How to INSTANTLY Play a Score on a Piano

10 Practice Hacks: • 10 Practice Hacks in u...
Transposing Instruments and alto clef: • How to Read SCORES, Pr...
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[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Leave a comment if this was helpful🙌🏻

[@nobumiau6472]

I'm 17 and I have also kind of suddenly decided to study conducting! I fortunately have 7 years of piano behind me, but I have no official diplomas. I will try hard to prepare fir the exams, and this video has been extremely helpful! Thank you!

[@GZAPPLE]

GOOD LUCKKKK

[@maurodonceloncina1627]

I also want to study conducting. I am 21 and I’m finishing my composition degree. I’m so glad to know more people that share our passion! Good luck!!

[@imparkub]

Good luck!!!!

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

If you want to get on a Zoom call for more advice, write me an email, you don't have to pay me or so: [e-mail] If not, good luck with the audition

[@nobumiau6472]

Thank you all for the support!

[@areyounatz]

Being piano-trained, I can read the treble and bass clef no problem. It'll take me forever to read the alto clef.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Yeah that's normal😂

[@eoghanbostock958]

if you keep with it and really lock in, it will come faster than you think! we pianists already read two different clefs at the same time. you’ve got this

[@TenorCantusFirmus]

I have the License in Score Reading (going to graduate in Composition this year) and must say this practically is the best condensed course in it I've ever found. Should be the very first lesson in the Subject for everyone.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Thank you, I very much appreciate your kind words.🙌🏻

[@CamSullyPiano]

I went to school and learned something similar to this when studying sight reading and taking conducting courses! This concept is really interesting thank you for sharing!!

[@MiScusi69]

Great lesson!

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Thank you, I appreciate the comment🙌🏻

[@carlowelker926]

These are valuable Information about score study. Thank you, Carl!

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Thanks for the comment🙌🏻

[@24cf648]

I have to thank you because I've been sight reading more lately and I've always wanted to read a score but I didn't know where to start ❤

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

You're welcome, thank you🙌🏻

[@brandonvc562]

Hey, I just want to recognize the effort that you put in your videos, the knowlege that you share to us it's truly amazing, thanks man 👏 PD: I'm a pianist and conducting has always been my goal, but I really don't know how to start, so this is very useful.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Thank you very much, your comment made my day😂

[@martinhaub6828]

Good for you for doing this! It's hard but for me any conductor worth the title should be able to do this. It's shocking how many baton wavers out there can't even begin to play a score on piano. Without recordings they'd be utterly hopeless. They are frauds.

[@isaacbeen2087]

I read in Schoenberg that it’s essential to learn all the clefs for score reading. For instance, if you have a trumpet in D, you can just imagine an alto clef, and the notes will come out the same (you just have to rethink the accidentals a bit). I hope I’ve got that right! is that not taught anymore? our director of music also mentioned this trick, but didn’t quite catch onto how important it was; he just kind of brushed over it. It was funny reading it in the Schoenberg years later, a light bulb sort of went off. I still haven’t practiced it yet, however.

[@MaggaraMarine]

My friend studies conducting and he said that that's exactly how it's done. The advantage of "clef transposition" is that you don't actually transpose - you just see the notes as written. I mean, transposition is seeing one note and converting it to another, and clef transposition skips the step of having to convert anything (although as you pointed out, the accidentals work a bit differently, so that's one thing to be aware of). Really useful for reading multiple transpositions at once.

[@isaacbeen2087]

@@MaggaraMarine Glad to hear it hasn't disappeared from pedagogy!

