How to FINALLY Memorize that Damn Fugue | Pro Learning Strategies

[@pianoplaynight]

I'm so lazy! I only transpose the fugue in 4 other keys instead of all major, minor, pentatonic, indian and dodecaphonic scales! 😜Excellent tips! Thanks

[@ELPsteel]

"why me, why me, no, go to hell" had me CACKLING at my computer 🤣🤣🤣

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Don’t try it at home with family members, may be lethal, lol

[@fatalite225]

your channel is truly underrated every single one of your videos is a hidden jem

[@chrisdei9121]

Suggestion for another topic: how on earth do you manage fingering when sight-reading, and also when not sight-reading, but preparing to learn a piece...especially Bach ( Fugues and other complex works for example....)

[@aagm.]

Great teacher, and you play very well. Thank you

[@frédéricchopinFan.9479]

Thank you! I hate memorizing fugues 😅 but now I understand how to memorize a fugue easily, and the structure. Thank you for these videos because these videos are really helpful and great. Thank you 😄

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Happy to help!😊

[@MH.Speedcrawler]

Thank you very much for this lesson. It works on all pieces

[@agustinussiahaan6669]

Great lesson, Denis.

[@jordidewaard2937]

This might be your best informative video to date (to someone like me who tackles piece like Chopin ballades but struggles when any musical theory is truly tested, like in fugues). I'm currently studying music theory through books, and while it does work, it makes much more sense when you see it visually, and especially audibly, applied!

[@user-sk7ws4sr4x]

Awesome. Such a densely packed video textbook.

[@homamellersh8446]

Hi Denis , even though I am not at the level to follow all that you were saying, I really loved the way you explained how to memorise the different sections . Thank you so much .

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Thanks for watching! These strategies work for any difficulty level pieces!

[@Michelle6998832]

Great tutorial/lesson and a refreshingly positive overview and point of view aimed at engaged thinking and problem solving skills in a playful, didactic, and almost effortless way in understanding the written score presented by the composer himself as a puzzling maze of melody, harmony, rhythm and the partnership needed to achive the symphony of sounds 🎶 known as music (to one's ears).. pun intended! 😃 Thank you!

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Glad it was helpful! Thank you kindly!😊

[@TheChungruby]

I truly appreciate your sense of humour during the session, Denis! Your perspectives made it fun and memorable, and I can apply them to both my practice and play. I have a deep love and respect for Bach's music, along with the works of many other composers. However, your insights regarding office talk added another layer to my understanding of Bach's music! I laughed so hard I cried when you made that comment, and I genuinely enjoyed your explanations 🤣😂🤣😂😆. In particular, when you emphasized the importance of selecting voices to express musical ideas as a form of musicality, it struck me as a critical point that can be applied to the works of other composers as well. Thank you for such an enlightening session! I look forward to your next one.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Thanks for the feedback! I am glad you found it helpful. It’s all usable in other pieces indeed!

[@soggi0]

I'm trying to learn Bach's WTK now and this video really helps a lot. Thank you!

[@rodrigogb6022]

Brilliant and generous, as you are! Thanks for sharing

[@pviseskul]

You successfully made the dense content pretty entertaining to watch 💛 I do find that working out the fingering for fugues is pretty hard, and many times awkward and tension inducing so would love to hear any tips from you on this topic maybe in the future vdo - thank you 😊

[@eerindiraarora6921]

Great explanations!

[@bunnyhollowcrafts]

I always make up stories to help me with rhythm. This was another inspiring video. Thank you!!!

[@ddgyt50]

Don't forget inversions, augmentations, and diminutions of the subject(s). Highlighting a Fugue can be very colorful. LOL this old brain can barely remember why I walk into a room, let alone memorize a fugue or any other form for that matter. nonetheless it is still worth the effort because one really learns when trying to memorize. thank you for all you do.

[@fortissimoX]

I'm not on a level where I could memorize fugues, but still, this was very helpful! 👍 Thank you very much, you're great pianist and educator. I wish you all the best!

