Chunking with Taffanel & Gaubert and Hugues
Please also see her "Connecting the chunks" and "Thoughts on chunking" below.
Here is my daily routine for using the T&G:
Daily: No. 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 17
Monday: No. 10
Tuesday: No. 11
Wednesday: No. 12
Thursday: No. 13
Friday: No. 14
Saturday: No. 15/16
There are several secrets to improving your technique:
- The muscles learn in chunks---the eye/brain relationship is also in chunks; so the more chunking you do, the better the results. Chunking is playing about one inch of music and then resting afterwards. Play the chunks in a good tempo. For simple time ones(simple time means that the beat is can be divided by 2s), a four note chunk would be played at 144 on up. For compound time ones (compound time--the beat can be divided by 3s); a six note chunk would be around 80 on up.
- The secret of playing fast is to put more notes on one gesture. If you have a gesture for each note that you play, then you will be plodding along.
For No. 6---I do the flat keys on M, W, F and the sharp keys on T, TH, S.
Instead of No. 8 and 9, I prefer to do a routine from Roger
Steven's ARTISTIC FLUTE. The chord progression is:
I vii iii vi IV V ii V7 I. Major keys. This is an area where I like
to rotate different exercises in. However, if you prefer No. 8 and 9
are just fine---doing the key of the day. Do you see the No.
1,2,3,4,5, and 6? Do all the 1s on Monday, 2s on Tuesday etc.
Ask? What does my playing need and practice that. So, some days there is more articulation patterns; others vibrato practice; then again dynamic contrasts, etc.
Now to the Hugues, Op. 101
Rotate through the book chunking 4 etudes a day, at a moderate to fast tempo. Simple timed ones at 120 on up and compound ones from 72 on up.
This will mean that you will rotate through the book every 10 days.
====
Play on the air. Work to have your air stream independent of your
fingers.
Tape record/minidisc these exercises. You will find your problem areas easily.
I like to do most of No. 1 -- octavo or 8va.
Video yourself--or practice in front of a mirror. If your elbows are moving when you are playing some things, this is something you will want to fix. The fingers should move from the knuckles only (the fingers have three parts--move from the third part away from the tip of the finger). The only exception to this is the left hand index finger which moves from the second part. The thumbs are also in three parts. Move from the third part. The left had thumb should be STRAIGHT and pointed to the ceiling. Check your placement by trilling from B to C# using the regular fingering. The flute should not move when you play this--neither should the left elbow. Check the combination of D, D#, E, D#, D. Excessive movement in either of these two places will hamper you smooth flow--timbre wise and tempo wise.
Having a good technique is more than playing fast. It is equally
about how
well you do things---clarity, tone, intonation, phrasing etc.
Set a goal. When my university students start this routine, it takes them about one hour and fifteen minutes. The goal is about a half an hour. When you reach this goal, you will have "beautiful hands." This is a long term project---but one that is certainly a winner.
Connecting the chunks
Date: Wed, 7 Dec 2011 01:10:02 +0000
From: Patricia George <georgeflute@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: Connecting the Chunks
A very few students have problems putting the chunks together. Have you explained to her that chunking is like making a quilt? You make one perfect square (chunk) and then assemble it to the next perfect square and before long you have a patchwork quilt. This is the same as putting the chunks together musically. Here are some games to play with her:
- Play a chunk, then double chunk (this means that you play the second chunk two times), alternate single and double chunking through the passage. The repetition of the double chunk will slow down time so she can stay in real time.
- Double chunk first and then single chunk. (The opposite of No. 1)
- Create patterns of single, double, triple etc. chunks.
- Check out the practice template in The Flute Scale Book, Chapter 4, Presser Edition, Page 51 or 4.01. Here there are 16 ways to play scales. Use these articulations and rhythms in the passage she is learning. The Hah or Key on each note will produce excellent benefits.
- In the Appendix 1, there are over 70 rhythms times 7 skills (T, K, Hah, TK or TKT, counted vibrato, flutter tonguing etc.) to play any group of 8 notes. 6. In the Appendix 2, there are over 70 rhythms times 7 skills (T, K, Hah, TK or TKT, counted vibrato, flutter tonguing etc.) to play any group of 6 notes.
- Play Tennis with her — you play a chunk, she plays a chunk alternating in real time back and forth like a tennis match.
- Play one chunk plus 1 note three times. Repeat by playing the same one chunk plus 2 notes three times. Repeat by playing one chunk plus 3 notes three times. Continue until she is playing the entire passage.
- Put the metronome on 72 (or whatever seems logical for the passage) for EACH note. I suggest 72 because it is close to the speed of her heart beat. Young students tend to be able to do things better if it is associated to their internal rhythm. You may have to experiment to find the best tempo for her. Choose a tempo so she can easily play each note and stay in the right place. The ticking of the metronome on EACH note really helps some kids. Increase the metronome speed with a tick to each note until she is in the proper tempo. Then start again with one tick to each two notes (simple meter) or three notes (compound meter).
- Ask her mom if she has any reading problems at school. If so, that may hold your answer.
- Watch her eye movement when she is playing something that she can play with ease. Is she really reading? Or, is she playing by memory. Are the eyes engaged on the page? If the eyes are glancing around the room, you might suggest to the mom to have her checked out by a reading specialist or opthomologist.
- Test her for SSS (scotopic sensitivity syndrome) There is a test on the web. www.irlen.com It may be that she needs to have her music printed on a different colored paper or either get the gel sheets or colored glasses.
If none of this works, write back. I have a ton more ideas.
Thanks for asking.
Patricia George
Editor, Flute Talk Magazine
www.fabulousflute.com
Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2012 16:29:56 +0000
From: Patricia George <georgeflute@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: FW: Thoughts on Chunking Part !
