It’s about the speed
A friend of mine told me that his piano teacher had recommended he try staccato practice when needing to build speed with something. I didn’t think about it too much at the time, but as I have a couple of projects at the moment that are requiring me to get up to speeds that I have never mastered before, I started re-thinking about this and whether it would be a good way to practice.
As with many things, I think if you can understand why something works, then it can help you stick with it and put in the effort. This is especially true here as I have never liked playing staccato. I always found it physically uncomfortable and, in general, I much prefer the smooth legato sound of a piano. I remember having to practice scales staccato and really hated doing this. So, as a practice technique, if I’m to go with staccato it needs to have enough ‘bang for buck’ as it were.
General advice on gaining speed
I have done lots of research on building speed and staccato is only occasionally mentioned almost in passing. The most prevalent advice is to practice:
- Slowly – often with a metronome – and build the speed gradually in small increments
- Small sections quickly – as little as 3 or 4 notes at a time with a break in between each group
- Rhythmically – dotted rhythms, triplets, etc.
Joining the dots
However, I have also seen a theme from Josh Wright who I follow on YouTube where he talks a lot about ‘releases’. This is the importance of not only pressing your finger down, but also lifting them up at lightening speed. This is where then I started to join the dots a little in my mind.
- First, if there is one thing that is absolutely vital for good staccato, it’s making sure you release the key super fast – as that controls the speed at which the damper returns to the string and, therefore, the duration of the note. It thus follows that practicing a passage staccato means you’re effectively also practicing ‘releases’.
- Secondly, when you are playing staccato, you’re effectively totally removing that tactile reference – the physical connection your fingers feel between one note and the next. In staccato, each note feels more ‘independent’ (or is it just me?). This also therefore means that your wrist then needs to become more supple. You’ll be using it more to move your hand around the keyboard rather than relying on passing fingers and thumbs over and under each other.
- Thirdly, playing staccato is more difficult (for me at least) than playing non-staccato (I won’t say legato as it’s not the same thing). Therefore, when I then reduce the amount of staccato I’m trying to achieve, it seems so much easier to play that little bit faster.
Experimenting
As an experiment, I tried learning Solfeggietto by CPE Bach – spending a few minutes per day playing it staccato. This has seemed to help me get it smoother and quicker in less time than would normally be the case. I think this is definitely something I’ll be keeping in my practice arsenal.
I found Solfeggietto in Melanie Spanswick’s book – which I highly recommend if you’re looking for a structured course.