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Happy to help!

[@westernkentucky5956]

I had no idea that agents got such a big cut! A lot of your description reminds me of the female US college Division I sports player. (I have experience in this area). A lot of whether you make the pros is luck, and then if you make it to the pros, you're still always broke. Anyway, I follow your channel and appreciate you very much. Please take satisfaction in how many people are following you on here. Best wishes to you.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Thank you! So much support warms my heart!🥰

[@GiacomoPhilipp92]

Great advices! Thank you. Best regards from Germany.

[@suzanne9581]

Another brilliant video! Thank you!

[@timothyhayes8128]

You rock so much! Thank you so much for the content I forgot I needed! Your last tip hit hard with me. I'm the kind who with most pieces have to start from specific places, so I will definitely learn to fix that. Thanks for the tips!

[@1980subrosa]

Excelent video! Succint and to the point, no nonsense. Thank you for sharing this!

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Glad it was helpful!

[@qazsedcft2162]

Your analogies are hilarious! 🤣

[@s_oh]

Thanks! Great video and great tips!

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Glad it was helpful!

[@mitchnew3037]

Thank you so much 😊

[@egarmo1]

Wonderful. Reminds of the Neuhaus'advice... create an artistic image on top of analysis, verbalize as mush as possible

[@josemoran508]

This is great! Thanks!

[@jonnyblock7310]

Thanks

[@EasyAsPieSongChords]

Thank you for this❤❤❤❤❤

[@rogergustavsson5139]

👍♥️♥️♥️ Thank you 😃

[@yoyichen4470]

Very helpful! Thanks!

[@zanmaran3872]

SUPER B Content . Thank you .

[@emevart]

Спасибо

Dux and Comes. My teacher used the original Latin to teach these to me.

[@BunniesRcooler]

I am a 14 year old student and I would like to try to get into a conservatory this year, though my technique is quite lacking in my opinion and I experience quite a lot of tension, even when just playing scales at around 120 bpm. Would you recommend me any of your courses? I was thinking about getting the hanon or czerny courses of yours, but I don't really know which is better. Have a great rest of your day, love from Czechia ♥

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Hi, I think Czerny course will be more suitable for your level. I will also release a complete technique re-building course this year, stay tuned and good luck with your music career!

[@BunniesRcooler]

@@DenZhdanovPianistAlright Thank you very much for this channel. So much value

Podria salir video explicando para trasponer.

[@leandrusi4533]

That damm fugue lol

[@egarmo1]

hahaha, 11:55 motif sounds like Messiah A Child is born....

[@andromedaperseus954]

I can memorize atonal like Ligeti and Schoenberg, but memorizing fugues is almost impossible for me...

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Interesting!

[@davidguitarchannel3963]

Why do you hate Sir Adnras Schiff? 0:30

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Self irony, no hate. He is amazing, and famous for his phenomenal memory.

[@davidguitarchannel3963]

@@DenZhdanovPianist Ohh got it.. Silly me hhh.. Thanks. I really liked this video.. You make the most difficult simplified and manageable.

[@pianoplaynight]

@@davidguitarchannel3963 while he has phenomenal memory, I don't think Schiff has a photographic one. He was talking about learning the art of fugue in an interview and only performed it many months later. What Denis is referring to is people like Richter. He learned the WTC2 by heart in a month, so about one p&f per day. Absolutely mindblowing

[@PianoTortuga]

Andras Schiff has memorized a ton of repertoire.. including pretty much all Bach..

[@KraggHC]

I read this as "How to learn a fudge" and I thought: Hey, I've always wanted to make fudge, fudge is delicious! And now I want fudge... I'll take the Piano lesson, though.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Omg now I want a fudge

[@Daniel_Zalman]

So, you want to write a fugue?

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

🤣 im no gould😊

[@maximyanchenko3780]

​@@DenZhdanovPianistnice one!

