Be SUCCESSFUL at MENTAL PRACTICE // How to mentally practice without your instrument -Piano Tutorial

Mental practice is a topic that I find is not talked about enough. It has huge potential and today, I share my experiences and techniques regarding mental practice away from your instrument.
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Website: danae-doerken.com
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[@weitze7]

Really useful summary - I tend to do mental practice naturally on bits that I keep getting wrong - then see if I can overcome them on the keyboard later - it works sometimes!

[@RolandHuettmann]

Since many years I meditate. Well, real meditation according to the system I use means leaving all thoughts and settling in a state of total bodily relaxation with the mind totally settled as well, even sometime expanded in a huge way. After meditation, any mental exercise is so much more effective since it becomes easy to focus without mental noise coming up. Before meditation I do Yoga asanas which again prepare for a relaxed state of mind, prepare for meditation, and then for mental practice. This all is like pulling the string of a bow to then shoot the arrow in a more effective way.

Love this! Meditation is amazing and it is so great that you are doing this regularly 👌🏻

[@nadiabirkenstock_harpsong]

Great video, thank you!

[@bjb0808]

So interesting. Why don't you have more likes? That's crazy. Thank you for the excellent advice.

Thank you so much! ☺️🙏🏻

[@paulkennedy5514]

im just a beginner really but one sort of mental practice that helps me is sitting with the sheet music with the metronome going and mentally playing the song in my mind in time. It really helps give me a deeper sense of the timing which i find very tricky still.

It’s so great to incorporate mental practice into your practice routine early on. 👏🏻

[@deanmorton1494]

Great video, as always (I'm playing catch up). Another technique I use away from the keyboard is to conduct through a piece. This is another way to engage the piece and will sometimes open up new interpretive pathways. It also gives you the opportunity to isolate rhythmic issues.

Thank you for watching and thanks for the additions! 🙏🏻

[@fredrehbein1299]

Thank you. This helps when I cannot sleep or I'm feeling sad. Thank you.

So glad you are finding it helpful! Thanks for watching 🙏🏻

[@levjea]

Merci!

Merci beaucoup!!

[@Sokolovpianist249]

Such an interesting point that you raised about multi tasking - thank you for another great video. Will definitely try this out!!

Thank you 😊

[@batboy242]

You are the best, I use your suggestions ,and to my surprise they work! Lol! I am 3 months into playing keyboard and because of you today I managed a good day of triad chords with bass notes! My wife and I recently celebrated our 53rd anniversary and now this ? If you ever tour the U.S make sure to include the Western Massachusetts or Albany ,New York area we would love to see you!

🙏🏻🙏🏻

[@elgrupocachedallas9685]

Great suggestions! I would like to add listening to great recoding of whatever you’re learning. I even loop and slow down sections and mentally ( and later physically) play along. I am more of a jazz player but I think this practice could be beneficial to classical musicians too.

Yes that’s great advice, thanks for adding this! 👌🏻🤗

[@KarlaHernandez-pl9qe]

Thanks for sharing these techniques, greetings from Dominican Republic!!🇩🇴

Thanks so much for watching, greetings back! 🤗

[@ananthd4797]

I find mental practice absolutely essential to memorize anything (not just music) in a short period of time. When it came to successfully memorizing and playing pieces in a relatively short time (by which I mean a week or two, not overnight! :P), I found it impossible to get the required confidence without mental 'rehearsal', as you put it. It's really hard to discipline yourself to practice in part mentally -- however, I remember that I was able to memorize two pages of a Heller etude in a couple of hours, using a combination of mental and physical practice, although I wasn't able to nail the technical portion immediately. I've found the best way to memorize is to try your best to memorize everything upfront, and then allow it time to sink in. So I try and get through multiple pages in the first day, and later on they solidify in memory with time. But it's hard, and I really need to resist the temptation to think that I'm tired and it's the end of the day. I've also used this for exams where I needed to memorize stuff in a day or two -- however, it's super tiring and I probably couldn't do it on a normal day without that kind of adrenaline rush. I really wonder how you deal with it on a regular basis! Thanks for asking :)

