaliable on there as part of a collection including cadenzas, transcriptions etc...I will have a look in the music shop tommorrow, just wondering if there is anywhere I could order them from otherwise. Feeling rather intrigued!

Along with lots of other music being catalogued at the International Music Score Library Project, you can download the exercises from public domain sources for free here:

http://imslp.ca/images/imslp.ca/0/0a/Brahm...1_Exercises.pdf

Ooo thank you! Didn't think to check on there Will have to take them to show my teacher...don't want my wrists to chuck another wobbly on me
xxx