[@giannottister]

In the Baroque no one played written fugues from memory; rather they improvised them. I don't understand why you have to necessarily play everything from memory now, a practice that essentially originated with Liszt and then continued because the art of improvisation had been lost.

[@adeemuff]

It originated with Clara Wieck who later married Robert Schumann

[@giannottister]

@adeemuff The point is that playing from memory doesn't necessarily improve performance, in my opinion.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

It does not necessarily indeed. However… Knowing a piece so well that one can effortlessly play it from memory unlocks much greater freedom in interpretation compared to when a score is still needed. The music becomes part of you, making it easier to enter a state of flow, which is essential for an unforgettable concert experience. Most concert pianists I’ve discussed this with agree, though they acknowledge that nobody enjoys the tedious process of memorization. It’s also unfortunate that improvisation is less common today. However, I wouldn't be so quick to assume the causality that improvisation declined because people began memorizing pieces. The opposite might be equally true: people began to value well-crafted compositions so highly that even brilliant improvisation seemed less convincing. After all, many attend classical concerts hoping for a cathartic experience, which is more likely when a masterwork is performed by an artist who is deeply prepared and fully understands the piece, rather than when someone improvises half of it because they were too lazy to put in the necessary effort. A true masterpiece usually emerges from careful planning. Chopin was an extraordinary improviser, but he meticulously refined every bar of his compositions. Bach, the ultimate improviser, crafted his fugues with deep precision. These composers would always elevate their improvisations with extra thought and refinement, which is why their works are masterpieces in every sense.

[@giannottister]

@@DenZhdanovPianist Are we sure that playing a piece from memory gives all this freedom? For some people yes but for others it is just stress added to the performance, with the nightmare of the memory gap looming. The problem is that now if you don't play from memory you can't do competitions or get on the concert circuit, which to me is just an imposition dictated by "that's the way it's always been done" which has little to do with the music in my opinion. But then you don't understand why if you play chamber music then you use sheet music; following the logic of more freedom in interpretation, you should play everything from memory.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

Of course, playing from memory brings its own added stress. However, playing with a score introduces a different kind of pressure: the constant dilemma of whether to look at your hands or the score during tricky passages, which increases the risk of mistakes. Page-turning is also a frequent cause of mishaps on stage. Additionally, relying on the score can foster a mentality of not fully internalizing the piece, which often results in a performance that lacks brilliance, even with the score in front of you. When a piece is so thoroughly learned that you no longer need the score, it's easier to enter a state of flow, REALLY. Achieving this however, requires the player to develop multiple types of memory-auditory, intellectual, motor, and visual-and to use all of them methodically while learning the piece. Competitions are designed to test musicians under the most demanding conditions. If someone struggles with memorization, stage stability, or handling stress, it may indicate that they are not suited to compete at the highest competition level as a concert pianist. I would argue that being able to play a limited amount of pieces by memory, let’s say 2.5 hours solo pieces and a couple of concerti (and this is all you basically need to take part in competitions), is an important quality for anyone who wants to become a concert pianist. Many (if not most) amateur competitions allow use of a score. Fortunately, there are many other paths for those with these challenges to build successful careers and fulfill their potential. Chamber music is often performed with a score because, with only a few players involved, there's a greater chance that one of your chamber partners might make a mistake, skip a beat, or introduce an unexpected rubato. In such distracting and confusing moments, having the score in front of you allows you to quickly find where your partner is and "catch" them within milliseconds. This ability is actually one of the most important one for a professional collaborate pianist. However, there are some musicians with such exceptional memory and quick reflexes that they can perform chamber music without a score. More and more concert pianists are now performing academic repertoire with a score, including renowned figures like Yuja Wang or Boris Berezovsky, who often face the pressure of performing numerous programs in a concert season on short notice. Many performers who perform complete WTC or similar do this with a score indeed. And you know what? Nobody cares. No one minds whether you play a recital with or without a score. So rather than blaming restrictions that aren't as strict as they may seem, it's more productive to develop better strategies for handling memorization and stress, if that’s the issue at hand, for situations where playing from memory is actually desirable and beneficial.

