Learning a Piano Piece from Beginning to Performance Ready

Successfully learning a new piano peace so it is ready to be performed is a wonderful journey that will take you through a lot of different feelings and thoughts. We always start with excitement and are ready to just play it right all the way through the first time!

After many years of studying, practicing and playing you will be able to do that a lot easier than right now, but for the now we’re going to learn several ways to help you get through a new piece the easiest and most correct way so you will love performing it for your friends and family.

So, you have a new piece. You may or may not know what it sounds like already but either way, there’s something that you need to do before you try to start playing it.

First: Analyze the piece and try to notice everything that is written on each page.

Look for:

• Key signature
• Time signature
• Different rhythms that are used throughout the piece
• Different note values that are used throughout the piece
• Articulations such as slurs, accents and other markings over or under any notes
• Dynamics
• Any tricky passages that have more complicated rhythms or note values
• Chords and arpeggios and which hand they are played in

Second: Divide the piece up into sections.

• Breaking down your piece into sections based on rhythm, notes and/or any other similar patterns that make up what looks and feels like a natural group of notes will really help you to learn it bit by bit instead of trying to learn everything at once. A lot of times there will be a whole note or a longer note value that can indicate the ending of a section.
• You can also look for changing patterns in each separate hand to help find individual sections. Or notice if the length of notes change or the style of playing. Any change can basically give you a separate section to zone in on and work on.

Now you’re ready to start working through the piece at your keyboard and these additional steps will get you through that process easily.

Third: Start working on the individual sections that you’ve already picked out.

• This is when you can actually sit down and start to physically play your new piece on the piano. Having separate sections allows you to focus on just one at a time and really dig in without getting overwhelmed with too much at once.
• Start with each hand separately unless you are a very advanced player and are used to doing sight reading. Go slowly and take your time to really learn the rhythm, notes, articulations and dynamics in this section.
• Work on each section until you feel at least 95% confident in knowing it before adding in a new section. Otherwise you may be trying to take on too much at one time. This doesn’t mean that you have to spend a month on just one section…spend as much time as is need to whether it be two days or two weeks or even two months. Move forward according to your own pace.
• Once you begin working on a new section, don’t neglect the one(s) that you already know. Continue reviewing them and playing them as needed so that you keep them in your fingers.

Fourth: Mark down your problem areas.

• Always have a pencil and maybe even an erasable red pencil at your piano so you can quickly mark in any spots that are giving you trouble and you can make a note, or mark in a fingering, or highlight a slur that you might be missing. This is a wonderful aid in helping you to be aware of trouble spots as they are coming up and focus in some detailed practicing on those specific places.
• Take each problem area and reduce it down to just the few notes or the measure that is giving you a hard time. Really practice hard on those notes and then go back and add in some more notes that start before the problem area, so you can get into it. Then you can go back and play through the whole section again.

Fifth: Put all of the sections back together and try playing from the whole piece.

• This is always our goal when breaking down a piece into sections for practicing – to play the whole piece and to play it well. After you have done some really good practicing you can then try playing all the way through without stopping. It’s actually better to mentally make notes of where you have some mistakes rather than stopping and trying to fix everything this time. You will always be able to go back and repeat your practice methods mentioned earlier, and you’ll need to. It takes time to really learn a new piece. So be patient with yourself!

Sixth: Working on the finer details.

• We are really mostly focused on notes and rhythm when we start learning a new piece; even when we break it down into sections and work on each one at a time. That’s important to do because it provides a foundation that we build upon and what we’re putting on top of that foundation are the finer details.
• This is when you want to make sure that you’re playing all of the articulations and dynamics…things like that. It can really help to put a small circle around any dynamic markings that you forget to play.
• Just as we break everything down in music to learn it – we need to do the same here. If you try to focus on dynamics and all of the slurs in the piece at the same time in the beginning, you’re going to mess one of them, or both of them up. Instead, play the section focusing on dynamics only and do this until you are really comfortable with what areas are loud and which ones are soft. Then go back and practice the slurs while playing the dynamics.
• Do this with each section, just as mentioned above.
• When you feel ready, try practicing the sections starting with the last one and work backwards to the first one. This will help prevent being weaker in some sections and stronger in other sections.

Seventh: Memorize your piece.

• Don’t panic…know that most of your memorizing is going to happen unconsciously while you do your practicing…as long as you do your practicing.
• Memorize your piece using the exact same steps that you did/do when learning a new piece. Analyze your problem areas, take each section one at a time, do one hands separately and then together, and then put the sections together to make up the whole piece.
• You can put a special mark by any areas that you struggle with the memorization and set aside some short 5-minute practice sessions where you work on just one of those areas at a time.

Eighth: Listen to recordings.

• Listen to a lot of different recordings of your piece by different artists. This can be really helpful in helping your own musical interpretation of the piece as well as give you ideas that you might not have thought of earlier on how to play a certain section or articulation.

Ninth: Get a metronome.

• Using a metronome is one of the best and actually quickest ways to practice fast notes, complicated rhythms, and changing tempos in any piece. The metronome is so great because you control the tempo at which you’re going to play and you can set it as low as you want or need to and then move up slowly and steadily to your goal.

Tenth: You’re reached your goal and you’re ready to perform it.

• You’re arrived! After lots of slow hard and steady work, you are ready for your first performance. What an exciting place to be in.
• Prepare for nerves…they are normal because your adrenaline is really pumping and your hearing all kinds of things in your head about messing up or missing that. Accept your fears and help keep them at bay by steady breathing with longer exhales than your inhales, and remember all of the hard work you’ve put into learning this piece. Trust your work.
• Don’t expect to be perfect and focus on how much you’ve grown since the first day you started on this piece. Know also that it takes years to truly know a piece down to your bones. Actually, the more you perform it, the more you really know it and it will be better each time.

​This video goes over all of these points and I’ll show you where you can access a free metronome online to help with your practice goals. 

If you like my tips and lessons, you will love the courses over on my website. Whether you are a beginner looking to get a solid foundation to build on or you are looking to take your existing skills to that next level, the online music courses on my website https://www.pianolessonsontheweb.com will help you do just that.