In the 1985 I read John A. Sloboda’s book The Musical Mind: The Cognitive Psychology of Music (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985). When I read the section concerning how much musical notation a one-line player (like a flutist) actually saw when reading a line of music, my first thought was, “I have been teaching music-reading incorrectly.”
In Robert Jourdain’s book Music, The Brain, and Ecstasy (Bard, 1997) (based partly on Sloboda’s book above), he writes about reading music: “When we view the world, our eyes gather light from an arc spanning 200 degrees from side to side, and somewhat less from top to bottom. This is the visual field. Only a small spot at the center of the retina (the fovea) is packed densely enough with light-sensing cells to provide the acuity necessary for identifying objects. It spans only 5 degrees of the visual field...As a musician reads music at normal viewing distance, the fovea embraces an area only about one inch in diameter. It absorbs information for a quarter second then jumps to the next fixation in a twentieth second more. A one-inch area is enough to cover roughly one measure on a single staff...Good sight readers...tend to look seven or eight notes ahead.” (This is the reason your Social Security card numbers, telephone numbers, and credit card numbers are grouped the way they are because the information is easier for us to read and remember: 4040663296465513 or 4040 6632 9646 5513)
After reading Sloboda’s book, I decided to apply this concept to teaching beginners. The entire amount of music notation the young student read for the first months of study was about one inch long followed by a rest. My thinking was—if the eye is grasping one inch—and then hopping to the next inch—why not teaching reading this way too? The success of these students was outstanding, so much so that I decided to try this “chunking” technique with my university students. I was calling this practice technique chunking soon after reading Sloboda’s first book. He calls it chunking in his second book, so I thought I must be on the right track. For the young beginners, it meant that I wrote everything out for them to practice in a notebook. For the university students, I chose the Hugues 40 Studies, Op. 101, because it is a book of mostly sixteenth notes. I got out my ruler and started measuring how much music notation encompassed one inch. I decided to chunk the ones in simple time by 4s (4 sixteenth notes) followed by a rest and the ones in compound time by 6s (6 sixteenth notes). (I think the publishers already know which fonts we read more easily than others.) Once again the quality of improvement of the university students was strong. The quality of the musical line improved because the students plays four or six notes on one blow of air and no longer counted with the breath.
The rest is just as important as the notes played. If the student is a poor reader, during the rest, he says the name of the next note. If the student is an average reader, then he says the word “set” which gets his fingers organized before the next note. If the flutist is more advanced, then he says the word “blow” to remind himself to play on the exhale rather than on available breath.
Each university student “chunks” four exercises a week and brings his work to me in a recorded medium (via email attachment, CD, on a stick etc.). I found by having the student record his work, he has a more accurate assessment of how he is doing. If the student sends the files to me via email, I can listen to the etudes before the lesson and there is more lesson time to be devoted to other things. In ten weeks, the student completes the Hugues and is ready to move on to Altes, Andersen Op 33,30, 63, 25, Karg-Elert, Casterede, Paganini, etc. However, I encourage the student to chunk the new etude several times before he begins to put it together.
While studying the new etudes, we continue work on the Hugues only this time chunking in larger groups of notes. For example this could be: chunk by slurs, chunk by two groups of four or six notes, chunk by measure, chunk by two measures, etc. What this grouping of various sized chunks (the chunk variation lengths) teaches the flutist to do-- is how to play ON the air and control the musical line. There are thousands of patterns that you can do---in four note chunks---play chunk, double chunk, chunk, double chunk etc. This means that you play the second and fourth chunk two times. I also use triple chunk etc. Chunk from the end of the piece, chunk from the middle, play the chunk backwards, alternate the octaves you play the chunk in etc. These practice techniques help develop concentration and counting skills. Patricia George Part 2 to follow.
Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2012 16:31:00 +0000
From: Patricia George <georgeflute@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: Thoughts on Chunking Part 2
At first I do not land the chunk-i.e. play the four note chunk plus one more note. The reason for this is most of us are musical and are used to playing to a resolution. However, in doing this we put too much space/time between the first note and the second note we play. This slight hesitation often makes difficult passages even more difficult. By chunking 1,2,3,4 rest in exact time, difficult passages are often rendered simple. (This is what Damien has written about: How much easier and quicker it is for him to learn passages-- and the level of execution is higher than before.) Most of us would naturally do: 1—2,3,4,1.
The first technic of stopping after the last note (4) is helpful in learning to play dance movements where the strength of the beat is important, bar lines are important and we want the music to feel it is coming away from the beat rather than leading to the beat. In teaching the Mozart Concerti, I have students (me too) chunk in groups of 8 notes. I recommend scale practice in both kinds of groupings of chunks. 1234, rest and 1 rest, 2341 rest. I also suggest doing the chunk, double chunk etc. patterns for concentration and engagement.
Chunking seems like it might be similar to grouping and in some cases it is. But note grouping (from Kincaid and Tabuteau) can be so much more. For example, think how you might group six notes.
Kincaid’s No. 1 way: 1 234561
But he taught me, it also works to do:
123456
1 234561
123 456
12 34 56
1 234561
Grouping marks do not affect the articulation. They are “thinking” marks for inflection.
I would agree that some things need to be practiced slowly. However be sure you choose what you practice slowly or quickly carefully. For example if you are a violinist and have an upbow staccato passage, practicing the passage with a full bow for each note on the string won’t teach you to play upbow staccato.
I have been pleased to read all these wonderful practice tips. I
wish I had had a creative teacher (or a teacher at all in my case)
when I was young and building my technique. It would have been so
much quicker and certainly more interesting than working things up
and down the metronome.
Patricia George
