Home › Forums › Forum Archives › Professional Harpists › danse profane tempo?
- This topic has 8 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 11 months ago by Elizabeth Volpé Bligh.
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April 21, 2011 at 1:32 pm #147989ninana-bParticipant
Hello dear harpists,
can anyone share heir thoughts about a tempo of a danse profane from debussy?
I am playing Renie version and I seem to be having difficulties getting into 152 per quarter note . is it just me, or is it usual?Thanks
April 25, 2011 at 1:45 am #147990Saul Davis ZlatkovskiParticipantIt is a challenge for everyone, I would say.
April 25, 2011 at 1:50 am #147991unknown-userParticipantI played this for the first time in the fall – it certainly wasn’t difficult at all to get it to 152, but it sounds like that was just me. I also think it is an appropriate tempo, but a little slower definitely wouldn’t be bad, especially if it makes it more solid for you.
~Sam
April 25, 2011 at 2:21 am #147992Misty HarrisonParticipanttry not closing as much. it’s called short articulation. still need to relax the fingers and close but just not as far in. you can play faster that way but check with your teacher to be sure you’re ready for it since it’s an advanced technique
April 26, 2011 at 1:08 pm #147993ninana-bParticipantthank you all, your answers are really helpfull….
April 28, 2011 at 11:21 pm #147994Elizabeth Volpé BlighParticipantTo build up speed, take a very small section of music and play it as fast as you can, hands separately, and stop. Gradually, you will train your fingers to move more quickly than they are used to. Once you have done this with only one hand at a time, you can put a bar together at this high speed. By building these little “bricks”, you can connect them and eventually get the whole phrase, then the whole piece, up to speed. Your muscles and tendons cannot be pushed past their current limitations, but you can expand these limitations with this method. It takes some time, though. If you try to rush this process too quickly, you can hurt yourself, so give yourself lots of time to learn the piece. The other impediment to speed is simply not knowing what comes next. Once a piece is memorized, it is much easier to play it faster.
May 3, 2011 at 1:03 am #147995carl-swansonParticipantElizabeth- Interesting that you should mention this technique for practicing. I learned that very late, and I learned it from a little book that Jane Weidensaul wrote called Scientific Practice. It’s a great book.
In my student days I used to practice everything slowly, and then speed things up, one notch at a time on the metronome. But that didn’t work very well for me. The technique of practicing maybe only 2 or 3 beats at a time at full tempo or close to it works much better. I usually practice like this only with both hands together unless one hand has something that is really difficult.
May 3, 2011 at 1:45 am #147996unknown-userParticipantThe technique works great to get something in your hands, but it’s terrible for memory. You have to work to make sure that you really know what your hands are doing.
~Sam
May 8, 2011 at 7:14 am #147997Elizabeth Volpé BlighParticipantYes, Sam, you’re right. For memory, you have to play slowly enough to really observe what is going on. Practising requires different strategies for different goals.
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