[@maximyanchenko3780]

Great video, Denis, as usual! 2 questions. 1. How do you approach performance of a fugue? When listening to most of the recordings, i usually find myself completely lost. That's probably because the performer knows the fugue so well that he really can process everything happening there in real time, while a listener needs more time to grasp what's going on, otherwise they will just fall asleep. What do you do to keep your listeners engaged in complex music? 2. About this specific prelude - it goes on triplet rhythm, so I find it very awkward and foreign when people play straight eights (only) in the beginning. I can't force myself to do it, i always play the dotted triplet rhythm. What's your view?

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

1. As shown in video, I try to fill anything I play with an emotionally clear content, where every element or section would have a specific color and idea. But truth be told, it’s not possible to always perform at the top of your charismatic abilities, and no matter how you play there always be enough people who will be bored, because attention is a limited asset, and complex music is really tough. Here, you tapped into the biggest “problem” of classical music industry: if you care about entertaining too much, you end up with tasteless profanity, if you care about The Art too much - you end up with a product, in which very few people would be interested in, because it needs the whole education to comprehend, enjoy, and appreciate it. Strictly speaking, you’d be able to truly enjoy and comprehend only those fugues which you have studied yourself following the strategy I explained: understanding it on the intellectual level, and empathizing to a material on the emotional level. 2. Train an ability to feel the quarter notes (metronome beat) but switch from filling those beats with triplets to duplets.

[@maximyanchenko3780]

@@DenZhdanovPianist Thanks for the reply, Denis! 1. Yes, I have no problem following the fugues I learned myself :) But the non-musicians don't usually have this luxury. And it's not just about entertaining meaning "having fun", it's more about conveying the meaning and showing the beauty of the composition for maybe someone who listens to it for the first time. I also play organ, and there (and also on harpsichord, where you don't have the dynamics like on piano) you use the tempo and "breath" much more freely and prominently than on piano which is usually played metronomically, and any deviation from the extremely steady tempo is frowned upon. To me, it reduces the approachability and results in a kind of gatekeeping. But maybe the genre of fugue is really just a musician's music.... :) 2. I probably phrased it badly. I don't have any technical problem playing straight eights there (I also play jazz, odd signatures etc). What I mean, those straight eights only appear in the beginning of each section and are not recapitulated nor developed as straight anywhere else, which feels weird. I just don't see any logic behind it, it feels like a copyist error.

[@maximyanchenko3780]

@@DenZhdanovPianist Actually, Richter plays the dotted triplets instead of the straight ones :) I know, his playing of Bach is commonly criticized (usually for the pedaling), but still can't be ignored I guess... What's your view?

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

@@maximyanchenko3780 maybe he was inspired by jazz swinging😅, honestly I don’t know. There could be also a tradition to play it like that as well at some point in some circles, many traditions are rising and then are lost. I don’t exclude that it was appropriate to play that way in Bach’s times, I just don’t know for sure, so prefer to keep to a widely spread approach. If you want to dig really deeply into what has been discovered about those forgotten styles of last centuries, you have to study from a historically informed approach with people who specialize on Baroque, play on periodic instruments, and research every little detail.

[@BANHMIZON]

Casual wear? Blasphemy!

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

I had my best silk concert thong underwear with gold cufflinks on me. You couldn't see them, because it's for paid Patreon subscribers only.

[@BANHMIZON]

@@DenZhdanovPianist Hah! in that case, i'll let it slide.

[@henkvrieling9586]

All those teachers: don’t start about your students this, my students that…. yes, you have students. Very interesting.

[@DenZhdanovPianist]

I bet you are Guru of influencing with a huge following, since you know better how to start videos.

[@mitchnew3037]

@@DenZhdanovPianistyou’re a great teacher 👍🏻