Chopin Etude Op. 25 No. 1 - EFFECTIVE EXERCISES TO LEARN IT // Piano Practice Tutorial

Hey everybody, this is Danai and today we will be talking about Chopin etude opus 25 number 1. This is a very requested video because ever since I started posting my first videos about Chopin studies, you have been asking me to make more videos about other Chopin studies. And so today I'm going to be adding opus 25 number 1 to the collection. Now I have made a video on opus 10 number 1, opus 10 number 2, opus 10 number 9, and also opus 25 number 2, opus 25 number 6, and a couple of other ones. So if you're interested in those, check them out. I will link them in the description box down below. And also I have talked about the significance of Chopin studies in general quite often. I find them incredibly helpful. They are great to build your technique. I always recommend that you start with Chopin studies fairly early, even when your technique is not quite ready yet for that level of difficulty, because you can really take it very slowly and progress step by step. And for example, study one Chopin etude for one or two years, and then after two years you will be at a very secure level to play it. And I think this is a great method in order to further your technique, build your technique, and in order to feel very secure when playing such a technically difficult piece. So today we will be talking about Chopin study opus 25 number 1, and today I tried something a little bit different. You have been commenting a lot under my videos that I should put the camera above the keyboard so that you can have the view from above. So today my sister Kiveli helped me with a video and will be doing all the piano playing. So everything that you will see will be her playing, and I'm actually filming from above. She also asked me to tell you that she looked at the study just today, so she revised it only in one day, because she hadn't played it for a very long time, but I'm sure that you will love her playing and find it very helpful. One thing that I want to say before we get into the exercises is that the tempo in which you do the exercises is something that you can very slowly increase. So if you are just starting out with this study, don't use the tempo that you will see in this video. This is basically the final tempo. You will see all the exercises at the final tempo, but if you are starting out with this study, you can play these exercises much slower. So really just choose the speed that you feel comfortable with, even if it is extremely slowly, and then very gradually increase it. And by gradually I mean you can go down a metronome line within, for example, two weeks or three weeks even, whatever you feel comfortable with. When I started practicing Chopin studies, I started at an extremely slow tempo, basically almost half the final tempo, and then I very slowly increased it over months, and then started playing through my first study probably years after I had begun. So the first exercise is that you play through the study slowly. As always, this is what I would always recommend to start with, you start slowly to get to know the piece, to get to know what every key feels like. After that, you get to the main exercise, I would say, of the study. And there are a couple of things to look out for. What makes this study technically difficult are the large jumps that always go outward in both hands simultaneously, and then the many little notes that have to be pretty fast in the middle. Also, there has to be this dynamic distinction between the outer notes that are clearly the melody and the middle notes that are actually not so important, even though they are very uncomfortable to play. So the main exercise is that you stay on the outer notes, the melody notes, and hold them before you then go back to the middle notes and play them quickly, and then go to the next outer note. While you hold those outer notes, you will have to try to relax the entire arm. This means that you push your wrist upwards and to the front in this motion, which makes sure that your entire arm is relaxed. When you do this, you don't have the possibility to hold tension here, or in the elbow, or in the wrist for that matter. So make sure that on every outer note, you relax your arm with this motion while holding it, and then go back and play the fast notes in the middle, and then once again, stop at the next outer note and relax once again. When you play those middle notes, make sure that your fingers are on the longer side. So don't try to play like this, but try to play more like this, a little longer, a little more flat, and in this motion, because this will help you to master those very large jumps. The next thing that you can do is practice in sections. Now I would start with very small sections. I would start with the quarter bar, and when you play that quarter bar, during that exercise, forget about what I said before with the dynamic distinctions, and with the outer note having to be the melody, and the middle notes have to be very silent and piano. When you practice this very little and small section, try to make all the keys sound the same, so every note has the same type of impulse and in the same dynamic. This ensures that your fingers learn to be very active when you play it, and then later on when you play through it, or when you play through the larger sections, you can then go back to making this dynamic distinction. So the next section is half bar, so practice the entire etude in sections of half a bar, and again, play every note clearly, so it will sound a little bit unmusical, but it will make sure that every finger has a separate, very conscious impulse from your brain, and it will make sure that your fingers know exactly where they have to go. And then after that, you can practice one bar sections, and now in these one bar sections, I would suggest that you go back to the musical way of playing the piece, because now you should have enough practice with giving every finger a separate impulse, and now you can go back to playing it as it is supposed to sound. So you really bring out the outer melody, and the middle is very silent. So if you're studying the piece at the moment, you know that the beginning is rather easy compared to the middle, where you have some very large, uncomfortable jumps. So when you're practicing these more uncomfortable places, try to isolate them and practice them in a way that I've also talked in previous videos already, how I practice large jumps, which basically is that I jump to the key that I have to reach, and then hover above it without actually pressing it, and after I've secured my position, I then press the key. I play whatever I have to play there, and then I jump back, hover above the key that I have to play next, and then press it. So these very uncomfortable jumps, I would practice in this way. After you've done that, you still have the ending, which is different from the rest of the study, and this ending also has a couple of exercises that are pretty helpful. First of all, you can do the exercise that you also did in the beginning. So you stop on the first note, hold it, relax, and then go to the next beginning note of the next section, hold it, relax, and so on. So another exercise that you can do is you isolate the transition between fourth finger and thumb and play those notes separately, and then always add a note after or a note before. So and the last very effective exercise I find that you can do is to divide it into two slow notes and four fast notes. And that way you play through the entire passage without stopping, but also without having to really play through it at the fast tempo all at once. You first have the two slow notes, then you can play four fast notes, and then back to two slow notes. After that, you also turn this around. So you start with the four fast notes, and then you have the two slow notes. So once you have practiced all of that, I would recommend that you practice the melody separately once. So basically the outer notes in both hands, fifth and fourth fingers, whichever is the fingering that you use on those specific keys, and that you go through the entire piece playing only the melody. And I would do that because that way you know exactly how much weight you have to put on that finger to create a certain dynamic and a certain sound. You can practice the phrasing because the jumps are hard enough, but still it has to sound musical within those notes that you play with the fifth finger only. So it's good to know exactly how much weight you have to place, how you have to position your hand and your fingers in order to create a beautiful sounding musical phrase with the outer notes. And once you have done that, you can then run through the entire study and play through the entire piece. So I really hope that you enjoyed this video and that you found it helpful. Let me know what you thought in the comments down below. Let me know if you are practicing the study right now and if there is any exercise that I missed that you find very helpful and important, then please add it in the comments. If you enjoyed this video, please leave a like and subscribe to my channel. That would help me a lot. And I will see you again next week. Bye!