Yes I totally agree with this, I think you really have to make it part of your regular practice routine in order to get to do it on an everyday basis without anything especially stressful coming up. I have actually also tried this method of memorizing everything upfront and then solidifying it as your practice progresses and I find that this definitely is the fastest method to learn something by heart. So if I only have very little time to memorize something, that’s exactly what I do as well. :)

[@ananthd4797]

@ Thank you for your reply. I'm glad it works when you're playing at a really high level as well! Only if it weren't so painfully exhausting haha. I've tried to learn something in a week for a lesson, starting Monday, and I've found that I'm usually only able to play it through comfortably by the end of the week if I've had it memorized by Tuesday, or early on in Wednesday. But I think this is something which should take less time with practice.

[@arashjafarpuor5617]

It was great dear Danae,I really enjoyed this video and of course your advices.please share more with us

Thanks so much! There are more videos coming very soon :)

[@arashjafarpuor5617]

@ Great!😍

[@satyamkumar3644]

Informative video 🙂

Thank you!

[@stefanufer608]

Noch ein faszinierendes Video von Danae. Danke!

Vielen Dank! 😊

[@metalsphere4109]

Thanks!

[@erickenn96]

Wonderful video Danae! Thank you for this exercise. Great idea for memorizing. Will be using it really soon.

Have fun with it 😘

[@billligon4005]

Need to try your ideas. Thanks for the info.

[@malebuls]

Dear Danai that’s right I have difficulty memorizing what you suggest look at the notes and bar by bar try to visualize?

[@batboy242]

Danae, I do believe that mind practice is beneficial, but ,watching you speak with your hands and mouth at the same exact time I wonderLol! Hmmm ( chuckle) Fran

Hahahaha very good point! 😂 It does take a lot of concentration for me to refrain from any physical movement 😉😂

[@brianbuch1]

Thanks for this. I'm about to be away from my beloved piano for 10 days. You mention various sorts of visualization exercises. I, like about 5% of the population lack the ability to form mental images. I don't "see" anything except with my eyes. That condition is called "aphantasia", in case you wanted to look it up. I tell you this just to give you more perspective for your excellent teaching practice. It would obviously be nice to be able to see a piece or a section of a piece in my mind's eye, but I can't. My memorization is thus usually a combination of muscle memory and sound memory.

Thanks for letting me know about this- I actually wasn’t aware of it! Thanks for watching 🙏🏻

[@Lyth]

Hey Brian, just wanted to let you know, as someone who also has Aphantasia, you can actually "learn" to be able to visualize, and slowly develop this ability that others have had since childhood. Fortunately, our brains are very malleable and are capable of learning just about anything! I would suggest looking into visualization meditation practices if that is of any interest to you.

[@24cf648]

Thanks, good tips:) But I've got a question: do you sight-read using mental practice? If yes, how do you do it? I mean, do you imagine the sound in your head? It's easier for me to practice something mentally once I've 'mastered' the notes and know how it should sound, but not starting from scratch

Personally, I actually usually sight read at the piano (not purely mentally) and get into mental practice once I have already played the piece on the piano. However, it is very effective to sight read mentally and yes, you would imagine the sound in your head as well as the feeling in your hand and fingers when playing these notes, how your body feels, and so on. Hope this helps!

[@per174]

Really interesting, Danae! I tried it with an ornament passage I'm struggling with in a Chopin nocturne, but it's difficullt. How to do it in tempo and deal with mistakes? Guess I need to spend more time. :)

Thanks so much! Yes, it is difficult at first, but it does get easier with time. So definitely try to keep doing it and you will get faster with time. :)

[@dimitridemetriades2637]

Hochinteressant ,wie immer ! Danke , Danae . Übrigens habe ich Ihnen neulich eine Nachricht auf dem FB Messenger geschrieben , und bat um Rat zu einer Beethoven Passage in op90 :)

Vielen Dank! Oh da werde ich mal reinschauen. :)

[@gervasiomontenegro569]

Very interesting video.