[@laurencefinston7036]

A minor point is that in this case, it only makes sense if you're using the imaginary alto clef just for the note names, because otherwise it would be an octave too low. I think it's easier to just transpose down by a whole step, which doesn't require any adjustment when thinking about the accidentals. I'm not sure how that would work, it might just be a matter of sometimes getting C flats, B sharps, F flats and E sharps and/or double flats and sharps,, but I don't really want to try working this out. There are other tricks like this, e.g., for reading the tenor clef, however the book I read on score playing (strongly) recommended not using them. Instead, it recommended learning to read them directly. That's what I did and I've had good experiences with that. It's not that difficult and once you can do it, you don't have to think about it anymore. I have a standard trumpet in Bb and I mostly don't play from transposed trumpet parts, so it's actually easier for me to transpose up when playing because I'm in the habit of doing it. That is, to get a C, I have to play a D. I also have a D/Eb trumpet and then I have to play a Bb if I want a C (when it's set up as a D trumpet). I learned trumpet the standard way, where the notated C is always the lowest note without valves. Trombones, on the other hand, aren't transposing instruments, so on my tenor, the lowest note with the slide all the way is a Bb and on the alto, it's Eb. It's not as hard as it seems at first. What I find a bit difficult is figuring out what to play on an F horn when the part is notated in C for a horn in some other key. It's not that hard in itself, but I wouldn't be able to do it at speed in the middle of playing a score (if that was something I did), if a horn part suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

[@laurencefinston7036]

I think "all the clefs" is a bit of an exaggeration and it kind of depends on what music you want to be reading. Even the urtext editions of Baroque music don't use the French violin clef and (regrettably) the tenor clef is almost never used for vocal music in modern editions. I can't think of a single piece of music I've played (as opposed to textbook examples) with a baritone clef and the only music with the soprano clef (one of the C clefs) I've ever played are Bach chorales in the Bargiel edition. I'm sure there are examples where these rarer clefs are used, but very few or none in the so-called "standard repertoire". The alto and tenor clefs are genuinely essential (for violas, cellos and trombones).

[@isaacbeen2087]

​@@laurencefinston7036 Interesting. A lot of what you've written there, for me, is confusing to read. What book is it that doesn't recommend this method? it has been standard practise for a very long time. Perhaps recently it has fallen out of fashion as schools no longer teach the different clefs. Using a different clef removes the need to transpose, as the other commenter pointed out. For instance, if you're reading a score with a trumpet in D, and the key of the piece is C major, and the trumpet part will be written in Bb major; transposing up a step will produce a C major tonality. Thus, when encountering a natural, E natural, for instance, one must instead play a sharp, if imagining the alto clef instead of the treble clef, giving an F sharp instead. Does that make sense?

[@laurencefinston7036]

Thank you for taking the trouble to make this video. I think it contains much useful information, but also that there is more to be said on the subject. First of all, I think score playing is something one does for other people rather than oneself. That is, if you're a conductor or a répétiteur. For myself, since I am neither of those two things, I find it more rewarding to read scores than to try to realize them on a piano. One advantage of this is that one can take all the time one needs. I also find it more rewarding, in a different way, to play all of the parts one after the other either on the original instrument or one with approximately the same range. If this isn't possible, than sometimes one must transpose by an octave or even two octaves. I play some transposing instruments and I don't find it easy to keep track of multiple transpositions simultaneously, so I think most other people will also not find this easy. French horns are especially difficult and the notation for Wagner tubas is inconsistent. However, unless you like Wagner or Bruckner, the latter shouldn't be too much of a problem. The best way I know of to study historical clefs is to play Bach's 4 part chorales in Woldemar Bargiel's edition, where the voices are in soprano, alto, tenor and bass clef. It is a real challenge. This (very old) edition was still in print the last time I checked. A very good book I read about score playing suggested starting with string quartets. They are difficult, because the voices often lie too far apart to be playable on the piano without transposition. The book may have been Hugo Riemann's "Partiturspiel", but I think it was a different one, which seems to have disappeared from the catalogue of the library I got it from. Anytime I arrange a piece of classical music (in the wider sense), I always write in the chords below the lowest system (only in books or sheet music I own!). It doesn't matter, it could be over the top system. I sometimes do this for pieces I have no intention of arranging, but just particularly like. I like to know the harmonies of what I'm playing and I don't just instantly recognize them, unless they're pretty simple. I also sometimes write in the harmonies for works with basso continuo. Except for Bach, the harmonies in most works with basso continuo are usually pretty stereotyped, so it's not strictly speaking necessary. However, when the harmonies are written in, it's easier to get an overview of the disposition of the piece. This applies to all music (with harmonies), not just music with basso continuo. The teacher of a history of opera class I took in college played from scores, so I saw it being done before I'd ever heard of it and didn't know that it had a name until much later. If I hadn't seen it being done, I would not have thought that it was humanly possible. Incidentally, it was reported that Mendelssohn's skill at score playing was nothing short of phenomenal.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Yes, multiple transposing instruments suck, after two, I also get lost😂

