Practice TIP of the week:

Here are the most recent practice tips I have covered:​
​🎵 July 20: Don't Fix Mistakes
​🎵 July 28: Sight-Reading as a Daily Habit​
​🎵 August 10: Exploring Cadences​
​🎵August 17: Playing Chord Progressions​

Each month, I focus on a specific theme for practice tips. This month’s theme is Understanding Harmony.

Today's Practice Tip: Practicing Blocked Chords

One thing about piano music is that composers love to fill the page with notes! This can lead to scores that look dense and notey, but beneath all of those notes, the harmony is usually much simpler than it looks. Many passages that look complicated on the page are actually just chords written in broken patterns or arpeggios. When you play only one note at a time, it’s easy to miss these patterns.

A great way to cut through the complexity is to practice the passage in blocked chords. Instead of playing every note in order, group them together and play them as a solid chord. For example, if your left hand has an Alberti bass pattern (the familiar C-G-E-G pattern that shows up so often in classical music), just play it once as a blocked C major chord.

This exercise reveals the underlying harmony, helps you see the “building blocks” of the piece more clearly, and makes memorization easier. It also frees up your ear to listen to how the melody sounds on top of the harmony, rather than getting bogged down by the surface detail of the (usually) left hand figuration.

If you have some music theory knowledge, label the chords and identify them in relation to one another.

Practicing in blocked chords is also extremely helpful when you have to change your hand position frequently. Once you’ve identified the chords and blocked them, practice them over and over until you can smoothly move from one chord to the next without hesitation or searching with your fingers.

With this kind of practice, you’ll find that your fingers feel more secure and your mind has a clearer map of where the harmony is headed. Since composers often use the same kinds of figuration in many different pieces, you’ll start to notice these same patterns popping up in piece after piece, which makes new music less intimidating and a lot easier to learn.

💜 Some of My Favorite Things

1. 🎹 Debussy – Étude XI: Pour les arpèges composés ​
   Happy birthday week to Claude Debussy, born August 22, 1862. This étude is full of overlapping, irregular arpeggios that twist and shimmer in unexpected ways. Here’s a beautiful performance by Mitsuko Uchida.​
2. 📚Book: The Savvy Music Teacher: Blueprint for Maximizing Income and Impact, by David Cutler
   ​If you’re a music teacher looking to diversify your income and rethink your business model, this book is a must-read. David Cutler outlines practical strategies for building a sustainable and fulfilling teaching career, with real-world examples and inspiring insights. It’s especially timely in an era where flexibility and multiple income streams are more essential, and also more possible, than ever. Buy it here.​
3. 🎵 Podcast: The Chopin Podcast - Garrick Ohlsson and Ben Laude
   ​This beautifully produced series explores Chopin’s music through in-depth conversations between legendary pianist Garrick Ohlsson and Ben Laude of Tonebase. You can listen to it on your podcast player of choice, or by visiting the website here.​

Some links in this email are affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no additional cost to you.