Thanks 🙏🏻

[@ananthd4797]

Nice video! Have you read Piano Technique by Gieseking? He talks a lot about learning scores completely away from the instrument.

Yes, I read parts of it during my studies - such a fascinating book!

[@anezkamunzarova9459]

Thanks for idea to read!

[@bettylee1816]

Thanks for the read recommendation!

[@ariya950]

you focus only play the right hand and then left hand or both hand at once when mentally practice?

[@bettylee1816]

Great video, can't wait to implement! I haven't used mental practice for the piano before, but I used it a lot for weightlifting with great result. I find it incredibly useful especially before attempting a weight I am afraid of. It doesn't make me any less afraid, but my follow through is more confident. For training I visualize before I do a heavy lift, how the bar will feel in my hand, how my body will move, how the bar will move, catching the bar, stabilizing, and standing up. The more detailed the better! Down to the temperature of the cold bar and the rough knurling and the impact and shock from the weight. For competitions I will also visualize hearing my name called, walking up to the stage, chalking my hands, bowing to the judges, the eyes of the audience looking at me. Video for proof: kzbin.info/www/bejne/poa0amabf7d9odU

Wow that’s so interesting, thanks for sharing. And I watched your video: very impressive, congratulations!!

[@jin8714]

When you said practicing a piece in your head, do you do it hands alone or together in your head? I find it very difficult to think through a Bach piece hands together, especially with more than two voices going on at the same time. It's like a train wreck. When practice a piece in your head, do you go through the fingerings on the keyboard , or the image of the score, or the progression, or others? Any tips will be very much appreciated! Thank you for posting the video!

Especially with pieces like Bach, I practice separate voices and separate hands in my head, because I also find it very hard to do both hands together mentally, if I don’t already know the piece extremely well. Also, for me, what works best is actually imagining the fingerings on the keyboard and what it feels like to press the keys. I try to imagine the hand position, the weight of the key, all of that. :)

[@jin8714]

@ Good point! Thank you so much!

[@malebuls]

What if I do not have perfect visual memory!

[@zaheerkhan5548]

👊

[@SYWPiano]

Funny story, I once memorized every single note of the set Op.59 by Chopin and forgot everything a week after my recital...XD

😂 as long as you had it memorized for the recital, that’s what counts! 😉

[@ddgyt50]

When you "visualize", do you mentally see the score, the keyboard, or both?

Personally, I like to visualize the keyboard with my fingers on it.

[@jph7957]

@ Thanks a lot, Danae! One more question: as you visualize your fingers, do you try to feel them at the same time, one by one as they move, or just watch? (without moving them, of course, as you explained).

[@trebronmeheszet]

Dear Danae! As I can see u r not an average KZbinr u r a concert pianist. I m practising piano on my own. I have less than 500 hours piano playing in my hands. But I learnt some transcendental etudes of Liszt, or gnomenreigen so I feel I have some talent about it. Do u have an e-mail address cuz I need help and I have many many questions and maybe u will have time give answers me. I wrote some KZbinrs but none of them gave answers about my questions. U seem very professional maybe u will answer me? Thank you

Dear Trebron! Please send me your questions via Instagram dm or Facebook messenger and I will answer as soon as I have time. Thanks so much for watching! 🙏🏻

[@trebronmeheszet]

@ I don't use instagram or facebook unfortunately

[@batboy242]

Danae, is it normal to take 4 lessons and still not be able to switch between the chords Cmajor, D#, and g major? Should I move on as soon as I get it right or stay here until if becomes fluid? Thanx Fran

Dear Fran, I would say to get it a little more fluid before moving on. No matter how long it takes and at what pace your speed is, I think it always helps to get some kind of stability and ease before increasing the difficulty. It also gives you a feeling of accomplishment and success which is a great motivational factor. :)

[@batboy242]

Thank You for your help,Fran

[@ian20n]

There is only one present and the consciousness owns it. Any other part or parts are the subconscious

👌👌

[@richardforshaw8479]

This assumes that you’ve got a brain in the first place!

[@melissaharrispiano]

Thanks!

Thank you so much!!