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Or Art of the fugue from bach for old clefs, but that's brutal😂

[@laurencefinston7036]

​@@Carl-FriedrichWelkerThanks for all the hearts. I have the Henle editions of Bach's works for solo keyboard (except the organ works) and they use the modern clefs. The Bärenreiter edition (Neue Bach-Ausgabe = New Bach Edition) uses modern clefs, too. Incidentally, I live very near where the Bach-Institut used to be (in a very beautiful street). I think I've played all of the fugues in the "Art of the Fugue" but it's been awhile. That's very complex music and the chorales are very simple to play, except for the problem of the three unfamiliar clefs. The last time I tried this, I hadn't started playing any instruments that used the alto or tenor clef. In modern clefs, they would be no problem at all. I found that two voices was pretty easy, but three was difficult and I couldn't manage all four. With practice, I could have, but I never reached the point where I could sightread all four voices. I didn't actually practice this very much. I don't really like "multi-tasking" very much and am not a fan of chorales, even if they're arranged by Bach.

[@isaacbeen2087]

​@@laurencefinston7036 Richardus Cochlearius just posted a video which explains the patterns used by the older musicians used to read all the clefs fluently. It's called "What are Complementary Clefs?" ... truly fascinating stuff!

[@laurencefinston7036]

@@isaacbeen2087 Thanks, I took a look but I'm not really motivated to learn this, since I already know how to read the historical clefs. I think this is one of those things where it doesn't matter that much which method you use, as long as you achieve the desired result, after which you can check it off your list.

[@johnchessant3012]

I think generally the strategy can only be to listen to the piece enough that you're really familiar with it, then figure it out for yourself at the piano until it sounds right. Perfect pitch helps :D

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

I don't think that listening will do the job, that's not enough, you generally say, that you can see conductors, who just practice with CDs and recordings

[@guscox9651]

you said that listening is not enough, but then you say that some conductors just use CDs and recordings. which one is it? haha@@Carl-FriedrichWelker

[@isaacbeen2087]

@@guscox9651 I think he's saying that you can tell when a conductor uses recordings to practise...meaning it's bad.

[@guscox9651]

oh i see makes sense@@isaacbeen2087

[@hoangkimviet8545]

I think this instruction is important for rehearsals.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Thanks as always for commenting💪🏻

[@AndreyRubtsovRU]

TLDR: There is no way

[@LearnCompositionOnline]

It starts with mastering solfeggio and figured bass

[@MosesM514]

😂

[@parsifal6094]

There is no such thing as "instantly" in music. You need practice, and practice takes time and effort

[@user-tu4hm8sm4z]

Were you a beginner at playing the piano or just at score-reading? You are not looking like a complete beginner at 0:03. I would have guessed that you might have played the piano for at least two or three years.

[@Carl-FriedrichWelker]

Yeah not beginner, I was in music university studying flute, so I had to play a bit piano, my level was a bad c minor fugue from first WTK Bach at the entry audition for flute. I was practicing every day for like 30 minutes or so in the very first year of my flute studies just because I enjoyed it. Then for one year I prepared for the audition and this is the part in the video. I still suck, can't play any difficult piano pieces for real after 4 years😂